Napoleon Hill – The Modern Frame

Cultural Existentialism: Instances and Instrumentality

While the previous essays¹ laid the foundation and began exploring some of the architecture of what I have called cultural existentialism, at this point the following can be offered as a working definition: Cultural existentialism is the phenomenon that views the individual as entirely free and unencumbered–by history, family, community, tradition, inherited ideas, et al.–and, therefore, free to live and define themselves as they see fit; the sole author of their life.² In this essay, I want to explore some of the more outward forms of cultural existentialism, as well as its relation to what I have called the instrumental stance. In so doing, I hope to shed some light on the question of the more recent origins of this phenomenon. Again, my focus will remain on America.

The Modern Culture of Achievement

As the concept of a calling became unmoored from its historically religious roots it gradually gave way to the secular concept of success.¹ Over time, success effectively became the end-goal or purpose of everyday life and existence.² This is the framework in which the modern culture of achievement was born. It is not a coincidence that this culture originated, developed, and matured to the greatest extent in America–a country wedded more than any other to the economic system of capitalism. The dream of success became the preoccupation of many and was reinforced in what I have called the “mainline thought” of self-help or success literature as it existed in the early to mid-twentieth century.³ It is within the overlap of the Social and Economic spheres, as well as the particulars of success literature itself that the image of the modern culture of achievement finally comes into view.

The Origins of the Modern Culture of Achievement, Part III

The previous essay dealt with some of the origins of what will become the mainline¹ thought in self-help or success literature throughout the twentieth century and beyond. In addition to this developing main-current we will find the emergence of offshoots and others, which at first begin slowly, and accelerate over time, up through the present day. Sometimes they are a departure in approach, sometimes they are a more focused look at a specific subject or category–such as personal finance, sales-techniques, human relationships, or something else. Nevertheless, the end-goal or purpose remains the same: success.² As such, what underlies the totality of this literature is a clear sense of utility or pragmatism–it is paradigmatic of the instrumental stance. This is not literature to be contemplated, it is a literature to be used.