The White Lotus: Searching for Destiny in a Nihilistic World
Costantino Esposito - Can a television series raise an issue that is usually ignored, such as the meaning of our existence in the world? Yes, it is possible if we are talking about The White Lotus, the HBO series now in its third season, which powerfully brings to the fore an issue that would have been considered inappropriate or impossible to resolve—like a deep wound that never heals or a secret desire that is never confessed. But in the end, it emerges and allows us to recognize in the story the drama and, at the same time, the charm of our own selves: that is, of a being that is “woven” from destiny. That is never simply what it is or what it does, what it must be or what it must do, but is a continuous search for the meaning of its own being and the purpose of its own actions.
The narrative format is repeated, as in the two previous seasons: a luxury resort, this time in Thailand, where a group of rich and successful people find themselves, whose glossy vacation hides all the insecurity, fragility, and repressed violence that has settled in their hearts from a lifetime of seeking power and success at any cost. People who are ‘fulfilled’ in terms of their social and economic status but often terribly ‘unfulfilled’ in their desire for happiness and their need to be loved.
What is the fate of these people? Mike White, the author of this story, seems to ask himself. It is revealed and, at the same time, hidden in events, encounters, circumstances of life, and even in that microcosm that is a tourist village, where, like fish in an aquarium, people reveal all their expectations, fears, and neuroses. A perfect ‘nihilistic’ aquarium, if you will, where everything works at the sometimes unsustainable price of stress that corrodes life to its core.
It is precisely in a dialogue between Rick Hatchett—a restless and feverish fifty-year-old on vacation with Chelsea, his young girlfriend—and Amrita, a specialist in anti-stress meditation, that the burning point of the issue is revealed in the second episode. Amrita asks Rick if there has ever been a moment in his life when he felt truly free, and when he answers no, she presses him further: not even when he was a child? He replies that his mother was a drug addict who died when he was ten, and his father was killed before he was born. The instructor then firmly invites him to detach himself from his “identity,” that is, from his own “self,” because that is where the source of his discomfort lies. Rick, with disarming sincerity—which is worth more than many psychological analyses and strategies—replies, “But I don’t have an identity. I don’t have to detach myself from anything because I am nothing. I never had an identity. I don’t need to detach. I’m already nothing.” The de facto nihilism of the rich and dissatisfied Westerner surpasses the therapeutic nihilism of Eastern meditation. And when Amrita objects that this could be an illusion he is telling himself, Rick adds: “If nobody puts gas in the tank, the tank is empty. This is not an illusion; the car won’t start. Nothing comes from nothing.”
The real problem is not getting rid of one’s “self,” but rather not having a self. The realistic observation remains that an engine cannot start if it is empty, if it is not filled with something that moves it: something that happens or someone who comes to meet us, who changes nothingness into being. And that makes us discover the self that we are, a reality that is given to us, which cannot be suppressed or reduced to what we claim to make of it or what we fail to achieve. Our self is not in our power; and the most obvious sign of this is our irrevocable desire for happiness.
Several other stories intersect and intertwine in The White Lotus, each in search of that meaning of life, that ‘destiny’ of which we are made but which is often so difficult or painful to decipher. But it is also the only possibility for the violence that arises from meaninglessness to be transformed, I would almost say ‘redeemed,’ by the peace that comes from saying ‘yes’ to reality. But, to stick with the particular story we have chosen as emblematic, in the last episode, Chelsea finds ‘her’ Rick again after a highly dramatic ordeal. “You’re free now,” she tells him, “it’s a new beginning (...). I love you. I always had hope, because of amor fati. You know what that means? That we have to accept our destiny, good or bad, and not try to change it.”
Here, the focus is ingeniously placed on what seems to be the only possible liberation from the anxiety of wanting to determine our own destiny and the inevitable frustration of not being able to do so. But love for fate can never be confused—even if it would be so convenient and reassuring—with fatalistic resignation. It takes an ‘I’ for there to be destiny, for the ultimate meaning of life to be recognized—fought for, rejected, or ultimately accepted. Love for being cannot arise from someone who is ‘nothing.’ If nothing comes from nothing, only life can give rise to life.
It is no coincidence that in the poignant final scene, which brings together all the stories we have seen unfold until the final violence and a new peace, a new beginning, the moving melody of an ancient choral song plays, singing “Lo, how a rose e’er blooming”: “Behold, a rose has sprouted from the stem of Jesse. A bright flower has blossomed in the cold of winter, when the night was ending.” Destiny is not something necessary that cannot be changed, but an event that can change us.