Ive been in an enquiry for the last year asking how does the US cultural lens influence personal development? The USA (California particularly) dominates this field and exports it worldwide in what Ive come to call the Spiritual Industrial Complex. I needed to go through a differentiation stage where I got quite anti-US so first off sorry if I ever overdid that :-) I also still think a critique is badly overdue still so here are my main conclusions. The US cultural bias in personal growth work across many disciplines leads to: - An over empathises on individual vs relational and cultural context. This means US personal development (PD) is blind to this cultural analysis and that it often stresses individual practice rather than community or political activity. Sometimes leading to self-obsession and narcissism. Due to the emphasis on individual rather than social development I think its become the perfect pressure valve in service of modern consumerism and often little more than a type of Prozac. - An achievement focus from the Calvinist tradition. Combined with the new age distrust of science and measurement this means its never-ending work! The Calvinist tradition also comes with a sense of humour failure foreign to my Anglo- Irish routes! - A politically correct and legalistic culture leading to certain rich avenues of PD being ignored. The latter also leads to branding and ownership of marketable models - A public confessional and performance aspect and emphasis on emotional expression over containment. Europe isnt Oprah. - A push towards being positive - see Happy or Die. US personal development has a distressing lack of cynicism :-) - A lean towards profit and consumerist models endemic in the US, often combined with over-confidence and a cult of celebrity that mixes unpleasantly with the Asian guru model. The marketing success here over European competitors is a result of these factors but at a cost!
Posted on: Sun, 25 May 2014 20:19:09 +0000
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