I am rising for the work of man.

From Collision with Reality: What Depth Psychology Can Tell us About Victimhood Culture by Lisa Marchiano.

Thinking of ourselves as oppressed or infirm may inadvertently cultivate what psychologists call an external locus of control. Locus of control is a psychological concept articulated in the 1950s by Julian Rotter. Those with an internal locus of control experience themselves as able to influence outcomes that affect them. Those with an external locus of control feel that most of what happens to them is beyond their ability to affect.

Though both external and internal loci of control confer advantages and disadvantages, research has shown that having an internal locus of control is associated with less stress and better health, whereas having an external locus of control is correlated with anxiety disorders. Importantly, an internal locus of control appears to be a decisive factor in determining whether one will be psychologically resilient. As a society, therefore, it is in our interest to cultivate an internal locus of control, and indeed, the popular notions of grit and mindset are undergirded by locus of control theory. However, some environments are fostering its opposite.

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Some current cultural trends award increased social status to those perceived as victims. Sociologists have posited that a new moral culture of victimhood is developing on college campuses. In such a culture, being a victim raises one’s standing and confers virtue, in part because it mobilizes protection and support from powerful third parties. The increased status of victimhood may account for the rise in “digital self-harm” that researchers have identified when teens cyber-bully themselves.

Victimhood culture rewards us when we are aggrieved, helpless, and weak. It therefore encourages us to experience ourselves as being at the mercy of external forces beyond our control, which, as we have seen, may have negative consequences for mental well-being.

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Thousands of years before anyone spoke of an “internal locus of control,” the poets and bards of earlier epochs knew the decisive importance of walking toward one’s fate. The one who did this was known as the hero. Whoever daily confronts uncertainty and fear, no matter how mundane the gesture, is heroic in the psychological sense. “We each have an appointment with ourselves, though most of us never show up for it,” writes Jungian analyst James Hollis. “Showing up, and dealing with whatever must be faced in the chasms of fear and self-doubt, that is the hero task.”5

In contrast to the avoidant teens profiled in the Times, consider the words of Marcus Aurelius. During a military campaign against Barbarian invaders, the emperor and stoic philosopher wrote the following lines to himself nearly two thousand years ago:

At first day’s light have in readiness, against disinclination to leave your bed, the thought that, “I am rising for the work of man.” Must I grumble at setting out to do what I was born for, and for the sake of which I have been brought into the world? Is this the purpose of my creation, to lie here under the blankets and keep myself warm?

Creating a society in which we are encouraged to confront anxiety and face difficult realities matters not just for the mental health of individuals, but also for our collective well-being. In the world that soon awaits us, humankind will desperately need those individuals willing to rise from their beds. The challenges that loom ahead will require us to set aside timidity, weakness, and victimhood and claim instead agency and boldness, no matter how grim the odds.