Dismantling Dysfunctional Society
The real solution is bigger than "just" solving sexual abuse. The whole dysfunctional society is connected to the issue of sexual abuse like a hologram. And each one of our selves is connected to the macrocosm as well. Society is you and is me.
Tearing down the edifice of the culture that provides for us, while it also destroys us in steady and sneaky and diabolically colossal ways, starts by tearing down the misconceptions in ourselves. It turns out that having an experience like sexual abuse to heal from and learn from gives us insight into the workings of exploitation mentality, anywhere, as it applies the same patterns of thinking and information-distorting methods to the extraction of resources from the living world. Rape of people, rape of nature, they are two branches of the same tree.
It is honestly said that our nation/our world is beset with a thousand problems, all interlinking. My message is that the problem is not the thousand problems, its the one thing in common with all those thousand problems. Its a style of thinking that created all those problems. There is a disease of dysfunctional thinking that has affected us people and we have not yet named the features or charted the fabric. It is thinking fragmented, cognition that narrows down on "this" while it blocks out "that", is centered around protecting our petty illusions, that rejects conflicting evidence with violent outburst, that confuses the SYMBOL for the THING. Its the inability to hear the truth, and the unwillingness to tell the truth.
We aren't born as liars. Telling truth is a dangerous thing in a neurotic world, such as it is. Children are hazed into society as they form their false self to survive.
The cure is therefore, learning to recognize the patterns in ourselves and each other, understanding and forming practices, groups and alliances to dispel and dis-empower that style of thinking and acting. Therapeutic intervention is about removing illusions and facing the truth. Ultimately the truth is we have the power to heal ourselves and our world.
Think what that would be like... if the purpose of assembly is the practice of telling truth, and how to set the stage to make it (or realize it already is) safe to do so. It might not feel safe momentarily, when another illusion crumbles because you are finally getting honest feedback, but that transition passes and the genuine intimacy people experience when completely honest with one another is worth more than the illusions we used to cherish. We can learn the value of that process and roll with it.
I see a waking-up, a burgeoning civil disobedience that starts in the self, as each self uproots the agents of oppression within their own heads. Within the family and circle of friends the realignment continues. And a blossoming up of the same dynamic, people standing up into their sovereignty and just saying no to the things that no longer fit. This disintegrates toxic industry from all sides. What if they gave a war and nobody showed up?
I do believe that there can be watershed events that catalyze a collective awakening. The applied-human-rights series of events described in this collection of essays are candidates for just such a catalytic process. The institutions of religion and of government hold together many assumptions about what reality is, and what we can expect. The notions we now use for government and religion are primitive; and the results are consistently falling short of a humanely conscious way. People cling to outdated ideas, regardless of whether they serve, out of fear and negative conditioning. But everywhere and in everyone is a kernel of hope that can be ignited when somebody demonstrates a new avenue of human development. The process of sanctuary by a Circle of Friends, and the personal interpretation of the Bill of Rights can be our opening into a renaissance of awareness. It is also a function of whether the time is right for such an evolution to occur. The time is right, is it not?
Tearing down the edifice of the culture that provides for us, while it also destroys us in steady and sneaky and diabolically colossal ways, starts by tearing down the misconceptions in ourselves. It turns out that having an experience like sexual abuse to heal from and learn from gives us insight into the workings of exploitation mentality, anywhere, as it applies the same patterns of thinking and information-distorting methods to the extraction of resources from the living world. Rape of people, rape of nature, they are two branches of the same tree.
It is honestly said that our nation/our world is beset with a thousand problems, all interlinking. My message is that the problem is not the thousand problems, its the one thing in common with all those thousand problems. Its a style of thinking that created all those problems. There is a disease of dysfunctional thinking that has affected us people and we have not yet named the features or charted the fabric. It is thinking fragmented, cognition that narrows down on "this" while it blocks out "that", is centered around protecting our petty illusions, that rejects conflicting evidence with violent outburst, that confuses the SYMBOL for the THING. Its the inability to hear the truth, and the unwillingness to tell the truth.
We aren't born as liars. Telling truth is a dangerous thing in a neurotic world, such as it is. Children are hazed into society as they form their false self to survive.
The cure is therefore, learning to recognize the patterns in ourselves and each other, understanding and forming practices, groups and alliances to dispel and dis-empower that style of thinking and acting. Therapeutic intervention is about removing illusions and facing the truth. Ultimately the truth is we have the power to heal ourselves and our world.
Think what that would be like... if the purpose of assembly is the practice of telling truth, and how to set the stage to make it (or realize it already is) safe to do so. It might not feel safe momentarily, when another illusion crumbles because you are finally getting honest feedback, but that transition passes and the genuine intimacy people experience when completely honest with one another is worth more than the illusions we used to cherish. We can learn the value of that process and roll with it.
I see a waking-up, a burgeoning civil disobedience that starts in the self, as each self uproots the agents of oppression within their own heads. Within the family and circle of friends the realignment continues. And a blossoming up of the same dynamic, people standing up into their sovereignty and just saying no to the things that no longer fit. This disintegrates toxic industry from all sides. What if they gave a war and nobody showed up?
I do believe that there can be watershed events that catalyze a collective awakening. The applied-human-rights series of events described in this collection of essays are candidates for just such a catalytic process. The institutions of religion and of government hold together many assumptions about what reality is, and what we can expect. The notions we now use for government and religion are primitive; and the results are consistently falling short of a humanely conscious way. People cling to outdated ideas, regardless of whether they serve, out of fear and negative conditioning. But everywhere and in everyone is a kernel of hope that can be ignited when somebody demonstrates a new avenue of human development. The process of sanctuary by a Circle of Friends, and the personal interpretation of the Bill of Rights can be our opening into a renaissance of awareness. It is also a function of whether the time is right for such an evolution to occur. The time is right, is it not?
