In the previous chapter we found ourselves at the crossroads; we can direct ourselves towards the dissolution that is vertigo and destroy our personality, or follow the path of ecstatic experiences and fully develop ourselves as persons. Experiences of the nausea of vertigo stem from an attitude of egoism, whereas experiences of ecstasy stem from a basically generous attitude. We can adopt such different attitudes because we direct life towards very varied, even conflicting, ideals. This direction decides the entire meaning of our existence: our desires, plans, attitudes, accomplishments – everything depends on the ideal we adopt.

It is time to deal with this question seriously since in the West for almost a century we have not decided on a well determined ideal suitably adapted to our humanity. For four centuries Europe ardently pursued the ideal of developing knowledge in order to increase power and to raise the level of human happiness to the maximum. Different fields of knowledge were cultivated frenziedly in the conviction that theoretical knowledge translated sequentially into technical knowledge, and this into control of reality, production of artefacts, comfort and well being. It was innocently thought that such progression could be raised to the nth degree, so that very advanced theoretical knowledge would generate a correlative measure of technical knowledge, theme control over reality and ultimately happiness.

This "myth of eternal progress" inflamed Europe, enabling it to achieve resounding successes in various orders, but finally it broke down tragically into the First World War. Amazing theoretical and technical knowledge led whole nations not to maximum happiness, but to disaster. In the post-war years many thinkers called emphatically for a change in thinking, namely, for replacement of the modern ideal with one that is more suited to the being, vocation and mission of humankind. Such replacement never occurred and the second world disaster struck.

After 1945, humankind was in constant fear of the Cold War and of severe warlike conflicts. Seventy three years after the first Great War we still have not changed the ideal and remain undecided between our attachment to the old ideal of "knowledge for power, power for enjoyment" and the desire to turn towards a true humanism worth living and dying for.

Such indecision weakens us when it comes to educating a new generation. We complain about the chaos today, of apathy in wide sectors of youth, and failure in the manner of focusing life on family, professional, artistic, political and religious issues. This is tragic, but quite understandable, for how can youth be imbued with the great values of life if the ideal was shattered in the two world wars and no faith in it remains?

I may selfishly lean towards ideals of knowledge, power and enjoyment, but I cannot forget that such ideals ended in provoking a catastrophe, which proved them false. The falsity of this ideal lies precisely in the last part of the "myth of eternal progress." It is true that theoretical knowledge makes possible technical knowledge which gives control over physical reality and produces work-saving appliances and well-being. But for whom is this well-being? For centuries it was understood that this meant the well-being and happiness of each individual and each social group, taken separately from one another. Hence the feverish race of men and nations to increase knowledge and power. But the increase of power gave rise to a consciousness of being superior to others; when employed for one’s own ends, this inspired several campaigns for extending one’s happiness at the cost of other’s; and the resulting conflicts turned into a raging whirlwind.

THE APPROPRIATE IDEAL IS THAT OF UNITY AND SOLIDARITY

If we want to lay real foundations for a solid peace and a social order adapted to human beings in their full scope, we must turn our ideal around. Knowledge, power, control of reality must be put in the service, not of each particular individual and nation for their private ends, but of a common action for the many people and nations. Though this may appear to be a minor adjustment, it has the power of transformation for totally changing our mental coordinates, our direction and our scale of values.

A new life corresponds to a new ideal. If we adopt the ideal of egoism and direct our powers and possibilities towards satisfying our egoistic interests, we fall onto the descending spiral of vertigo which leads almost inexorably to destruction. I say "almost", because humans never totally lose their freedom and capacity to change direction. But these diminish as we advance along the path to vertigo. If we devote our whole being to the welfare of others, to establishing true forms of community, living in an open and committed manner, we head along the path to ecstasy which will develop us to the full.

