- John Kaminski's essay "What Do We Do?" states
our collective predicament succinctly, comprehensively, and with poignant
accuracy. He asks all the right questions, and he asks them in the right
way. Since creative thinking can only arise from the way in which questions
are framed in the first place, this is half the battle. Ultimately, the
very answers we seek are hidden away inside the quality of the questions
we ask. The problem is that few people ask the right questions: the questions
based on the premise that everyone and everything matters. And fewer still
burrow into difficult questions until the concealed inward layer where
answers exist finally becomes apparent. While none of us has the all the
answers, these great questions belong to everyone, and deserve our best
consideration. And although one person can only offer the partial and limited
conclusions of individual character and experience, there is no other place
to begin.
My understanding of what we can do is that we must do what we can. And
we don't know what we can do- until we try. It's no use quailing at our
inadequacy to the task of reinventing civilization. Imperfections are no
excuse in the face of dire necessity. Only through each of us offering
what we know and can do, will we ever understand the great potential inherent
in what we know and can do together.
I believe we can do any number of things. We can begin by accepting the
terrible facts about the way things are right now. By that I don't mean
to agree with any of it, but rather, to accept once and for all that we
really do live in maddening times, and to go on from there. In order to
do this honestly we dearly need those whose gift is to tell us the truth
about the worst. Without the gift of knowing the worst, we can't even begin
to make our peace with the facts.
Then we can discover how to sweeten every aspect of what we have left.
Most of us have a tendency to sink into despair, or to become more or less
permanently angry about what we see. The first big battle then is often
learning how to maintain a reasonable equanimity in the face of ever-increasing
insanity. Negative emotional reaction to rising lunacy is no help, although
most of us experience some degree of this or another. It's far more useful
to tune to the frequency of emotional non-resistance, employing the mind
for understanding and problem solving. And while heart-felt feelings of
any kind are a pure and useful substance for understanding, automatic emotional
reactions are merely the waste products of the solar plexus. Feelings of
the heart exist quite apart from the habitual emotions that serve only
to disguise them. We can't hear the guiding voice of the heart whenever
we are slaves to our own emotions- or anyone else's.
Intensifying self-awareness, and retraining habitual reactions to personal
and world suffering is always a good place to start, and to come back to
on a regular basis. Working on external problems takes our focus away from
ourselves, and that's something most of us experience as a welcome relief.
Except that the conditioned energy we bring to any work will characterize
every bit of it, including whatever subconscious programming we brought
along for the ride. As always, transformation of the world still begins
at home.
We can also keep in mind and heart the inestimable value of all individuals
who are able to care about the whole. Those who can see through the general
craziness are in short supply at the moment, relatively speaking. Whoever
perceives the systemic madness carries a tremendous burden of awareness,
during the most tumultuous and difficult moment in human history. This
is quite a heavy load to bear up under. For some, there is an attending
depth of loneliness and isolation from society that is the exact opposite
of what most people naturally want. Few human beings relish being outcasts
and objects of ridicule in the eyes of those they are trying to help. It
is vital to realize that depth perception and sincere caring adds immense
value to life, regardless of what the majority thinks or says, and irrespective
of what happens outwardly in the world.
From the realization of personal value and personal power, talents and
creativity can be set loose in the direction of problem solving. The proven
ability to find and act on solutions, of any size and in any area of our
lives, generates willpower and a healthy sense of purpose. And it's not
a big leap from having will and a sense of purpose to realizing that we
can use it to help create a new world from the ashes of this one.
Whoever wishes it already has gifts and talents to offer toward the regeneration
of life. This is where the practical changes arise first: as revelations
within our own minds and hearts. Little by little, as each of us finds
a niche where we can fit our talents into this world, change happens. It's
true that in our lifetimes we may not see the results on a scale we would
want. But the greatest lesson of all is to give our best without expectation
of reward, including the reward of seeing the kind of change we hope to
see in our own lifetimes.
We know there is no aspect of our national life that doesn't need transformation.
