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Transforming to a New Mythology
Published on 30/03/16
by randy
Since the beginning of man, the predominant myth was “us vs. them”. We’ve been programmed to live in a mindset of conquest. There are those who win and those who lose. The warrior was time honored and we were taught to believe the harm we caused our perceived enemy had little or no negative consequence upon us. I suppose the gift of modern technology is in showing us how flawed this myth is. The reduced value of conquest was most blatantly shown with the introduction of the atomic bomb. It became clear that what we do to each other we do to ourselves. With the strength of today’s nuclear weapons there is no winner. No conquest. With the further advent of communications and transportation we see there’s simply no way to live in an isolated universe. Those who cling to the old mythology try with all their power to insulate their subjects from the transforming paradigm. We can see the resistance to change in Saudi Arabia, Iran, North Korea and many within our country who would attempt to build walls rather than bridges. No doubt, the pace of change is accelerating and it’s only human nature to want to cling to the old mythology. Yet, it’s the closed mind that refuses to open to a broader global consciousness that threatens the existence of us all.
When I was younger I thought an invasion from outer space would bring us together. It was clear we needed to get bigger than our differences. The Cuban missile crisis, Vietnam and now the vague war on terror have woken many to the fog of war and the conquest mind. As a child I relished the game of Monopoly. It coached me well in the conquest mind and greed. Today I find it humorous that many of those who won that game in real life have come together to see how they can give their wealth away for the betterment of humanity. They are some of the clearest examples of this transformation from fear and greed to healing and nurturing.
The new mythology is not based upon attack and separation. It’s based on communication and the desire to understand and join together in the pursuit of a higher quality of life for all things and beings. It recognizes that everything is connected and no one is immune from the pain and consequence of selfish actions. This new paradigm has been perceived as ‘soft’ by the divided conquering mind. It will do all it can to hang on to it’s perceived notion of dominance. Yet, there’s no escape. Those who hang to their belief in holding ‘the right religion’ clearly see their future is threatened as the old military mythology is promoted. Those who cling to wealth from the use of polluting fossil fuels will tire of insulating themselves from air too dirty to breath. Those who hold the belief that climate change is to be ignored will see their beach front property flood. Those who would deny education and health care to the poor will see anarchy from the uneducated and the spread of disease from those we refuse to care for. The old mythology necessarily imprisons the conquerer in fear of being conquered through their ignorance of our interdependence.
While the old mythology was based on the divided mind, the new mythology puts emphasis to the wholeness of the living experience. The old mind is caught with individualistic survival thinking and the new mythology would be driven through collaboration and communication. This transformation is happening, being pushed along with greater speed by the closed minded actions of today’s militarists and right wing. We can see the threat brought to our freedoms and our very planetary existence. I believe we can all agree that we’re living in uncertain times. We’re living in times that require balanced actions that carefully consider the experience of those we perceive as our enemies. The most dangerous words we can say to each other are, “I know that”. It’s the clear mark of the closed mind. The new paradigm recognizes the need to empathize, to seek understanding, and to work together for peace and harmony. The new paradigm invites us to sit together in silence before taking actions from old paradigm thinking. It places deeper respect to one another, surrenders the righteous thinking/belief of the conquest mind, and moves to wholeness.
Our current political setup shows us clearly how we’ve outgrown the old mythology. Like a cancer, our various political parties fight one another to the level of disfunction at a time when we need dramatic stewarding actions. Our supposed system of checks and balances has cracked as fixed beliefs/ideology block us from our curiosity to find better solutions. The new mythology would put a media emphasis upon those trained in the skills of dialog and open minded diplomacy. It would be dominated by exploration from questions like, “What do you want?”, “What do you think we can do together?”, “Tell us more.”, “We hear you saying you want __________. Is that correct?”, “We hear you say you expected ______________, but you got ________________. So now what?” The new paradigm would show us more interviews like this. The new paradigm would see this as the most important skill our world leaders could hold.
The old view, driven from fear, greed and ignorance of our interdependence, is the view of “No.” The new, global consciousness is driven from the “Yes” to belonging. It puts focus upon how we can serve one another as the turbulence of climate change, rapidly advancing technologies, a widening wealth/power gap and warfare to mention a few, threaten us all. It’s time to ‘just be’ as we discover the bubbling up of real questions and solutions rather than the absurdity of the questions currently being asked from our political candidates. Big money in politics has failed us. Profit driven education and health care without moral conscience have failed us. Devoting most of our national budget to military expense has failed us. Distracting our populace with conquest sports entertainment has put us to sleep. Numbing the populace to TV, drugs and bad foods has failed us. Pushing ideology has failed us. Arming our populace with guns has failed us. Ignoring the stewardship of our environment has failed us. Lobbyists and special interests have failed us. It’s time to wake up to the global consciousness myth before it’s too late. It’s time to sit together, to join, to communicate, to breath the same air in gratitude for the opportunity to participate in our healing.
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