One may ask why the ideal of unity and solidarity are adapted to one’s being. This question is important because the choice of an ideal is decisive and must not be made carelessly. If I choose an ideal simply because it responds to my taste or personal leanings, it will not be related to the rest of life. I choose the ideal of unity and solidarity because it responds to the reality of being human, which, as we saw, is a "being of encounter" that constitutes a very high form of unity. To create high forms of unity we must form relationships with other realities and accept the possibilities they offer. One lives, develops and perfects as a person through engaging one’s life with that of others.

We rebel against this demand of our personal reality when we are selfish and retreat into solitude, thereby acting against our true being and falsifying it, for no man is an island, as the English poet, John Donne, rightly observed. One who sullenly isolates oneself is embarking on the descent into vertigo and abandoning oneself to destruction, whereas in opening oneself generously to others, one enters the path to ecstasy which leads to fulfillment.

We now see clearly that the ideal of selfish isolation blocks one’s development and suffocates, whereas the ideal of unselfish surrender lifts one to the peak of perfection. We must look further into how this change of ideal transforms everything, how to carry out this transformation and how the aspects of a person’s life are altered when one changes the ideal?

A CHANGE OF IDEAL ALTERS ONE’S WHOLE LIFE

Taking as one’s ideal for life the establishment of high forms of unity means, firstly, changing one’s basic attitude to everything that surrounds us: instead of control, respect; instead of lowering the value of people, maintaining and fostering it. My goal will no longer be to have you at my mercy, as a means to my ends, but to recognize your personal independence which enables you to collaborate in my life as you so wish.

By changing my basic attitude, I change my whole conduct. By not trying to control you, but collaborate with you, I do treat you not with arrogance, but with humility; I do not lock myself in the solitude of selfishness, but open myself to your life with generosity of spirit and gratitude.

This generous and grateful opening to the environment makes me attentive to all the values I assume in life. This attentiveness makes it possible to respond positively and responsibly. One who can respond to the invitation of a value is responsible for the consequences; one who does not respond to values is irresponsible.

Thus understood, responsibility implies a readiness for sacrifice, because what is valuable can be assumed in one’s life only by fulfilling certain demands, which basically require an act of generosity. Loss of a sense of sacrifice is one of the major dramas of the 20th century. For two centuries sacrifice has been interpreted as repression and reduction of one’s true self. This mistake can destroy the roots of our personal life as creative. As every sacrifice implies grading two or more values, it is not a loss but a rise to a higher level of accomplishment. Knowing how to distinguish clearly between the various values and to give priority to the highest is the heart of the human virtue of responsibility.

By this change to unselfish ideals I behave responsibly, for this transforms me from an indolent, passive, noncommittal state to one that is active, enterprising and full of initiative. By developing respect and receptiveness to values I am able to encounter all that is valuable: people, communities, language, institutions, cultural works, scenery, etc. With this my life becomes dynamic and acquires strength, for encounters are a source of energy, decision, feeling, beauty and light.

Willpower alone has little value, but linked to a high ideal it gains irrepressible energy. Some would maintain that in humans "strength comes from below", from the pulses of instinct, that the spirit is limited to directing and controlling in some measure the elementary forces surging from deep within the human being. As with a steam boiler generating energy, the spirit and, therefore, the intelligence, operate merely as a safety valve. This concept of man ignores the existence of ideals as driving ideas giving impetus to human life and its meaning. Anyone who has ever dedicated his or her life to a valued ideal knows what torrents of energy spring from this attitude of surrender.

By directing life towards a high ideal, one learns to see everything in perspective and from a proper distance without being buried in every minor detail. Such distance or perspective enables one to discover the meaning and value of each attitude, option and activity which have value and meaning when they bring one closer to the ideal. Their meaning and value will be ever higher the more they enable one to reach the goal of one’s existence.

The discovery of this link of the ideal with value and meaning provides the right criteria for putting our scale of values in order. If we wish to be genuine and accomplish the vocation and mission assigned us by our ideal, we must take as the maximum value not the achievement of the easy satisfaction of immediate and fleeting pleasures, but rising to the best within ourselves which comes about by creating valuable personal relationships. Hence, our highest endeavor is to grade values: pleasure is certainly a value, but not the highest; to have full meaning it must be integrated within the process of personal realization.

