Author: Jakob Ryce

Writer, poet, wayfarer of a digital age. I write stories, essays and articles. https://medium.com/@jakobryce | @JakobRyce
Articles by Jakob Ryce

Youth Suicide: An Unnecessary Statistic

And why our healthcare system isn’t helping

Grace sad image

We had a deal. Had created a system for when she was feeling ‘under the weather.’ In fact, it was a code for when she felt suicidal, a simple text message that used a hurricane category scale system.

If Grace was feeling blue but it wasn’t too serious, it was a Category 1. Winds were picking up and there might be some falling debris, but usually some music or a silly movie could calm things down.

If it was a Category 2 or 3, I’d start to worry. Sometimes she’d text: Category 2 … I think, maybe worse. Definitely strong. And I’d wait to hear back, hoping her foundations wouldn’t be ripped from the earth, all the while knowing she was in a dangerous sway towards a free-fall. Often a hot chocolate and a long chat would do the trick, and I would feel a swell of relief that she was stable, calm and safe.

But if it was a Category 4 or 5, things were serious. This was when the storm was rushing around her, and her fragile frame was being shaken apart, nearing total collapse. This was when she was heading for a complete ‘outage,’ where her foundations and her entire world was suddenly plunged into an all invasive darkness where nothing could escape.

There were a few rules with a Category 5. She would need to speak to Lifeline or call her dad or a friend, any hour of the day or night. Grace thought the hurricane system was a good idea. I remember her saying … “Jake, you don’t have to worry … I’m not going to do anything silly, I promise.”

The following Tuesday I received an out of the blue Skype call from a friend in London. He asked me if I was sitting down, and told me that he had been contacted by Grace’s boyfriend Peter. And then he dropped the bomb …“I’ve got some sad news man … Grace killed herself.”

My world did two things in that moment. It spun in circles and the walls came crashing down. I hung up without a word and sat there staring at a blue screen. Gutted and in shock.

I was a week away from moving to London. One week. This was not for a holiday, this was to start a new life, to try something new. And now I had to fly to Hobart and attend my best friend’s funeral, before I even had a chance to understand what was happening.

I booked a flight and was in Hobart 2 days later. I was given bogus directions and arrived late, but eventually I discovered her family and friends gathered around a small plot at the back of the cemetery. Grace’s little sister was crying and leaning over her grave. I watched as she dropped several roses over the coffin. It was everything you would expect a funeral to be … it was even raining.

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Articles by Jakob Ryce

Your Looking-Glass Self

Why you should give up the need for validation

digital-man

You want to be popular, you want people to like you and that’s completely normal. Maintaining a healthy self esteem is vital. In fact, it’s becoming even more important as our society grows ever more competitive. And yet, the race towards popularity comes with some adverse side-effects, such as depression, alienation and anxiety. Being ignored can be just as painful as being rejected, and it’s exactly why external validation has become the latest ‘psychological drug,’ administered online by trained App Developers.

Your self image is exactly what fuels social media companies. It’s why they re-purpose language (like, follow, friend, love) and it works perfectly — for them. They understand that people have a need to control painful feelings and prove their worth. It’s why you make posts, it’s why you upload selfies to Instagram, and it’s why you use social media in the first place — to be seen, to have a voice, and to feel that buzz that comes with each like. But it’s also a behavioural pattern that many of us aren’t aware of.

Loneliness, guilt, anger, acceptance, fear of failure, fear of rejection … all these emotions play an integral part in the quagmire of validation.

Elizabeth R Thornton calls these patterns our ‘mental model’ — our deep-rooted ideas and beliefs about the way the world works and how things ought to be. It means that we expect certain results from the things we do, say, create or share. In fact we are predisposed to seek validation and this influences our behaviour, and as Thornton explains, these mental models can keep us trapped in old ways of thinking.

External validation is just one of these models, as is perfectionism and control. In Thornton’s ‘Objective Leader Assessment’ survey, 55% percent of people responded that their self-worth was often, more often or always tied to what others think. There are so many people busy projecting an image of what they believe others want, that they rarely stop to consider their own unique qualities and gifts.

kid

We want to feel included and important … seen, heard and ‘liked.’ And it all starts in childhood.

Children seek attention as a survival instinct. They want reassurance that they are loved, protected and secure. If they’re hungry they might cry or slap the wall with mash potato, if they’re fearful or angry they might lie or throw a tantrum. We expect this from children — but when adults play attention seeking games it’s seen as a form of manipulation. However, if this need for validation is something learned, then it is directly connected with how our brains work. In fact, studies have been made to show how the reward part of our brain is more active when others agree with, or reinforce, our own opinions.

