Recovering Agency in the Age of Anti-Experience

Within the past few years, there has been a significant rise in mental health issues, primarily, among Gen-Z. This situation has naturally become an increasingly popular area of scholarship, leading social psychologist Jonathan Haidt to publish his 2024 book: The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness. His thesis is that smartphone use is detrimental to the development of youth and has contributed to the rapid increase in mental health issues among them. Although this situation is serious, I, like Dr. Haidt, do not see this situation as hopeless, and interestingly enough, neither does Gen-Z. A study from the summer of 2025 by The Global Coalition for Youth Mental Health reports an interesting paradox. Gen-Z feels a strong sense of responsibility in shaping the future of their country. This is supported by their consumption of more news content than any other generation, but this continuous engagement also results in increased levels of anxiety and thus erodes their well-being. But it is not only well-being or happiness that is eroded, but ultimately agency: the ability to make decisions.

Often, the proposed solutions to this issue are solely practical. Educators and leaders tend to emphasize the importance of advanced technical training and placing more career trajectories at their disposal. While these solutions are often well-intentioned, they inadvertently do a great deal of harm. By placing more options at their disposal, they further propagate this decision fatigue. The solution then is not emotional or technological, but metaphysical. I propose, rather, that directing Gen-Z towards options that are ordered towards the fulfillment of the realities of the human person result in increased agency. By teaching Gen-Z who the human person is, they will be better equipped to make decisions that empower themselves and others, further contributing to a society where the whole and the individual can flourish.

I. Loss of Agency

With the rise of the digital age, man seems to have made remarkable advancements. Connecting with others seems to be easier than ever before, information is more accessible, and it seems that one is able to be free of all their physical “limitations” in forming their personal identities. The rise of screens as a medium of experience has seemingly yielded these wonderful effects, but this new way of participating in “reality” actually vaguely represents real experience. Experience, is ultimately the engagement with what is outside of oneself. [1] The objects of experience that we encounter challenge and expand our understanding of the way things are. This new understanding directs us towards the world and enables us to act in meaningful ways. In the realm of anti-experience or that of digital consumption, however, the object of experience is no longer something in the external world, but it is one’s emotional responses.

In his work, The Disappearance of Rituals, the contemporary philosopher Byung Chul Han writes, “Today, we consume not only things themselves but also the emotions that are bound up with things. You cannot consume things endlessly, but emotions you can … the consumption of emotions strengthens the narcissistic relationship to ourselves. The relationship to the world that we have by way of the mediation of things is thereby increasingly lost.” (The Disappearance of Rituals, Ch. I, Compulsion of Prediction, pg. 5) Byung Chul Han is pointing to the contemporary decline of happiness and even giving us a framework to understand its effectiveness.

The reason why experience can lead to genuine joy while anti-experience cannot is because one cannot derive something genuine from something artificial. Only what is real can yield what is real. The framework above shows how the realm of experience primarily concerns man’s relationship with the outside world. Of course, this includes consumption of resources, but it is defined by an understanding and respect for the existence of other objects or living beings before decisions of what to do with them are made. The realm of anti-experience on the other hand is defined by consumption of emotion via the medium of digital screens. Because emotions (the object of man’s awareness in this realm) do not have an independent and finite existence, one can endlessly consume them, leading to a numbing of sensitivity to the real world. The self becomes the alpha and the omega of all activity. The world no longer becomes something to behold, but an arena of stimulation. Anti-experience does not just distract from experience, but it significantly undermines agency. This degeneration can be a quick process that conditions individuals to be passive beings of consumption rather than creative beings of contemplation and action.

II. What does it mean to exist?

To understand why this erosion occurs, and how to be on our guard against it, the question of “Who is man?” becomes deeply important. Without a coherent answer to this question, it becomes impossible to determine what constitutes a good choice, and therefore impossible to exercise agency.

The Catholic Intellectual Tradition, and the classical philosophical tradition more broadly, has an extremely sound and coherent anthropology that stemmed from the question: “What does it mean to exist at all?” The tradition, primarily influenced by the thought of Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas, teaches that all beings have a hylomorphic unity or the composition of two interdependent principles, namely matter (hyle) and form (morphe). The matter is the “stuff” that something is made of and the “form” is what determines it to be that kind of thing. Man is therefore a union of both body and soul. Our soul (form) is the principle of life that gives our being unity and rationality and thus organizes our bodies (matter) accordingly, resulting in the human person as we know. [1]

This realization was made not by merely studying the tradition, but through the observation of reality. Through this method, Aristotle noticed that there was a “functional” aspect of reality. He saw that different beings had different functions that are according to their natures and that these natures were explicable by their forms. For example, an eye is for seeing, an ear is for hearing, etc. He then naturally claimed that given that an eye is for seeing, an eye ought to see excellently. This move is central to the Aristotelian idea of telos, which is the idea that everything has an ultimate goal that it is directed to or ordered towards. [2]

