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The Horiz of a Relatio nship
What can rescue America from a social milieu of its own making, beset by “I-thinking,” solitude, and, ultimately, fear? Ushering in trust on the winds of true relationships, the protagonists of the New York Encounter face-off against the pessimism of de Tocqueville’s 19th-century analysis.

by Carolina Britoon

“When all professions are open to all, and when one can reach the summit of each of them by oneself, an immense and easy course seems to open before the ambition of men, and they willingly fancy that they have been called to great destinies. But that is an erroneous view corrected by experience every day. The same equality that permits each citizen to [individually] conceive vast hopes, renders all citizens individually weak. It limits their strength in all regards at the same time that it permits their desires to expand” (513).
While this passage could have easily been taken out of last week’s This American Life or the latest critique of social mobility in The New York Times, I was surprised to find instead an attribution to Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America in 1831. Upon visiting the United States, Alexis de Tocqueville made this shrewd observation about the land of opportunity: dogged individualism limits human potential and generates restless, insatiable men. In turn, these men’s “hopes and desires are more often disappointed, [their] souls more aroused and more restive, and cares more burning” (514). For the American who believes that effort is always matched with fulfillment, he or she finds instead solitude, insufficient success, and an inherent nostalgia for relationship. Despite desperate attempts of affirming oneself as the only necessary ingredient for success, structurally we find a relentless neediness. I am not enough for myself. According to Vaclav Havel, we are meant to live in relation with “something outside [ourselves], something like our own, personal existential horizon. All of [our] actions, in fact, take place against the background of this horizon.... And even things apparently trivial, and apparently meant to fulfill personal needs, conceal somewhere in their depths this sense of ‘relating’ to that forever receding place” (Letter to Olga, 122). Where is that difficult “relating” occurring? What is its aim?

A structural dimension. The New York Encounter this year explored the challenge of relationship to society, individuals, and ourselves. Our dialogues pitted de Tocqueville’s individualistic, disappointed “hopes and desires” against men and women who have searched for alternatives. As we found in our dialogues, the egocentric approach of individualism is hard to shake off, and even harder to recognize as a problem. Loneliness, for example, is no longer considered a social aberration but an inevitable outgrowth of mainstream liberal values. De Tocqueville would have described 21st-century men as “withdrawn into [themselves], almost unaware of the fate of the rest. Mankind, for [them], consists in [their] children and personal friends. As for the rest of his fellow citizens, they are near enough...[They] touch them but [feel] nothing...” (695). Both Nathan Heller, in his New Yorker article, “Semi-Charmed Kind of Life,” and Eric Klinenberg, in his recent book Going Solo, attempted to defend this individualism in a society where 28% of all households are single-person dwellings. The people they present to us, however, are insecure, proud of their freedoms but hungry for contact, anxious, smug, and occasionally scared. In the words of Pedro Noguera (see the interview on page 12), renowned sociologist and Professor of Education at NYU, “people who are isolated, and alienated, even with wealth, are much more likely to commit suicide than people who are connected to families or who are married. They report higher feelings of happiness through those connections.” Although we value creating our own narratives, striking out independently, and not living in our parents’ basements, we have sacrificed a fundamental need for communal affirmation and unconditional affection in the process.
The need of human connection also surfaces in tragedies such as the Boston Marathon bombings and the shootings in Newtown. In the moments in which Americans could have instinctively run to safety, they ran towards danger. President Obama, in his remarks after the Boston bombings, highlighted this aspect: “In the face of evil, Americans will lift up what’s good. In the face of cruelty, we will choose compassion. In the face of those who would visit death upon innocents, we will choose to save and to comfort and to heal. We’ll choose friendship. We’ll choose love.” At the Encounter, Noguera stated that this is not unusual, but a structural dimension of the person: “We have good research now showing us that there is a human quality that is almost genetic toward altruism, toward the pursuit of togetherness. That is, rather than living out the perceived ideal of the rugged individual, most human beings have been drawn to the collective. This was actually something that troubled Darwin. Darwin, who gave us the idea of the survival of the fittest, also knew that human beings, unlike many species of animals, create families, and that fathers actually in many cases stick with their offspring. He couldn’t explain why they would do that, if it was simply about individual interest.”