In 2010, a team of researchers from University College London and Aarhus University in Denmark investigated brain activity in relation to validation, and published their findings in the journal Current Biology. They took 28 volunteers and asked them to make decisions based on a selection of musical pieces. Once their opinions had been recorded, they were informed of the ‘experts’ opinions, and discovered that when participants opinions coincided with these experts, the area of their brain associated with reward lit up like a Christmas tree. Soon after, volunteers decided to change their choices to reflect the expert opinions.

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Essays by Jakob Ryce

Why Haruki Murakami is so Very Japanese

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by Jakob Ryce / 5th June, 2018

Haruki Murakami belongs to a new generation of contemporary authors who speak to the eclectic, progressive spirit of Japan, often communicating his theories through popular magazines and resisting traditional literary labels, such as ‘jun bungaku, pure literature, opting instead for the Anglicism fuikkushon, fiction’ (Stretcher 1998). And this indifference with the Japanese literary establishment has sparked debate if this is Murakami’s rejection ‘of literature as “art” in the contemporary period’ (Stretcher 1998).

Murakami’s writing style lives in the present and is uncluttered by hyperbolic descriptions; a minimalist who embraces the Japanese concept of Kanso – avoiding accentuation to allow room for simplicity. Comparatively, his writing often features English expressions, which are translated back into Japanese. ‘Murakami writes in Japanese, but his writing is not really Japanese. If you translate it into American English, it can be read very naturally in New York’ (Stretcher 1998).

Nonetheless, the ‘internationality’ and transparency of his writing style has created broad appeal. David Mitchell calls Murakami ‘the world’s best-known living Japanese novelist’ (Mitchell 2005). A fair statement, when considering his novels have been translated into over 50 languages and have sold millions of copies worldwide, making him one of Japan’s most recognisable postmodern writers.

However, for all his Western influences, there are elements of fantasy, magical realism and Japanese mythology at work. This essay will examine the Japanese themes and influences in Kafka on the Shore, and how Shintoism acts as an important cultural anchor in Murakami’s novel.

Loners, Ghosts & Transformations

In Murakami’s stories, his first-person protagonists often experience the mundane—however, they tend to observe life with a minimalist, hyper-aware worldview. His character’s feel closer to reality (and are more relatable) than the stereotypical Hollywood heroes of Western culture. Furthermore, they are often loners who are dealing with some form of loss, or suffering from a loss of identity. A.T Lai postulates this may be ‘caused by an absence of “idealism” and any source of self-fulfilment, is further severed by a loss of connection with the past, including the nation’s cultural past’ (Lai 2007).

In Kafka on the Shore, Kafka Tamura’s motivation to run away from home – to find his sister and mother, and shake an Oedipal curse – is also a desire to transform, as he explains to Oshima: ‘I don’t like the container I’m stuck in. Never have. I hate it’ (Murakami 2006, p. 286).

Recurring themes of transformation are woven throughout the story, as are interrelated conditions – such as depression spawned from abuse, and a desire to reclaim lost innocence. ‘A lot of things were stolen from my childhood … and now I have to get them back’ (Murakami 2006, p. 343).

Furthermore, there is a fragmentation occurring within particular characters – a disassociation of self – as they come to terms with their own existential struggles and often violent natures. For instance, Nakata speaks in the third person as if he inhabits a body without a fixed character, it’s ‘as if his soul had fled but never returned’ (Wirth 2018). Hence, how Shintoism, as a sense of emptiness, is used here – not by rejecting it, but by assimilating it. ‘The body shapes the formless self in new ways, but when the body is traumatised, it can congeal into the wound of an unchanging self’ (Wirth 2018).

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Essays by Jakob Ryce

Fahrenheit 451 & Bradbury’s Foresight of Fire

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by Jakob Ryce / 28th April 2018

In Fahrenheit 451 Ray Bradbury creates a hedonistic society that thrives on ignorance, is dependent on technology and constantly distracted by ‘TV parlours’ (Bradbury, Ray 1953, p. 31). It’s a novel that’s shockingly prophetic and its concepts go far beyond the author’s own imaginings.
Free-thinkers, or individuals in possession of literature, are seen as a threat to peace, as books ‘… are thought only to lead to political and social idealism, which in turn leads to dissent, unrest and unhappiness’ (Rutten, Kris 2011).
But what can we learn about our contemporary society from novels such as Fahrenheit 451? Do our social values and cultural practices mimic literature or is it the other way around? ‘Who is predicting this future? From what perspective is this future imagined?’ (Rutten, Soetaert & Vandermeersche 2011). This essay will attempt to analyse how digital distractions connect to social and cultural commentaries found in Bradbury’s classic story.

