A Place to Start
posted by Sean Burkholder | June 2, 2009
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IcerocketI'd like to begin my participation here at Evolver with a question:
Knowing what we know today, why are we doing what we're doing?
This question can be applied to the collectivity of our species, and also individually. It is important to be aware that there is no judgment in this question, but quite simply a sincere request for each individual - who makes up the collective - to just look. Because in the looking, in a simple, clear, inquiring look, it is possible for just about everyone to see that, at some level, we - collectively and individually - know better.
So why aren't we doing better? Why do we continue to make excuses for doing so many things that we know are destructive, damaging, life-degenerating, conflict-creating? Why? When we know better, is there any excuse good enough to continue with something else that we know is degenerative? Any excuse at all?
The signs and indications that the excuses aren't holding up are everywhere. Yet the "leaders" who have been sanctioned to make decisions for the good of the people they serve are not making decisions that are good for those people. Again, there is no judgment in this observation...it's just an observation. It's as plain as the sun in the sky on a sunny day. Suffering on and individual and collective level, in the world of people and in the world at large, is greater than ever.
When I point this out to people though, I get little more than weak complaints, excuses, shrugging shoulders. What's a person to do? The state of disempowerment that people have in relationship to their own lives is extreme. Very few feel or believe that they are able to take responsibility and make their own changes. But where has this personal power gone, why is it absent?
It has been given to the aforementioned "leaders", who exist at many levels of human society. Yet ask a person if they would "give" that responsibility, that power to those people, and most would say "no". Nevertheless, consciously or unconsciously, it is being given, and given freely. If one does not question why s/he pays taxes, buys permits, asks for permission to simply be, it does not change the fact that participation in the present infrastructure endorses the continued existence of it, willingly or not.
For now, this is an exploration, an opening of a dialogue (polylogue?) to bring awareness to the places and domains of personal and collective experience, to introduce perspectives and tools useable by anyone, that can facilitate a shift in consciousness that seems to be utterly necessary at this time. More to follow...
Comments
One of the challenges of
— Sep 29, 2009
One of the challenges of language is that we use it to judge. Someone once quoted Osho as saying, "Every word is a judgment." So to the end that one sees judgment in what is said, I suppose that judgment is a part of that person's way of perceiving. Getting caught up on the words rather than looking to what the words point at is a challenge we all face, because we live in a society built upon language and description.
I use language as a tool to direct the attention of awareness to the process underlying action/activity. So while your points are valid and worth asking - thank you! - I feel quite clear that these questions that I've posed are not loaded with judgment. But it's important to find that out. Quotation marks and italics indeed highlight focal points. "Leaders" for example...I draw additional attention to this "role" because we have been and continue to be led in a manner that is creating great suffering and destruction. Observations, not judgments. Furthermore, a great many follow, against their own inner knowing, and in the following, create the suffering and destruction. What then is the role of "leader", and what right do any have to complain who participate? More excuses...
Anyhow, I agree with you...this seems like an incredible focal and gathering point here at Evolver, and I look forward to participating. Thank you for sharing.
In response to why do we allow the state of things etc.,
— Mar 04, 2010
Hello Sean, a pleasure to read your thoughts on this ? This is something that can boggle the mind. It makes me think of an idea for a bumper sticker/tee shirt i had: "Let go my ego" I am not surprised I found this blog in Psychedelic Society because it is much harder for those of us who who have experienced altered states of consciousness to grasp the state of things. Things like a society that spawns war, incarceration of those who seek to expand their minds, corporate profit over human life, power, money and materialism as equalling success. As far as language and the battle of words, meanings, what was truly meant by them, and translation; language as a medium is not usually able to convey the level of depth necessary to evoke emotion or sane reasoning even when delivered truthfully and backed up with facts. A quote from George Carlin "By and large, language is a tool for concealing the truth". Recently I was excited for change in our country only to see our "we the people" majority agenda destroyed by evil men choosing riches for the very few over death and suffering for masses/the serfs. But I know better than to let this bother me, lately I've been challenged to maintain the state of consciousness that beams light, healing and love. So anyway, to make the loop "why this society that clearly knows better does what it does"( i'm sure that's not word for word), is simply because so many are living in fear, the walking dead and they have never let go of their ego, and because of this they can not see inside themselves or outside themselves as they should or experience empathy for the suffering they bring to others and our planet. During altered states I (we) have communicated with others, without words or need for language, once you have done, you realize where we must be headed as a collective conscious and how exciting it is.
