The spring or adolescent phase in life cycles is about individuation, knowing and defining a WAY.
To understand our unity with the Great Spirit, we must sometimes define our truths and separate ourselves.
Here there we see dualism, good and bad, positive and negative. We connect from our individuation.
We fully immerse ourselves in this exploration, so as to understand our place in the greater cycles and spirals of life.
First there is NO WAY, then there is THE WAY, then there is no way.
To understand our unity with the Great Spirit, we must sometimes define our truths and separate ourselves.
Here there we see dualism, good and bad, positive and negative. We connect from our individuation.
We fully immerse ourselves in this exploration, so as to understand our place in the greater cycles and spirals of life.
First there is NO WAY, then there is THE WAY, then there is no way.
Branches, Twigs, Leaves and Flowers
As our experience and knowledge grew over the last 8.000 years, we began to have experiences of 'controlling' nature. Our ancestors fought hunger and cold, invented tools, planted and harvested, managed animals, built physical, philosophical and social structures, … Then we declared 'ownership' over these, and over nature and the Earth herself, defending our structures, tribes and resources, …
Now we developed separate identities branching away from nature. We want to head for the light, to break free from the dark Earth, roots and old trunk. We begin to see ourselves as separate from and superior to nature and to other species and cultures. We develop great attachment to our particular 'twig'. We create ever more complex 'twigs' of sciences, laws, sub-cultures, medicine, therapies, …. religions and politics … ever more complicated separation … attempting to know and control the ever finer details of nature and human nature. We believe that with 'our' sciences, politics and systems we can solve everything. We believe ourselves to be superior and that the gods take second place. Now our conflicts and crises are more related to these separations from our roots and between each other. We attack and defend ourselves and our systems from other remote branches … forgetting that we are all from the same roots. Leaves reach up to the sun, looking for the same light and the truth. We idealise our flowers, remote from the roots, that have forgotten, and even reject, their origins. They show off and compete for attention. The adolescent arrogantly thinks they know everything, that they are better than and different to their parents.
But it is natural that we attach ourselves onto these branches of groups, beliefs and systems. It is natural that we struggle to know and control our environment, defining ourselves as different and separate. Of course we will become attached to some systems and beliefs along the way. This immersion, and even addiction, believing that we can know and control nature, is an essential phase in our evolutionary and learning cycle. Our modern culture is living the crises of this phase. There are many modern practices which still have some essence of connection to our roots, but in most therapies, religions, political, ecological and holistic practices we find this same competitive arrogance. Each define and defend their version of the good, the positive and the truth.
Some of the confusion in the life of the adolescent adult is in on one hand we are actually adult, a parent, a teacher, having a job and paying the bills, even being a manager, leader or therapist. We feel very grown up. However we also have our inner child with its fears, defence mechanisms and conditioned responses. This packet of inner voices will usually become apparent as we act in the world. We will experience some relationship and social conflicts with our own or other groups, theories and systems – inter party conflicts – conflicts between branches. We might notice where our chosen group marginalises or damages some people or the environment.
In adolescence we want to believe the truths of our chosen branches and paths even when we begin to notice the conflicts. Remember how we all live in our particular trance, described in the page about Altered States of Consciousness. In our modern consumerist addiction we squirm a bit, comfortable in our discomfort so unable to take the risk of fully looking at what is going on and letting go the infantile dependencies. We are stuck in “the unbearable lightness of being” until life gives us a nudge.
These tensions and conflicts are our guides and opportunities to bring more consciousness and love. When there is sufficient love and containment around any conflicts that emerge then we can 'die' and learn, revise and expand our consciousness. In No Way we might use a range of modern psychologies, sciences and tools as long as their use is clearly rooted in harmony with natural cycles. It is important to learn from all sciences, philosophies and practices, to immerse ourselves in deep exploration, without attachment to any. This is possible within a compassionate holding environment.
NO WAY has no truth, no good, no bad, ... nothing special. Just one hand clapping and a bit of dried shit on a stick.
Now we developed separate identities branching away from nature. We want to head for the light, to break free from the dark Earth, roots and old trunk. We begin to see ourselves as separate from and superior to nature and to other species and cultures. We develop great attachment to our particular 'twig'. We create ever more complex 'twigs' of sciences, laws, sub-cultures, medicine, therapies, …. religions and politics … ever more complicated separation … attempting to know and control the ever finer details of nature and human nature. We believe that with 'our' sciences, politics and systems we can solve everything. We believe ourselves to be superior and that the gods take second place. Now our conflicts and crises are more related to these separations from our roots and between each other. We attack and defend ourselves and our systems from other remote branches … forgetting that we are all from the same roots. Leaves reach up to the sun, looking for the same light and the truth. We idealise our flowers, remote from the roots, that have forgotten, and even reject, their origins. They show off and compete for attention. The adolescent arrogantly thinks they know everything, that they are better than and different to their parents.
But it is natural that we attach ourselves onto these branches of groups, beliefs and systems. It is natural that we struggle to know and control our environment, defining ourselves as different and separate. Of course we will become attached to some systems and beliefs along the way. This immersion, and even addiction, believing that we can know and control nature, is an essential phase in our evolutionary and learning cycle. Our modern culture is living the crises of this phase. There are many modern practices which still have some essence of connection to our roots, but in most therapies, religions, political, ecological and holistic practices we find this same competitive arrogance. Each define and defend their version of the good, the positive and the truth.
Some of the confusion in the life of the adolescent adult is in on one hand we are actually adult, a parent, a teacher, having a job and paying the bills, even being a manager, leader or therapist. We feel very grown up. However we also have our inner child with its fears, defence mechanisms and conditioned responses. This packet of inner voices will usually become apparent as we act in the world. We will experience some relationship and social conflicts with our own or other groups, theories and systems – inter party conflicts – conflicts between branches. We might notice where our chosen group marginalises or damages some people or the environment.
