Existentialist anxiety is the vertigo of realizing one’s own freedom

Evidence

Sartre read Kierkegaard, and was fascinated by his contrarian spirit and by his rebellion against the grand philosophical systems of the past. He also borrowed Kierkegaard’s specific use of the word ‘existence’ to denote the human way of being, in which we mould ourselves by making ‘either/or’ choices at every step. Sartre agreed with him that this constant choosing brings a pervasive anxiety, not unlike the vertigo that comes from looking over a cliff. It is not the fear of falling so much as the fear that you can’t trust yourself not to throw yourself off. Your head spins; you want to cling to something, to tie yourself down — but you can’t secure yourself so easily against the dangers that come with being free. ‘Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom’, wrote Kierkegaard. Our whole lives are lived on the edge of that precipice, in his view and also in Sartre’s. — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 61

Sartre agreed with him that this constant choosing brings a pervasive anxiety, not unlike the vertigo that comes from looking over a cliff. It is not the fear of falling so much as the fear that you can’t trust yourself not to throw yourself off. Your head spins; you want to cling to something, to tie yourself down — but you can’t secure yourself so easily against the dangers that come with being free. ‘Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom’, wrote Kierkegaard. Our whole lives are lived on the edge of that precipice, in his view and also in Sartre’s. — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 61

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines the central existentialist concept of anxiety as freedom’s dizziness, distinguishing it from literal fear of falling.
• XREF: The cliff-vertigo account of anxiety will power much of Sartre’s later conception of bad faith and freedom in Being and Nothingness. — connects to: Anguish is consciousness of being one’s own future in the mode of not-being — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 239; Anguish is freedom’s self-apprehension, opposed to the serious man’s faith in external values — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 253; Existential psychoanalysis decodes behavior to reveal each person’s fundamental choice of being. — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 1346 (+10 more)
• DEEPTHINKING: The insight that anxiety is not fear of falling but distrust of one’s own freedom is genuinely paradigm-shifting about how choice feels.
• CANDY: The cliff/vertigo metaphor of anxiety about freedom is a quotable, self-contained image.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café: Freedom,…, 61

Broader Connections

• Anxiety about freedom drives subjects to alienate themselves in things #expands (0.95) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 128
• Realizing one’s radical freedom produces anxiety, not liberation #corroborates (0.92) — Sarah Bakewell, At the Existentialist Café, 501
• Existential anxiety increases religious conviction while appeased anxiety weakens it #complicates (0.80) — Norenzayan, Ara, Big gods - how religion transformed…, 615
• Fear of freedom masks itself as defense of the status quo #expands (0.80) — Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, 78
• Existential worries intensify religious belief and their appeasement diminishes it #complicates (0.80)
• Moral anxiety is intrinsic to existence, not imposed from outside #corroborates (0.75)