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Core Issue

Since my teens, reading Fritjof Capra, Jung, Jes Bertelsen, and others, it was clear to me that one of the core issues in western culture is blind dualism. And I keep rediscovering it in new ways.

Origins
The origins of our blindly dualistic worldview has been described by many. It may have started with agriculture, although the main shift seems to have come with patriarchy and masculine gods. Judaism, and later Christianity and Islam, all grew out of and perpetuated this worldview.

This is a worldview that has a split at its core: God vs. creation, male head vs. females/children, humans vs. nature, soul vs. body, good vs. evil, etc.

And it is a worldview that springs from and triggers fear and deep alienation.

Results
An experience of a split world creates a long line of consequences. Consequences we are all too familiar with...

From alienation and fear...

We feel we need to dominate and control nature (from which science and technology springs).

We feel we need to dominate other human beings (power-over rather than power-with).

We have created a social system, reflected in all social institutions (including schools), that operate from a power-over view.

We cling to abstract ideas rather than our direct experiences.

We hold onto ideas and images, rather than being comfortable with the always changing now.

We see something as "good" and something else as "evil", and try to eliminate the "evil" in ourselves and others.

We split ourselves from ourselves (parts of our mind and our body) and the rest of the world.

We are not comfortable with life and ourselves as we are...

We run around trying to "fix" something - through consumerism, self-righteousness, escapism, addictions (including to new approaches to healing), and much more.

We choose from fear, rather than from what is life-affirming...

Change
It is deeply tragic, and it is the engine of our civilization. It is the tool with which we may kill ourselves, unless there is another shift.

And there are many tools for the changes required. Some of which are outlined other places in this journal (breema, trans-dual practices such as Big Mind, working with projections, deep democracy, non-violent communication, etc).

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