The Foundations of Personality by Abraham Myerson (color ebook reader .TXT) 📕

more virile and less sensitive to fine impressions.

The introspectionists, culling, chewing the cud of their

experiences and sensations, find in their own reactions the

realities. In fact, interested in consciousness, they are

sometimes bold enough to deny the realities of anything else.

Where the others build bridges, they build up the ideas of

eternal good and bad, of beauty, of the transitory and the

permanent, of now and eternity. They deal with abstract ideas,

and they luxuriate in emotions. They build up beliefs where

thought is the only reality and is omnipotent. They are the

founders of religious, cults, fads and fancies. They inculcate

the permanent ideals, because they are the only ones who interest

themselves in something beside the show of the universe.

But too often they are the sick folk. Without the hardihood and

the energy to conquer the outer world, they fall back on a world

requiring less energy to study, less energy to conquer. Sometimes

they develop a sense of unreality which vitiates all their

efforts to succeed; or they become hypochondriacs, feeling every

flutter of the heart and every vague ache and pain. The Hamlet

doubting type is an introspectionist and oscillates in his mind

from yea to nay on every question. Such as this type develop

ideas of compensation and power and become cranks and fake

prophets. Or else, and this we shall see again, they become

imbued with a sense of inferiority, feel futile as against the

red-blooded and shrink from others through pain.

Everywhere one sees these phases of interest in antagonism and

cooperation. The “healthy-minded” acknowledge the leadership of a

past introspectionist but despise the contemporary one as futile

and light-headed. The introverted (to use a Freudian term) call

the others Philistines, and mock them for their lack of spiritual

insight, yet in everything they do they depend for aid and

sustenance upon them. Introspection gives no exact measurements

of value, but it gives value and without it, there can be no

wisdom. But always it needs the correction of the outer world to

keep it healthy.

While we have dealt here with the extremes of extrospection and

introspection, it is safe to say that in the vast majority of

people there is a definite and unassailable interest in both of

these directions. Interest in others is not altruism and interest

in the self is not self-interest or egoism. But, on the whole,

they who are not interested in others never become

philanthropists; they who are not interested in things never

become savants; and they who do not dig deep into themselves are

not philosophers. There are, therefore, certain practical aspects

to the study of interest which are essential parts of the

knowledge of character.

1. Is the interest of the one studied controlled by some purpose

or purposes, or is it diffuse, involuntary, not well directed?

2. Is it narrow, so that it excludes the greater part of the

world, or is it easily evoked by a multiplicity of things? In the

breadth of interest is contained the breadth of character, but

not necessarily its intensity or efficiency. There are people of

narrow but intense successful interest, and others of broad,

intense successful interest, but one meets, too frequently,

people quickly interested in anything, but not for long or in a

practical fashion. There is a certain high type of failure that

has this difficulty.

3. Is its main trend outward, and if so, is there some special

feature or features of the world that excite interest?

4. Is its main trend inward, and is he interested in emotions,

thoughts, sensations,—In his mind or his body, in ideas or in

feelings? For it is obvious that the man interested in his ideas

is quite a different person than he who is keenly aware of his

emotions, and that the hypochondriac belongs in a class by

himself.

5. If there are special interests, how do these harmonize with

ability and with well-defined plan and purpose. It is not

sufficient to be keenly interested, though that is necessary. One

of the greatest disharmonies of life is when a man is interested

when he is not proficient, though usually proficiency develops

interest because it gives superiority and achievement.

Interest is heightened by the success of others, for we are

naturally competitive creatures, or by admiration for those

successful in any line of activity. The desire to emulate or

excel or to get power is a mighty factor in the maintenance of

interest. “See how nicely Georgie does it,” is a formula for both

children and adults, and if omitted, interest would not be easily

aroused or maintained. In other words, the competitive feeling

and desire in its largest sense are necessary for the

concentrated excitement of interest. So any scheme of social

organization that proposes to do away with competition and desire

for superiority labors under the psychological handicap of

removing the basis of much of the interest in work and study and

must find some substitute for the lacking incentives before it

can seriously ask for the adherence of those with a realistic

view of human nature. One might, it is true, establish traditions

of work, bring about a livelier social conscience as to service,

but these are not sufficient to arouse real interest in the vast

majority of the race. Here and there one finds a man in whom

interest is aroused by the unsolved problem, by the reward of

fame and the pleasure of achievement, but such persons are rare.

The average man (and woman), in my experience, loses interest in

anything that does not directly benefit him or in which his

personal competitive feeling is not aroused. Interest becomes

vague and ill-defined the farther the matter concerned is from

the direct personal good of the individual, and proportionately

it becomes difficult to sustain it.