It is not difficult to imagine the high level attained by beings of the universe. Let us think, for example, of a piece of bread. It is the result of a process of production, certainly, but is made from the fruits of the earth, among which is wheat. I place a simple grain of wheat in the palm of my hand. Can anyone in the world produce this grain of wheat? Millions of ball-point pens and thousands of cars can be produced in one afternoon, but a grain of wheat does not ripen in one afternoon: wheat is not manufactured.

The farmer receives from his elders the art of tilling the earth and a few seeds. Trustingly he puts the seeds in mother earth and waits patiently for the rain to moisten the earth and bring nutrition, and for the sun to ripen the plant. When the countryman, seeds and earth, rain and sun, and the ocean which evaporates the water, and the wind which sweeps it along in the form of a cloud, all come together, one day the miracle occurs when the grain emerges and the wheat ripens. This simple grain of wheat is the fruit of a union, which we can well term encounter. Hence, it is heavily symbolic; that is, it refers to the realities which fruitfully intermingled the potentialities and created it.

Something analogous can be said of wine. For this reason both bread and wine are so appropriate for symbolizing human friendship at a fraternal meal. The father of the family invites a friend to eat. He takes the bread, breaks it, hands it round and shares it. He pours wine into the guest’s glass. Wine and bread symbolize perfectly shared friendship because they are already, from beforehand, the fruit of an encounter. This manner of seeing realities as meeting points of different elements expands and deepens our understanding of those with whom we must weave our lives. It is amazing to think of the horizon of possibilities which open to our power to create valuable relationships if we see all that surrounds us in its full and correct implication.

The French philosopher and playwright, Gabriel Marcel, confesses in his Metaphysical Journal that at the start of the First World War, when his task was to inform families that they had lost a son, a soldier was for him no more than a name on a card to which he added a cross when the soldier died. When he contacted the family this unknown name took on life, and he became involved in a multitude of relationships. He was the son of these distraught parents, the husband of this distressed woman, the father of those destitute orphans. Thanks to this enrichment of his language, the idea Marcel had of each of the human lives involved in the horror of war underwent a radical change: each life was something unique, irreplaceable, incomparable. No mother who lost her son could be consoled by the idea that she could have more. The lost son would be missed forever, and could not be replaced by any other.

This way of seeing realities as unique, as the fruit of a group of relationships which happens only once in history, perfects our capacity to value daily life and its events in their full scope. By evaluating them correctly, our life becomes a web of encounters and, consequently, a meeting place, despite the hardships of daily existence.

Consideration of another person as unique and irreplaceable has great significance for one’s love life? The person who sees in the beloved something unique for him or her, easily understands what specialists in ethics affirm, namely that love requires eternity; there is no sense in promising love for a certain period of time. To love someone, wrote Gabriel Marcel, is to tell them: "You will never die". In virtue of this, true love requires fidelity. When fidelity fails, love is broken. Faithful love creates relevant modes of unity which will last throughout time, because it is the source, in turn, of new motives for loving.

It is often thought nowadays that an everlasting love is impossible, that it is a risk to promise lifelong fidelity, that love does not withstand the buffets of time and the changes of sentiment. This is all very true when the love relationship is reduced to sentimental exuberance, to a mere exchange of satisfactions which like a fleeting flame fades on the instant, and creates nothing stable or of value. Add some creativity to your relationship and you will see the lasting strength your love acquires. As with good cloth, perdurance is a question first and foremost of quality.

When a love relationship is conceived and begun with a will to create together a relevant ambit of coexistence, it turns into a never-ending source of new reasons to love. It is possible that the reasons which drove both people to join together will fade with time. But this decline will not mean the eclipse of love, which will be stimulated by new reasons, possibly less intensely passionate, but closer to the nucleus of one’s person and therefore more mature and noble.