Each of us represents a microcosm of this larger problem. This also means
that each of us is a small piece of the world already in our power to refashion
and regenerate. The sole antidote to widespread corruption is regeneration.
We begin with ourselves, and move out from there into the world, and then
back again, in an ever-changing polarity of focus. The world can only grow
wiser as we do: no more and no less.
And even now, despite the darkness and the suffocating craziness all around
us, strong green shoots are growing up through the cracks in the walls.
Everywhere we look closely enough, an evolutionary revolution can be found
in the very midst of the chaos. Examples are ubiquitous, and worth nourishing
wherever they are sprouting up. Life is reborn each time a single human
being abandons agreement with the gruesome corporate model of survival.
Whenever factory food in renounced in favor of supporting local organic
farming, a new and viable relationship to earth takes root. Every time
one person changes habitual negative reactions to existence, the face of
humanity has been changed, however modestly. Each instance of telling the
truth about our civilization, in a way that other people can hear, makes
a small dent in the paradigm of denial. Whenever and wherever anyone is
at work on changing the political system, the revolution is already well
underway, then and there. And we know that all these kinds of alterations
are happening every day. We know that there are hundreds of thousands of
people who are participating, in small or large ways, in changing the world
one person at a time: the only way it has ever been done.
The redemption of our society on a grand scale may very well not occur
anytime soon. Nevertheless, the new world is already being built, one person,
one family, and one group at a time. There are innumerable small coteries
of rational people working together in effective ways, already deeply immersed
in regenerating one aspect of the world or another. There are groups dedicated
to alternative living in general, to alternative economics, alternative
medicine, alternative politics, alternative agriculture, alternative energy
and alternative everything else. Experimental models of a better way of
life are quietly arising everywhere, scattered across the landscape, and
for the most part unconnected in our minds. But they are there, and understanding
just how many there are is heartening. The tendency to dismiss the world
of working alternatives, because this world is not yet the prevailing one,
overlooks the natural processes of evolution. The future inevitably shows
up a little at a time. What is new and better always begins on a small
scale, in relative obscurity, and in direct opposition to the prevailing
winds.
Many of us agree that there is a strong likelihood of widespread material
catastrophe coming along one of these days. We believe that this must probably
occur before we will find room and opportunity to build a humane and self-sustaining
social structure on any broad scale. Old consciousness embodying the old
paradigm is crystallized, stubborn, powerful, popular, selfish and stupid
as hell. It shows no signs of willing transformation, and such intransigence
inevitably equates to eventual self-destruction. But even so, this need
not result in our remaining passive: quite the contrary. We might expect
new forms of life to be built for the most part on the ruins of the old
ones. It wouldn't be the first time. And there will never be a better way
of life for everyone if we don't develop specific alternatives ahead of
time, and have a practical portfolio of blueprints to offer. First come
the small-scale experimental models, finding viable new ways of relating
to all forms of life. Only then, when we find out what really works, will
we be fully prepared to build a new country. There are many people working
hard now for the sake of the future we all want to see. And without them,
the ones who begin anew regardless of current conditions, we would have
nothing at all- not now and not later.
The worst-case scenario most of us can imagine is that we might actually
have the power to destroy our own planet. We might prove collectively too
ignorant to learn to live reasonably together and in harmony with our one-and-only
environment. Yet even if that happens, no individual or group effort to
live sanely in this universe was ever wasted. Energy is neither created
nor destroyed: but it can always be transformed, and in this is the beauty
of our existence. Each of us is going to leave this physical body behind
when we go anyway, no matter what. The meaning of our lives here is found
entirely in how we spend them. Planting seeds for the future in the nooks
and crannies of a dysfunctional and dying civilization takes immense courage,
creativity and dedication. No matter what happens next, we can either give
our utmost, despite all opposition, or we will find that we not have lived
at all. And spending our days in the strenuous effort to create the prototypes
of a better world, one small incremental step at a time, in the face of
tremendous obstacles, is a glorious thing to do. We must do what we can,
because no matter what happens next, doing what we can is the right and
beautiful and wise way to live.
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