In business as in life. Bringing this reality to the intimate level of the family, French philosopher Fabrice Hadjadj, in his discussion at NYE on the nature of the self, described the physicality of belonging in its most essential elements: “Here is the conclusion that I can draw from a simple meditation on my underbelly: I can be fulfilled only with the other and even in the other–not by flourishing but by fructifying–in other words, by giving birth to another with another.” Even the intimate, physical structure of a human being points to a need for embracing and generating others. We, therefore, cannot escape the structural, physiological failure in individualism–however much we try.
Hearing that this need to turn to one another is also predominant in the realm of business may have been one of the most compelling surprises at the New York Encounter. In the business world, analysts like Judith Glaser rarely praise the lone-ranger. In her book Creating We, she asserts that “I-centric” work environments are doomed to fail. Concurring with that evidence, Anujeet Sareen reminded us that the foundation of business success cannot be entirely attributed to America’s scrappy individualism and self-rebranding, but to the ability to create and maintain strong bonds among coworkers and an overall culture of trust. Every year, Fortune magazine publishes a list of the 100 best companies to work for in the United States. According to the questions asked, Fortune equates “best” with the quality of the relationships in the work place. The survey asks employees three questions: “Do you trust the people you work for?  Do you have pride in what you do?  Do you enjoy the people you work with?” Over the past seven years, according to the Russell Investment Group, the stock price of these 100 companies rose at twice the rate of the overall stock market. An established body of research among schools and corporations demonstrates the links between trust and performance. If people trust each other, they’ll be able to work through disagreements, take smarter risks, work harder, and dig deeper for the good of the whole. If they don’t trust, they’ll disengage and focus instead on their resumes, rumors, and politics.
The 2008 recession has brought to the forefront certain dissatisfaction with the American dream and in this sense, as Bernhard Scholz states, “we are in a period of deep transformation whose aim is to create a new future, in the direction of a more human society with a sustainable economy.” Although this sustainability grounds itself in a communal identity, Scholz also redefines what work is, as first and foremost an ongoing expression of oneself, and not only the means to profit. While many staunch individualists would agree with that sentiment, Scholz pursues this further and argues that work becomes a privileged personal growth opportunity if it’s done in dialogue with the individuals and reality around you. Citing his work with youth as an example, he asks:  “Let’s go back to the girls and guys of our vocational schools: How did they get out of their situations, situations they faced with resignation, often without hope? They did it because they met someone who believed in them, someone who communicated to them that their lives have an infinite value. So these young people began to understand an infinite desire within them, waiting to be released as a force enabling a true experience of life, bringing a change in their very selves and in the relationship with the world around them. Every one of us is infinitely more than what we can do. We are not defined by the circumstances of our life or by our success or our failures.”

Beauty prevails. The logic of relationship is not merely an idea we have compiled from research, but rather from personal experiences. Bringing the discussion home, Fr. Julián Carrón also offered a compelling example that encapsulates the reasons for the New York Encounter itself, and informs the most profound inquiries and needs of the human being:  “The companionship of Christ allows us to look at reality in a more complete way.  For example, if a boy is visiting Disneyland with his family, he is happy, because everything strikes him as wonderful.  He’s curious. He’s enjoying every attraction of the park but suppose, in a moment of distraction, he gets lost. What earlier had been regarded positively all of a sudden becomes strange because he is alone, full of fear. Having gotten lost, everything all of a sudden is menacing. When he finds his family again, his attraction recovers its beauty.  Beauty prevails over menace, and the boy starts to enjoy everything again. He recovers an adequate relationship with reality that allows him to have a true perception of it. Living life in the company of Christ produces the same effect in our relationship with everything. Living life in His company, everything becomes meaningful again. Time acquires sense, intensity; it’s not empty anymore, but full of density. Nothing is trivial, everything is full of possibilities.  Life becomes an adventure to enjoy together.”
The moment my action is rooted in the awareness of being loved at work, at home, or at school, suddenly life opens up. Within our conversations, we found individualism wrenching itself open to the possibility of companionship, and from companionship, openness to transcendental unity with the ultimate Other. Our days at the Encounter set the direction of our work together this year as we ask ourselves this question: What aspirations are worth the energy of our lives, and who should we trust to reach Havel’s “receding horizon”? How do we walk with openness toward seeing life as an adventure, full of beauty and promise–knowing it can only be lived through the relationship with Another?