In adolescence we want to believe the truths of our chosen branches and paths even when we begin to notice the conflicts. Remember how we all live in our particular trance, described in the page about Altered States of Consciousness. In our modern consumerist addiction we squirm a bit, comfortable in our discomfort so unable to take the risk of fully looking at what is going on and letting go the infantile dependencies. We are stuck in “the unbearable lightness of being” until life gives us a nudge.
These tensions and conflicts are our guides and opportunities to bring more consciousness and love. When there is sufficient love and containment around any conflicts that emerge then we can 'die' and learn, revise and expand our consciousness. In No Way we might use a range of modern psychologies, sciences and tools as long as their use is clearly rooted in harmony with natural cycles. It is important to learn from all sciences, philosophies and practices, to immerse ourselves in deep exploration, without attachment to any. This is possible within a compassionate holding environment.
NO WAY has no truth, no good, no bad, ... nothing special. Just one hand clapping and a bit of dried shit on a stick.
The Modern World
Our modern Western lifestyle is very adolescent. We believe ourselves to be above nature. We believe that we can control everything. We still believe our race, culture, democracy, religion, etc. … to be superior to others. Even those who identify with green ecology, with savings or pension in an ethical investment company, following alternative spiritual paths etc can have a 'holier than thou' attitude. Our modern culture seems to be trapped in a kind of adolescent struggle for control and freedom … but we are simply being manipulated into more subtle forms of addiction ... In the same way that the Punk movement became just another fashion. Even our schooling is a part of shunting children into an unreal world, ensuring their sense of isolation and dependence as adults.
Western exploitation of other cultures and the natural resources has meant that we now live in a relative comfortable abundance. Our western European economy, 'the National Interest', that is our jobs, our health service, our education service and our pensions, have been built upon and are still dependent upon the massive exploitation, robbery of land and resources, slavery of workers … in the lands we 'liberated from heathenism', exchanging our bibles for ownership of their land, oil and gold. In our Western comfort we have become dependent … addictively so ... on this ongoing, legalised destructive exploitation. The big banks, investment and pension companies that generate income for our governments depend upon this. Our style of living, 'the National Interest' depends on this. We make wars, bribe and manipulate governments and support political parties that seem to maintain this consumerist National Interest.
Since we are all part of this infantile and adolescent social trance, we must look deeply into it.
We must know our chains in order to find our personal ways to break free.
You might cry out, ”not me! I am not included in this 'we' above”, “I am an ecologist, vegan, anti-wars, I give money to X. Y and Z causes”. But we have grown up in this modern consumerist culture where our easy consumption of these centralised services leaves us asleep, blind to many realities. Our Altered State of Consciousness in fact inhibits our creativity, our understanding and indeed our freedom. For example, our centralised politics tells us we are in crisis, that we have to cut back on some of these centralised services. But actually all of us in the UK, Europe and USA are in the 7% richest people on the Earth, using 90% of its resources … even our poor working or unemployed classes benefit through our education, social, welfare and health services funded by hundreds of years of our ownership and exploitation of the rest of the planet.
These days there are many therapeutic, ecological and spiritual movements, with objectives to improve the human condition, but which try to stay in this adolescent place between spring and summer - "we seek to be in the light, with a clarity of decision, we know clearly the steps toward this light, etc." They and many of their followers struggle with depression when they encounter the 'shadow aspects', death and decay that naturally happen in life. In rejecting the natural cycles they cannot learn and so repeat the same human neurotic stories implied in thinking we can know and control nature and life on Earth.
There is clearly NO WAY we can do this and indeed, most of our attempts to do so end in further pain and destruction.
Western exploitation of other cultures and the natural resources has meant that we now live in a relative comfortable abundance. Our western European economy, 'the National Interest', that is our jobs, our health service, our education service and our pensions, have been built upon and are still dependent upon the massive exploitation, robbery of land and resources, slavery of workers … in the lands we 'liberated from heathenism', exchanging our bibles for ownership of their land, oil and gold. In our Western comfort we have become dependent … addictively so ... on this ongoing, legalised destructive exploitation. The big banks, investment and pension companies that generate income for our governments depend upon this. Our style of living, 'the National Interest' depends on this. We make wars, bribe and manipulate governments and support political parties that seem to maintain this consumerist National Interest.
Since we are all part of this infantile and adolescent social trance, we must look deeply into it.
We must know our chains in order to find our personal ways to break free.
You might cry out, ”not me! I am not included in this 'we' above”, “I am an ecologist, vegan, anti-wars, I give money to X. Y and Z causes”. But we have grown up in this modern consumerist culture where our easy consumption of these centralised services leaves us asleep, blind to many realities. Our Altered State of Consciousness in fact inhibits our creativity, our understanding and indeed our freedom. For example, our centralised politics tells us we are in crisis, that we have to cut back on some of these centralised services. But actually all of us in the UK, Europe and USA are in the 7% richest people on the Earth, using 90% of its resources … even our poor working or unemployed classes benefit through our education, social, welfare and health services funded by hundreds of years of our ownership and exploitation of the rest of the planet.
These days there are many therapeutic, ecological and spiritual movements, with objectives to improve the human condition, but which try to stay in this adolescent place between spring and summer - "we seek to be in the light, with a clarity of decision, we know clearly the steps toward this light, etc." They and many of their followers struggle with depression when they encounter the 'shadow aspects', death and decay that naturally happen in life. In rejecting the natural cycles they cannot learn and so repeat the same human neurotic stories implied in thinking we can know and control nature and life on Earth.
There is clearly NO WAY we can do this and indeed, most of our attempts to do so end in further pain and destruction.