If we were to zoom out on history as far back as we could we would see that the same problems have plagued our existance since the beginning. The idea of war and of the survival of the fittest has been a part of our experience throughout all recorded history.
In today’s society you feel a pressure to protest things. To raise your voice and repost the instagram stories. But I just can’t help but think of all of history and how there have been protest after protest after protest, opposing sides acting as the fuel for their enemies cause and vice versa. Sometimes I wonder if it is our very participation in these matters in a way continues to fuel the problem… Just like in an argument amongst individuals. A bitter pill I’ve had to swallow is realizing that when there is a drama happening in front of me, it is only because I continued to return the volley over the net… each turn growing with more and more force and hostility between me and my so called enemy.
I find it an interesting stance that Mother Theresa took, to never participate in anti-war rallies, and only peace rallies, as she believed it was only helpful to participate in a positive message (creating) versus a negative one (tearing down). Negative actions tends to have a spiraling affect, until quite literally we are willing to end life in order to hold on to our point of view. In my recent years in Atlanta I saw situations turn from minor slights, to habored hatred, to ending life… all to be right in the end… and to hold on to our need to feel right.
Nowadays I hear people complain all day about the state of this world and about the evil of the “other" - the men, the women, the democrats, the republicans, the president and elon… i don’t even know anymore. just whatever the algorithm daily instructs my conviction to be.
The depth of what is happening to us cannot be understated, that we are further being disconnected from a genuine sense of responsibility over our real lives and the immediate world we live in… made to feel completely helpless against the circumstance of the “world” that is presented to us each day through our routine channels. Nowadays everyone presumes to knows everything, including the sum of an individual based on their instagram profile. It has become frightfully superficial.
One of the greatest lies that I believe has been the cause of such demise of societies over and over and over again is this idea that our enemy lies in anyone else except ourselves. It is only when we, on the individual level, begin to exemplify, in action, positive alternatives the very things we hate in this world, will we then begin to take steps towards a true healing. To break the cycle and open up new possibilities for the future other than the continued destruction of life.
I been asking myself recently. “what will you create?”