By evaluating or appreciating each person as unique and irreplaceable, the appreciation of life grows. If we see each human life, even the most humble, as the fruit of an unrepeatable encounter, we value it as something unsurpassable. In his Heiligenstadt testament, written as a young man when he thought he was dying, Beethoven confesses that he would have put an end to his life on many occasions because of the tragedy of his incurable deafness were it not for his love of music and virtue. In Beethoven ethical virtue and artistic creation were closely linked to his faith in man and the Creator of all talents. He was conscious of being a genius, but attributed this not to himself, but to the generosity of the Creator. He always was open to dialogue, humble and reverent, and never broke ties with God or man. "I have been given – he once confessed – the gift of living in a world of undescribable beauty and my life’s task consists in conveying to men a reflection of such beauty through the language I master: music."

Returning once more to the initial idea: changing the ideal changes everything in life: attitudes, behavior, mood, perception of reality, scale of values, way of evaluating life and its events, all are transformed.

Replacing the ideal of control by that of solidarity perfects one inasmuch as it prepares one to create the highest forms of interpersonal relations, which are the different forms of encounter. Hence, the feeling of happiness aroused by the encounter of persons with each other and with the Creator. This was captured in an unparalleled fashion by Beethoven in the final part of his Ninth Symphony: "The Ode to Joy."

The light shining on the field of play constituted in every encounter enables one to make another decisive change, namely, in one’s intellectual life. The person who yearns for an encounter loves and respects reality: consequently, he or she is not satisfied with slip shod opinion but studies each reality and event with the most suitable concepts and terms. One whose goal is to establish ambits of life will take guard against affirming, for example, that a "woman has a body and must be free to do with it what she will", the phrase proposed by a certain Minister of Justice for legalizing abortion. He forgot that the body is not an object, and cannot be a possession freely available. The body is not owned by a person, whether male or female, but is as personal as the spirit and therefore is not susceptible to control. The new life is the fruit of an encounter, not a mere product of a manufacturing process. For this reason those who enter the encounter and give origin to this life cannot own or dispose of it.

One who engages in genuine encounters sharpens his intellectual life and avoids misunderstanding certain mental schemes as dilemma when they are only contrasts. One will never think he has to choose between the criteria we forge in our interior and the norms imposed from outside. One’s own creative life warns one that human beings become truly autonomous when they are heteronomous, that is, when they adopt norms, criteria of action and values suggested from outside. Though in principle different and distant, external and strange, they can become intimate if adopted actively as rules of play for life and its encounters.

Precise thinking and expression suited to each form of reality is an art we should learn and practice. To make this possible, we must direct ourselves towards creativity, not towards control. This is the deep reason why precise learning and creative life are mutually stimulating.

Once the ideal has been changed from control to creativity genuine intellectual life takes shape; then we realize that to establish true unity we have to adapt to the demands of the realities we wish to encounter. In order for me to encounter you, I must be truthful, honest, faithful, humble, open and magnanimous. If I am not truthful, I show that I do not want to share my intimacy with you; you do not trust me and draw away, which makes the encounter impossible.

Strictly speaking, the different virtues are powers or capacities; they are different ways of maintaining the capacity to establish valuable types of unity. Fidelity, truthfulness, patience, creative imagination, order, strength, generosity, silence, piety, magnanimity are all different forms of experiencing solidarity in love. Contrary to what has been said for the past two centuries, virtues are not the attitudes of a prudish spirit, but basic conditions for human creativity.

By changing the ideal, we change our way of behaving and acquire a special facility to embody the goal aspired in each action.

This new spiritual direction changes the range of human feelings. By exchanging the ideal of control for that of unity, one experiences a pleasant change of feelings: vertigo is exchanged for exultation, sadness for happiness, anguish for enthusiasm, desperation for joy, bitterness for jubilation, destitution for support.

Feelings hold great importance for they detect the values or antivalues we adopt and the positive or negative direction our life pursues. The feelings aroused by ecstasy are a sign of one’s rise to a high level of unity. Nothing is more important in the human structure than a maximum stimulation of enthusiasm for values and giving due importance to the inner joy aroused by taking up something or joining with someone who invites us to adopt the great values they encompass.

