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They dream about the pages of gossip columns or about the spotlights of the “Minute of Glory” … Is it possible to speak about the special psychological warehouse of those of us who dream of becoming famous?
With the start of a new television season, thousands of teenagers go to auditions in the hope of becoming participants in the next show. Among the young there is a fierce struggle on the approaches to fame, as, indeed, among the 30-40-year-olds: who will lead the news in prime time, who will be given a literary award, who will reign on the political Olympus or collect full stadiums … The desire to be a star has never been so sharp, strong and universal.
Sociologist François de Singley sees nothing surprising in this: “To desire fame is simply to allow oneself to dream. As a young man, I desperately wanted to perform on stage, although I did not know how to sing at all. Those who make their way to the screens today do it a thousand times more energetic and successful than us. I didn’t dare to tell anyone about my dream at all, it was simply impossible to admit it. That’s the whole difference: today everyone has the right to declare their desire to become famous. Read blogs. I once had a beautiful notebook where I wrote about every cycling champion I was fond of, but I never showed it to anyone. Today I would have my own blog and a group of people who like to read it!”
Finding Yourself
Well, every teenager dreams of fame? In any case, there are quite a few of them, explains developmental psychologist Yuri Frolov: “In adolescents, this desire manifests itself more often, since it stems from the desire to find oneself. To feel their value, a young person needs the recognition of others. People, on the other hand, are adults, personally mature, can rely on themselves, on the experience of their victories and mistakes.
But not all teenagers move from dreaming to action. “I never went on stage, but I became a well-known sociologist,” says François de Singley. – There was a kind of transfer: my thirst for fame was realized in science. I think if you are desperately dreaming of fame at the age of 15, you have a real chance to achieve recognition in another field by the age of forty … “
Need for love
It seems that we all in one way or another dream of becoming a star. According to the psychoanalyst Jean-David Nazio, this expectation of fame is individual and arises mainly from the history of relations with the mother.
“The need for public recognition says, first of all, that a person needs love equal in strength to maternal love,” the psychoanalyst clarifies. “It was thanks to her that we first felt our own exclusivity.”
But it can also occur in those who were rejected early, who felt abandoned, helpless. In this case, the dream of fame is an unconscious challenge to the mother who underestimated us.
But the need for recognition and love does not fully explain this phenomenon. In the desire to become famous, contempt for others (sometimes unconscious), and a desire to push back possible rivals, and the hope of escaping from a faceless environment can be manifested.
“This explains the aggressiveness, hostility, anger, which can often be found in those striving for fame,” adds Jean-David Nazio. “Moreover, these sides of a person often turn out to be unexpected, being disguised by openness, generosity, good nature – also quite real.”
Fame, a mirage of glory
“Fame has always accompanied those who have done something significant, achieved success or accomplished a feat, a good deed,” says psychologist Dmitry Leontiev. – There is also black, bad glory: so, alas, Herostratus achieved his goal, who, in order to remain in history, burned one of the seven wonders of the Ancient World – the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus.
In the twentieth century, with the advent of the media, the constructive desire to become famous – that is, to surpass others in something, to create something unique, to accomplish a feat, to set a record – is increasingly being replaced by a painful desire to expose oneself to an audience of millions of people. As a result, today fame is no longer identical with real glory and is not an indicator of merit. However, millions of people are chasing mirages, and those who manage to snatch a piece of fame, then often turn out to be deeply unhappy … “
Thirst to conquer
Some psychoanalysts consider the desire for fame to be an innate impulse that occurs in everyone in the womb. So, Alfred Adler, one of the most famous students of Freud, the founder of individual psychology, called this tendency to conquer objects and space the desire for superiority. He saw in it the main motivating force of our behavior, since thanks to it we can compensate from childhood for the unconscious feeling of our own inferiority inherent in each of us.1.
“Adler believed that from this feeling arises the desire to overcome, superiority, success,” says psychologist Dmitry Leontiev. – Later, he came to the conclusion that the desire for success is still primary and universal, and not everyone feels inferiority, but only those who do not achieve it. Chronic experience of this state can develop into an inferiority complex.
Western society gives rise to the illusion that success is not only achievable, but simply necessary in order to start living truly.
It is about the need to be successful in any task in life. “The way we fulfill this need determines our lifestyle,” Dmitry Leontiev continues. – For those who assert themselves at the expense of others, this desire, according to Adler, takes on painful forms – in this he sees the origins of crime, alcoholism, drug addiction, and mental disorders of the personality. The best way is to cooperate with others on the basis of common goals.”
lack of patience
Modern Western society, with its obsessive advertising of success, gives rise to the illusion that it is not only achievable, but simply necessary in order to start living truly. Ambitious and energetic teenagers, who took show business stars as a model, in the end, quite sincerely declare that the main thing is to be seen and noticed. First to become famous, and only then think about how to express yourself and what to work on. With this understanding, glory is seen not as a result, but as a starting point.
According to François de Singly, this reversal was due to the modern confusion in relation to time: “For us, the logic of mastering skills no longer exists. We study insanely for a long time … And finally we reach professionalism by the age of 30-35, and by the age of 50 it’s all over. If by this age a person has lost his job, it is very difficult for him to return to duty. So young people compensate for this prospect with dreams of quick fame, and I understand them. In my opinion, this is a kind of unconscious form of protest.”
The “society of recognition”, the “success society” instructs us to flaunt our “I”, to impose it on others, so that others and we ourselves do not perceive ourselves as losers. We are assured that becoming famous is very easy. As a result, everyone wants to jump into the “social elevator” and no one wants to climb the stairs.
Theoretically, a teenager has approximately equal chances to one day go on stage or enter a prestigious university, but in reality this is only an illusion of a road open to everyone. A very narrow passage leads to the upper floors. Young people under this pressure feel an ever stronger need to use their imagination. Imaginary glory compensates them for its absence in reality.
“The TV screen gives the illusion of immortality”
It is worth sending a letter to the editors of the program – and everyone has a chance to fulfill their dreams. Journalist Alexander Monakhov, former editor-in-chief of the popular Antenna-Telesem TV guide, reflects on what we are looking for on the TV screen.
“For all the differences in the formats of modern television programs, the idea of their producers is generally the same: the viewer needs new, until yesterday, unknown faces with whom he can identify himself. We in Russia, of course, are not alone in finding our reflections on the TV screen. So, the Big Brother program invented on Dutch television (the once popular Dom-1, -2 resembles this format) conquered England, Italy, Australia, Argentina, Germany, Switzerland and the USA.
One of the reasons for the success of such projects is that viewers see people like themselves on the screen, and, therefore, someone can say to himself: “If this Masha got her minute of fame with these stupid tricks, if such a well-known TV presenter talks to her on an equal footing, then I…”
It seems that you do not have to work for many years, the main thing is to be on the screen, guess the letter, play the harmonica – and you are a star, and the world is at your feet. However, there is a more optimistic explanation for the popularity of such programs: we are alive as long as we are remembered. Any participant in the television fields of miracles remains in family legends. They will talk about him at common dinners many years later, review the recording of the same program, chuckle affectionately at the clumsiness of the “TV star” … In a sense, he will always be.
1 A. Adler “Essays on individual psychology”. Cogito Center, 2002.