For beings such as plants, their telos is simply to grow, nourish, and reproduce; for animals, to sense and to move; but humans, while having the capacities of animals and plants, also have the capacity of rationality. Therefore, what is good for us is to act in accordance with reason and live virtuously and in turn be happy (since virtue is what allows us to act according to reason through the governance of the passions and the encouragement of reflection and contemplation). [3]

III. Aquinas and Happiness

Aquinas however takes this a step further by saying how although it is true that our natural end is to “reason well”, we are spiritual beings whose ultimate end is beatitude or union with God in a way that is unique from the animals or plants since we can know God in a way that other beings cannot. This is due to the two faculties of our souls: both intellect and will. Aquinas says the following in his Summa Theologiae (I-II, Q. 3, Art. 4):

“For if the acquisition of money were through an act of the will, the covetous man would have it from the very moment that he wished for it. But at the moment it is far from him; and he attains it, by grasping it in his hand, or in some like manner; and then he delights in the money got. And so it is with an intelligible end. For at first we desire to attain an intelligible end; we attain it, through its being made present to us by an act of the intellect; and then the delighted will rests in the end when attained.

So, therefore, the essence of happiness consists in an act of the intellect: but the delight that results from happiness pertains to the will.” [4]

Therefore, by “seeing” (intellectual seeing) God, who is Truth itself, the object of our intellect is infinitely satisfactory, and by then delighting in that vision, who is Goodness itself, the object of our will is infinitely satisfactory. In this framework, agency is not simply a matter of having more choices, but of being disposed to choose that which we know to be truly good.

IV. Agency in the Digital Age

Though man’s basic metaphysical structure and end is clear to us now, some fail to see its vast importance to the human person and opt instead for an anthropology that neglects the value of our physical matter. This idea is becoming especially prevalent in the modern day with the rise of digital personas. Many members of society seemingly exist solely online behind usernames and avatars. Spending all of one’s time in this “realm” can cause one to believe that this is how they “actually” exist. They see themselves and their consciousness as one and the same, treating their biology or physical body as irrelevant to the decisions they make, ultimately stemming from a flawed understanding of the transcendence of the human soul.

Additionally, many members of my generation spend an immense amount of time on social media looking at the lives of other people from a third person perspective. Allowing this to occupy your time elicits the natural reaction to compare oneself to what they see causing reduced self-esteem and empowerment. IBM’s Institute for Business Value conducted a global survey with a sample size of 15,600 Gen-Z members between the ages of 13-21 that showed that 74% of respondents said that they spend their free time outside of school on the internet. The risk of neglect, if not an outright detestation, of one’s body is imminent for countless members of my generation. By grounding their decision making in an accurate metaphysics, Gen-Z can make decisions that are informed by the structures of reality, and thus in line with their nature. They will then in turn increase their agency and ability to become future leaders.

V. A Path Forward

If my diagnosis is correct, and the issues in society truly have a basis in a flawed metaphysical understanding, then we need to take concrete steps to reorient ourselves towards a true understanding of human nature. It is up to each one to figure out what is best for themselves, but in order to begin to restore agency, here are a few helpful tips that I recommend:

1) Cultivate regularly scheduled leisure time. Whether it is playing sports, painting, or simply reading a book because you enjoy it, having fixed times where you can let your soul rest is crucial. It is extremely beneficial if this leisure time is away from screens and even better if it takes place outside. This kind of leisure promotes genuine experience, bringing us closer to the reality that we are created for, while simultaneously ensuring that we do not fall into draining anti-experience that is not truly restful.

2) Push yourself in your professional work. If we are going off an eight hour work day, then roughly one-third of one’s adult life will be spent working. This is no small fraction, and therefore, one must learn to find meaning in their professional work. The primary way is by first developing professional competence, which can only be acquired through diligence. By establishing set times to study your professional field, you are not only becoming more diligent, which will allow you to work more effectively without distraction, but you are actively making a difference in the lives of others.

3) Sacrifice one short-term good each day. Many different desires are constantly competing for our attention and consumption whether they be screens, food, distractions in the workplace, etc. By choosing one short term pleasure each day to sacrifice, you will build a disposition that is comfortable with depriving oneself in the moment for a greater purpose. This disposition is necessary for striving towards our ultimate end.

This list of recommendations is by no means exhaustive, but I believe it is a great start to directing oneself towards experiencing the world in the way that man is designed for. For more practical guidance, Superhabits by Andrew Abela offers helpful advice.

VI. Agency and the Pursuit of Good

[1] ST I, q. 76, a. 1 ; De Anima II

[2] Aristotle, Physics Bk. II, Ch. VIII

[3] Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Bk. I, Ch. VII

[4] https://isidore.co/aquinas/english/summa/FS/FS003.html#FSQ3A1THEP1