One of the tasks of a new humanism and civilization we should establish today consists in re-evaluating correctly understood emotions: the series of feelings aroused by our full development. If we realize that feeling enthusiastic about values is a great virtue, we will arouse such feeling in others. Good spreads itself; it radiates and expands. Like beauty and truth, goodness longs to be shared. The person already sharing in them strives to acquire the skills necessary to transmit them accurately and attractively; he or she becomes a guide for the others. Such a guide or leader tries not to control, but to collaborate for mutual enrichment.

OUR FUTURE DEPENDS ON THE IDEAL OF UNITY

From the above one can see clearly that what is decisive at this moment is changing the ideal, overcoming indecision and choosing clearly and explicitly the ideal of unity and solidarity. Present research on various fronts is reaching the conclusion that the goal in life is the bond of solidarity. In politics the need to establish close and firm ties between peoples and even between continents is acclaimed. Biology underlines the need to establish a web of affection and protection between father and child. Clinical psychology stresses that the present problem is the meaning of life, which is achieved in personal love, helping others and unconcern for oneself.

Professor of Psychiatry, Aquilino Polaino, advised those who are depressed to help others and assured them that if they did so many of their problems would disappear and happiness would be restored. In many cases, depression has deep physiological causes and must be treated clinically. Often, being out of form is due to an excess of concern with oneself, being trapped in the closed space of one’s ego.

We would do well to reflect on the ideal which directs and polarizes our life. One must ask, where is one’s center; what ideal drives, directs and gives balance to one’s life? If one does not find his or her balance, one should slowly examine the goal to which one’s life is heading. Does it correspond in value to one’s dignity as a person? These questions are decisive if we wish to build our life on a solid base and give it full meaning. Our being is dynamic, it is on the road towards realization, which is not all predetermined by nature as it is for animals. The cat, when born, instinctively knows its objective. It is sufficient for it to be carried along by the force of instinct to achieve the object of its existence. Humans must plan their objectives and pursue them. The power of instinct may collaborate, but has no directive force. Hence, for man it is not enough to surrender to the demands of instincts. These must be integrated by one’s intelligence into an overall plan drawn up in accord with criteria which are not written in the genes. It is the person’s great privilege to be compelled to lucidity in one’s plans and to creativity in one’s actions. But this entails great uncertainty, for should one’s creative and lucid power fail one may waste one’s life and even sink below the level of an animal.

But it must be asked where must one seek the true ideal of one’s life: if born with it, how can one discover it? The answer is long and complex, but might be condensed in two observations. Open your spirit little by little to everything that is valuable. Allow yourself to be magnetized by values, go deep into their field and you will hear them inviting you to merge them into your life. Welcome them warmly, embody them, carry them out enthusiastically, interact with them, and they will be a source of light for you. This light will enable you to distinguish the scale of values and discern the fruitfulness of one over the other. Such discernment will inspire you to accord priority to the highest, for amongst the one that little by little stands out as the source of all the others will be the driving value, the Ideal. And when you give yourself up to this ideal, commit your life to it and meet its demands, you will discover increasingly its relevance and effectiveness in your life and will welcome it with greater intensity and devotion.

The secret of human formation consists in immersion in the magnetic field of values. Once inside their sway, the main work is done by the values themselves, which not only exist but assert themselves. When I was a child, my mother used to say to me: "Take this bread and chocolate and give it to the poor person who has knocked at the door". I was reluctant because the man had a long beard and frightened me, especially at night. My mother insisted: "He’s not a criminal, only a beggar. Take it to him." My mother was trying to expose me to the power of the value of pity and to enable me to be captivated by its special spell, by the enchantment of any kind gesture. Soon, the poor man’s knock at the door had me answering quickly without anybody telling me to do so. The knock had become the voice of the value of pity calling me. Becoming accustomed to responding to the call of values makes one "responsible" and raises one to a level of human maturity.

