Lent 2023 | Week 2: Where Do We Look To Figure Out What to Want?

Mimetic Desire

Last week we asked the question, “What is it that you want?” We might like to think that what we want is unique to us. Our desires are our own and fulfilling them is what sets us apart from everybody else. But what if desire works differently?

What if what I want is not singular but mimetic?

Mimetic is a technical word coined by the French social theorist René Girard to describe the nature of our desires. We can hear in it the echo of the word ‘mimic.’ To understand desire as mimetic is to recognize that what we want often mimics what others want. We see what someone else desires and then adopt it for ourselves. It might be hard us to swallow, that we are imitative creatures, because it works against the high value we place on personal authenticity and self-expression. Imitation, we judge, is for lesser life forms: Monkey see, monkey do.

We are not monkeys.

But if we can have the humility to see how it is so often the case that our desires ape the desires of others we will be able to see the mimetic dynamics at work in our lives.

As Girard points out, “Man is the creature who does not know what to desire.” It is not to say that when we are hungry we don’t know to want food. Or that when we are cold we don’t know to want shelter. We are not working at the level of instinctual desire. To say that we are creatures who do not know what to desire has to do with those higher level, more abstract longings particular to being human. Who am I? What is my meaning? What is my purpose?

These questions do not have obvious answers. It isn’t clear to us what we ought to do to fulfill these desires. We can’t just go to McDonald’s and order some meaning. So what do we do?

We look for models. Not fashion models (though they are included here), but those things which model for us what is worth desiring. Not just clothing, but the whole gamut of desires.

We don’t know what to desire so we look to models of desire.

Take Netflix or PlayStation. What is going on when we binge a show or a game? In part, I think what makes us want to keep watching, or keep playing, is the intoxication of desiring what these characters desire. The most powerful stories not only make us feel or think, but also to desire. We don’t know what we want so we go to movies, shows or video games to be told, if for only an hour or five!, what to want – to get the girl/guy, to move a boat, to level-up, to save the world.

Of course, the big elephant in the room when it comes to mimetic desire is social media. What are we doing when we endlessly scroll through Instagram or Facebook (is Facebook still a thing?). A lot of things are going on, but the best (worst?) social media sites, have spent billions leveraging the power of mimetic desire. We scroll because we want to want something. In part, we are looking to and for models of desire.

What do I want?

I don’t know. Let me scroll some more.

Social Media Addiction

Social media can be seen as a mimetic playground. Author Luis Burgis explores some of how these dynamics play out when we engage with social media. He gives us some categories to think about models of desire (internal and external) and how social media can distort the influence such models can have in and on our lives.

• What are some of the external and internal models in your life?
• One way to think about desire is that desire comes from a place of lack. We want what we feel we lack. How might your time on social media help you put a finger on what is it that you feel you lack?
• Burgis encourages us: “We have to know when our models are enflaming us with a desire that will bring real fulfillment or whether it’s going to bring a dopamine hit or allow us to fantasize about a life that we’ll probably never have and even if we did have would probably make us miserable.” How might this help you discern what is going on when you engage with social media?

Scripture

Take some time again this week to sit with Matthew 20:20-28.

• In what ways are external and internal models at work in this passage?
• How have your desires been shaped, for or better or worse, by the various models in your life?
• Is it strange to think of Jesus as a model of desire?

Let Us Not Falter in Desire

“When Christ appears, your life, then you also will appear with him in glory.” So now is the time for groaning, then it will be for rejoicing; now for desiring, then for embracing. What we desire now is not present; but let us not falter in desire; let long, continuous desire be our daily exercise, because the one who made the promise does not cheat us.

St. Augustine

• Take some time to sit with this quote.
• Read Colossians 3:1-4.
• What does Augustine think we ought to be desiring for?
• How are we prone to falter in desire? What would it look like to “let long, continuous desire be our daily exercise”?