One crucial issue in the novel is society’s dependency and obsession with television – a foresight and a warning that has gone relatively unnoticed, as we rocket towards digital oblivion and endless streaming.
In the novel, Montag’s wife seems to be void of free will. Millie reflects our entire modern culture: obsessed with her ‘three-wall television’, reality TV, known as ‘The Family’ and dependent on her devices; going to bed wearing her Bluetooth ear-buds, described as ‘Seashell ear thimbles’ (Bradbury, Ray 1953, p. 30). She is caught in a perpetual loop of digital distraction – ignorant to her surroundings, even when her husband begins hiding books in their home. Moreover, there is a sickness at the root of Millie that she’s not aware of – she self medicates and is completely nescient to the cause of her self destruction. In addition, Millie represents the superficiality of modern culture, as she avoids any real issues, escaping to her TV parlour – a mirror that our own solipsist society is so drawn to: our screens.

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Essays by Jakob Ryce
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The Mirror of Young Adult Fiction

by Jakob Ryce / 24rd October, 2017

Young Adult literature has become synonymous with young heroes or heroins. Stories of young people forced into a quest to overcome the odds or face tyrannical forces, often to achieve some form of liberation from the confines of their society or environment. The origins of the genre are still debatable. Novels written for young people could arguably date back to the 1800s – when Sarah Trimmer defined ‘young adulthood’ as between the ages of 14 – 21 (Wikipedia, 2017). Books, such as ‘Oliver Twist’ (1838) or ‘Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’ (1884) all had the hallmarks of books written for young people, yet were really about young people. According to Michael Cart ‘ … a case could be made that the first young adult novel was actually Maureen Daly’s Seventeenth Summer, published in 1942 …’ Cart goes on to explain that this was an era when America began recognising adolescents as a separate generation (Cart, Michael 2001, p. 95). J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye is often said to be the first true Young Adult classic, and perhaps was partially responsible for the genre gaining momentum in the 1950s.

Nevertheless, it was in the 1960s when the Young Adult Library Services Association decided to market novels of the era (considered suitable for ages between 12-18) and the Young Adult genre found its solidity (Strickland, Ashley 2015). In the The Outsiders, S. E Hinton gives readers a peek into the hardened life of a social outcast. It connected to young people in a direct, authentic way: with its adolescent tones and gritty themes. Moreover, many readers were unaware that Susan Eloise Hinton wrote the book during high school, or that she was even a woman. Caren J. Town states ‘ … the novel retains the capacity to speak to young adults about masculinity, identity, and the economic forces that drive our society.’ Town describes the book as a ‘landmark event’ that captured audiences with its poignancy, rogue characters and desolation (Town, Caren J. 2015, p. 15). Over the next decade YA novels branched out to become more direct: tackling mature themes of love, betrayal, alienation and desolation. If we consider the natural evolution of society and culture since the early twentieth century, including environmental shifts, then the metamorphosis of archetypes within literature is simply a part of that change. Therefore, each young generation (of the time) can look to Young Adult literature as a mirror of their own lives, and thus, help establish a sense of identity within society.

Quite often Young Adult fiction will depict a character’s journey from deprivation, or hegemonic oppression, to resolution. The result can be either overly dystopian or naturalistic – conveying a series of complex emotions or modes. Independence and maternal instincts play a large role in The Hunger Games, by Susanne Collins. Katniss Everdeen has been thrust into adulthood by her environment – having to fend for her broken mother and little sister Prim. The roles have been reversed here, and perhaps for the best. ‘It is the women’s daughters, in fact, who are perceived to be more successful at retaining female agency in the face of social oppression …’ (Curry, Alice 2013, p. 96). We can see this reflected in real-life circumstances – the teenage child forced to become the patriarchal nurse, or the child-become-mother scenario: providing for their young siblings within divorces. Nonetheless, Katniss’ resentment at her mother’s depression is also indicative of her anger towards her own seceded and resigned District – a disembodied social hierarchy imposed by the Capitol (Curry, Alice 2013, p. 96). ‘All I can see is the woman who sat by, blank and unreadable, while her children turned to skin and bones’ (Collins, Susanne 2008, p. 16).

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