The Great Gatsby

The desire for special love and a self-concept apart from God is the desire for death. Jay Gatsby decides at an early age that wealth and success will be his chosen self-concept. Jesus calls the special love relationship the ego’s most boasted gift and when we meet Jay at his mansion years later, we see a man possessed of an idealized vision of his first love, Daisy.

Despite the fact that Daisy and Jay have had no communication for many years and Daisy has married, he has the fixed idea that he can complete himself and fulfill his life dream only with Daisy. Gatsby’s deep sense of lack and unworthiness propel him to build an outrageously wealthy and glamorous lifestyle with which to impress Daisy and win her back.

It’s impossible to possess and love someone at the same time: love gives freely to all. Jay desperately believes that it is possible to change the past, and he tries with all his might. In the end, all roadways of the world lead to death.

The only way out is to accept what is, now. To accept that you have “no control over the world” (T-12.3) and to “let all things be exactly as they are” (W-268) are the keys to freedom and allowing peace to reign. Peace is perfectly attainable; you can experience peace of mind, but you can’t ever have an outcome in form that will truly satisfy you.