I should like to end this reflection on the ideal with a story. In the last days of World War II, many people from Eastern Europe fled towards the West to escape Russian rule. As a result several refugee camps were formed along what would later be the Iron Curtain. One morning, a man dressed in a white habit arrived at one of these, the legendary Werenfried van Straaten, as corpulent as he was kind. He spoke to them of a God who is love, and offered substantial aid and a message of hope. Among the refugees there was a girl, who is now a missionary in India. "That day I felt the vocation within me – she declared in an interview – I had never heard speak of love. Only hate and extermination had surrounded me. This Father revealed to me that there was a kingdom where people helped and loved each other. At that moment I decided to devote my life to serving that God, so noble and rich, who vanquishes hate."

The appearance of love in the gloomy surroundings of hate and misery signified for this girl the revelation of a high value. She felt her whole being drawn strongly by the call of that value, which offered immense possibilities for meaningful action. She did not doubt for one instant: that was her goal. She had discovered an idea – love – which for her was a source of true life, creative attitudes and meaningful action. In letting herself be drawn by this driving idea or ideal she understood that her life was to be directed towards it. Her vocation was decided.

Vocation, ideal, value, fullness of meaning and successful life all join closely together. The great scientist and humanist, Albert Einstein, felt this in his life and made the following confession: "The ideals which have lighted my path and time and again have given me the courage to face life with valor, have been kindness, beauty and truth." Seen properly, these ideals join together in a unity with love rightly understood and lived.

Without doubt, one who finds an ideal suited to his or her life possesses eternal light and spirit, because the ideal is a goal we wish to attain in the future. But from the future it returns to give the present impetus and meaning. An ideal is not a mere idea, but a dynamizing idea, on which hangs everything in our life. For this reason the manipulators who wish to control the very roots of our intelligence, our willpower and our feelings, put every effort into replacing our ideal of establishing personal relations of unity which inspires the processes of ecstasy, by the idea of serving ourselves, which sets us on the descent into vertigo. If we let ourselves be seduced by the serene voices of manipulating demagogues, we will be subjected to the worst of slaveries: that of the spirit. We will not be free to build our life perfectly corresponding to our most intimate and inalienable vocation.

On the other hand, the one who obeys the demands of his own reality as a person, rather than the dictates of the majority who dominate by manipulation, directs his or her whole life towards the ideal of creating relevant interpersonal relations. This direction frees one from attachment to immediate and passing fancies in order to become truly free, that is, free to be creative. We shall see this more fully in the next chapter.

of what he aspires to be.

Until he is,

3. Once a valuable idea turns into an ideal, the energy it radiates draws us to giving it life, enriching it and turning it into the point of reference for all behavior, the rule for authenticity, the impetus which dynamizes and gives meaning to our existence.

This process is well described by Héctor Mandrioni in his work The Vocation of Man.

2. Cf. A. de Saint-Exupéry, Le petit prince (New York: Harbrace Paperbound Library, 1943, 1971), pp. 86-87; El Principito (Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 1972), pp. 86-87. A detailed analysis of this work is found in my book Análisis estético de obras literarias (Madrid: Narcea, 1982), pp. 223-265.

3. A direct translation from the German original can be seen in my work Vértigo y éxtasis, 2nd vol. of Proyecto Líderes (now Escuela de pensamiento y creatividad) (Madrid: PPC, 1987).

4. Cf. L’energie spirituelle (Paris: PUF, 1944), p. 23.

5. Cf. Ethos und Ideal in der Erziehung (Vallendar-Schönstatt: Schönstatt, 1972), p. 186.

6. Ibid., p. 187.

7. Ibid., p. 197.

8. Ibid., p. 198.

9. Cf. Grundriss einer neuzeitlichen Pädogogik für den katholischer Erzieher (Vallendar-Schönstatt: Schönstatt, 1971), p. 166.

10. Op. cit. (Buenos Aires: Ed. Guadalupe, 1979), pp. 74-75.