That is why in our day “dollars and cents” appeals to interest

are made; away with abstracts, away with sentiment; the publicity

man working for a good cause now uses the methods of the man

selling shoes or automobiles: he attempts to show that one’s

interest and cooperation are demanded and necessary because one’s

direct personal welfare is involved. Whether or not ethically

justifiable, it is a recognition of the fact that interest is

aroused and sustained, for the majority, by some direct personal

involvement.

Thus in education, a fact to be learned, or a subject to be

studied, should be first sketched or placed in some use value to

the student. Knowledge for knowledge’s sake is appealing only to

the rare scholar, he who palpitates with interest over the

relationship of things to one another, he who seeks to discover

values. Now and then one finds such a person, one thrown into

sustained excitement by learning, but the great majority of

students, whether in medicine, law or mathematics, are

“practical,” meaning that their interests are relatively narrow

and the good they seek an immediate one to be reaped by

themselves. Recognizing this fact in the abstract, the most of

teaching is conducted on the plane of the real scholar, and the

average student is left to find values for himself. From first to

last in teaching I would emphasize usevalue; true, I would seek

to broaden the conception of usevalue, so that a student would

see that usefulness is a social value, but no matter how abstract

and remote the subject, its relationship to usefulness would be

preliminary and continuously emphasized in order to sustain

interest.

Interest, like any other form of excitement, needs new stimuli

and periods of relaxation. People under the driving force of

necessity continue at their work for longer periods of time and

more constantly than is psychologically possible for the

maintaining of interest. So it disappears, and then fatigue sets

in at once,—a fatigue that is increased by the effort to work

and the regret and rebellion at the change. The memory seems to

suffer and a fear is aroused that “I am losing my memory”; the

threat to success brings anguish and often the health becomes

definitely impaired. Overconcentrated, too long maintenance of

interest brings apathy,—an apathy that cannot be dispelled

except by change and rest. Here there is wide individual

variation from those who need frequent change and relaxation

periods to those who can maintain interest in a task almost

indefinitely.

A hobby, or a secondary object of interest, is therefore a real

necessity to the man or woman battling for a purpose, whose

interest must be sustained. It acts to relax, to shift the

excitement and to allow something of the feeling of novelty as

one reapproaches the task.

As a matter of fact, excitement and interest are not easily

separated from their derivatives and elaborations. Desire,

purpose, ambition, imply a force; interest implies a direction

for that force. Interest may be as casual as curiosity aroused by

the novel and strange, or as deep-seated and specialized as a

talent. The born teacher is he who knows how to arouse and

maintain and direct interest; the born achiever is the man whose

interest, quickly aroused, is easily maintained and directs

effort. To find the activity that is natively interesting and yet

suited to one’s ability is the aim in vocational guidance.

There are some curious pathological aspects to interest

—“conflict” aspects of the subject. A man finds himself

palpitatingly interested in what is horrible to him, as a bird is

fascinated by a snake. Sex abnormalities have a marvelous

interest to everybody, although many will not admit it. Stories

of crime and bloodshed are read by everybody with great

avidity,—and people will go miles to the site of grim tragedy.

Court rooms are packed whenever a horrible murder is aired or a

nauseating divorce scandal is tried. A chaste woman will read, on

the sly and with inner rebellion, as many pornographic tales as

she can get hold of, and the “carefully” brought up, i. e., those

whose interest has been carefully directed, suddenly become

interested in the forbidden; they seek to peek through windows

when they should be looking straight ahead.

As a matter of fact, interest is as much inhibited as conduct.

“You mustn’t ask about that” is the commonest answer a child

gets. “That’s a naughty question to ask” runs it a close second.

Can one inhibit interest, which is the excitement caused by the

unknown? The answer is that we can, because a large part of

education is to do this very thing. “Can we inhibit any interest

without injuring all interests?” is a question often put. My

answer would be that it is socially necessary that interest in

certain directions be inhibited, whether it hurts the individual

or not. But the interest in a forbidden direction can be shifted

to a permitted direction, and this should be done. In my opinion,

sex interest can be so handled and a blunt thwarting of this

interest should be avoided. Some explanation leading the child to

larger, less personal aspects of sex should be given.

The interest of the child is often thwarted through sheer

laziness. “Don’t bother me” is the reply of a parent shirking a

sacred duty. Interest is the beginning of knowledge, and where it

is discouraged knowledge is discouraged. Any inquiry can be met

on the child’s plane of intelligence and comprehension, and the

parent must arrange for the gratification of this fundamental

desire. How? By a question hour each day, perhaps a children’s

hour, a home university period where the vital interest of the

child will be satisfied.

To return to the morbid interests: do they arise from secret

morbid desires? The Freudian answer to that would be yes. And so

would many another answer. It is the answer in many cases,

especially where the desire is not so much morbid