The holidays, whichever you celebrate at this time, the fast approaching the turning of the year, are already upon us. I am still amazed that another year has gone by, but this year so quickly it seems. What has changed? If you make the mistake of listening to the news, to the worse it would seem. If like me you think that the future can be better, then you see the possibilities coming. Watch your words and thoughts – they show how you think, and how you explain yourself to people. These words show if you are one of those living in fear of the changes coming, or if you are willing, to be a leader to make this the year of transition and transformation. A better world is the hope that we can share.
I came across a parody of a popular Christmas carol by singer Martin Kerr. He pretty much hits the nail squarely on the head. The time to change is now here. Not some mythical future. As comedian and social critic Geoge Carlin said, “Aperson of good intelligence and sensitivity cannot exist in this society very long without having some anger about the inequality – and it’s not just a bleeding-heart, knee-jerk, liberal kind of a thing – it is just a normal human reaction to a nonsensical set of values where we have cinnamon flavored dental floss and there are people sleeping in the street.”
It’s crucial to say NO! No more of greed and corruption. No more hurting ourselves and the Earth. No more doubting our personal sovereign power. We must heal the planet, thereby healing ourselves. It’s as simple as that. Our global society will not and cannot change – it is too locked into exploitive hedonistic materialism. American philosopher, futurist, and self-described social engineer, Jacque Fresco. like so many saw the future as the Hierarchy would guide us to, or another option we have refused to see for so long. He said we are “…wasting energy fighting for rights in broken systems. His solution? Stop patching the cracks and rebuild society from the ground up with equality built into the foundation.”
My five items are my synthesis of years of pondering a path that could get us to a new world without having to ‘fight’ an entrenched hierarchy. It’s as simple – and yet as difficult it seems – as changing your worldview – how you look at the world. Living consciously rather than unconsciously as the puppet masters want to keep you living is the key. My first three items are predicated upon this notion, with item 1 being the crux start. To recap: item number one: Mindfulness. We must start being mindful and conscious of every thought and action. A question to ask yourself every day,” What will the world look like when we are all enlightened, and practice mindfulness.” Item number two: New Economics. Since the 1980s, the world has been caught in a whirlwind of economic transformation called ‘Globalization.’ While it has had many benefits, one major consequence has been the erosion of local economic systems, knowledge, and supply chains (e.g., The Walmart Effect). Item number three: New Metrics: Redefine what success means for your community.
The linked graphic shows the main difference in the two primary worldviews I talk about – the ego-human wrapped up in competitive global material hyper-consumerism that believes humans are the top of the pyramid of life, and the opposite eco-human living as part of the mutualistic global ecological system. The simple difference: an old meme that expresses a belief humanity is first and foremost here to exploit the world, and a new meme that humanity is a part of the system endowed to practice full stewardship. Our intelligence gave us the ability to choose. We have convinced through long conditioning to accept the former, but the latter is just a choice away. The human heart that has long living in fear, creating hate and separation, also responds to the quiet invitations of kindness, courage, forgiveness, wonder, tenderness, and the simple act of listening. Nothing hard or magical, just a choice to live our better angels, instead of our worse devils.
Throughout the world in whatever faith or philosophy dominates, there exists the cause of how we have been controlled. We have been led to follow a hedonistic mindset, known in the west as the seven deadly sins of: pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust, gluttony, and sloth. This has led us to rely on the hierarchical systems to provide for us, instead of us relying on ourselves and being sovereign and resilient. I offer the two technological steps to begin that transformation: Item number four: Food resiliency. This is important since true resilience means creative thinking about how communities regenerate themselves for self-sufficiency. Item number five: Energy resiliency. Our lives revolve around technology that uses energy, and we need to control it at the local level. If we locally control our food and energy – living ecologically – the systems will reset themselves. No longer a ‘Conquest of Paradise,’ but a Reconnection to it. Looking again at the ideas from Robin Wall Kemmerer (RWK) we come to see the indigenous worldview as a teacher – something that Aldo Leopold also encouraged with his ‘Land Ethic’ – we see land, “…not as a machine but as a community of respected non-human persons to whom humans have [an ethical] responsibility. Restoration requires renewing the capacity not only for ‘ecosystem services’ but for ‘cultural services as well… Biocultural restoration raises the bar for environmental quality of the reference ecosystem, so that as we care for the land, it can once again care for us.”
Renowned naturalist E.O. Wilson said, “There can be no purpose more inspiring than to begin the age of restoration, reweaving the wondrous diversity of life that surrounds us.” Environmental activist, Joanna Macy, talks about the changes coming as the potential for the ‘Great Turning’ – “the essential adventure of our time; the shift from the Industrial Growth Society to a Life-Sustaining civilization.” Note, she says a shift from a society to a civilization. Daniel Quinn makes this distinction slightly differently in how he says, we need to transform from our current destructive civilization to go ‘Beyond Civilization.’ “Action on behalf of life transforms. Because the relationship between self and the world is reciprocal, it is not a question of first getting enlightened or saved and then acting. As we work to heal the earth, the earth heals us” RWK. In a nutshell, they all (including myself) talk about the rebirth of a spiritual connection to the world – seeing the connection as sacred and not just transactional. “Only when people understand the symbolic relationships that sustain them can they become people… capable of gratitude and reciprocity” RWK.
Our knowledge of the natural world comes from science. Yet, while science itself is essentially neutral, the translators upon which we rely use language are coupled with hedonistic economic-technological values, we should not be surprised that we are in the global fix we find ourselves within. “For what good is knowing, unless it is coupled with caring? Science can give us knowing, but caring comes from someplace else” RWK. As I have emphasized often, “It is not more data that we need for our transformation to people [of the world], but more wisdom” RWK. She continues to critique not science per se but the, “scientific worldview, the illusions of dominance and control, the separation of knowledge from responsibility.”
The natural world speaks to us all the time, but the language is subtle. It is up to us, the humans that care to make the changes. We are the ones that use words to convey ideas of connection and caring. “Language is our gift and our responsibility… Words to remember old stories, words to tell new stories, stories that bring science and spirit back together to nurture our becoming people [of the world]” RWK. The technology to heal the world exists already. But we have to make the decisions from an eco-centric standpoint that is not economically driven by a globally controlled market economy. And that will only happen locally, where WE can control it.
To Be Continued …………..
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