the crisis of imagination

This blog is my contribution to the Blog Action Day 09 dedicated to the issue of Climate Change.

 

“The purpose of activism and art is to make a world in which people are producers of the meaning, not the consumers. ” Rebeca Solnit, Hope in the Dark

 

Possibly the biggest crisis we are facing right now is the crisis of creativity and imagination.

All is not well with our world.

Most of us have noticed.

Yet we respond differently. It is hard to know what is the most common response as we all move in different circles and our perceptions are colored by our cultural and family background, our assumptions about the world, socio-economic demographics, and so on…

But maybe it would be fair to say that majority of people are in a state of shock. Some are in denial, some are angry, many are frightened and numb. And a  few are excited about the possibility of change and the awakened citizenship.

 

We human beings have a tendency to cling to what we know. Even if it is dysfunctional, even if we have outgrown it and it stifles and poisons us,we still cling to ways of doing and thinking that are familiar.

We assume that the world has always been this way and that it will continue to grow much in the same way,  in the linear fashion we imagine to be a universal law.

Yet this is just the brief chapter in the evolution of human existence. Not too long ago we were intimately familiar with the natural cycles of the Great Mother, hunting and gathering, carrying our young on our back, worshiping the sun and the moon and the great earth that sustained us. We were connected, we cared, we were in tune and sensitive to our environment and all other beings that shared it with us. We lived n harmony. We were “Sustainable”…

I am not suggesting we return to our hunter-gatherer ways. Neither will I propose here a vision for a Brave New World (many great minds are engaged with this task and are far better equipped for it then I ever hope to be). I am merely putting things into perspective.

 

But I would like to make a point.

 

All change begins here, now, with us.

Every morning when we wake up, we put on yesterday’s face.

And we recreate yesterday’s world.

If we think of a human being as a microcosm, then we can apply some of the insights we have about human health and wellbeing and apply them to  the state of the world. In his book “Transperent self”, deep psychology pioneer Sidney Gerard makes the following point: “ I think we need in our society to take the precept “Ye shall be born again” out of Sunday school and put it into our public schools. I think we need to liberalize and pluralize our social structure so that people can be thought a theory of personal growth that encourages them to let an incarnation die without killing their embodied selves so that they can invent new ones and find company and places to live them until they die of being worn out… When a  man sleeps his facial expression changes and the chronic neuro-muscular patterns which define his character all dissolve. When he awakens, his facial musculature reproduces the mask that defines his physiognomy, he holds his body as he did yesterday and he behaves towards everybody he encounters  as he did yesterday. It is almost as if he pressed a button to release a reproduction of yesterday’s self. In principle he has the possibility of recreating himself at every moment of his waking life. It is difficult but possible to re-invent ones identity.”

I feel like we are holding a key here.

As I re-invent my identity, as I let go of my limitations, fears, habitual ways of responding to things, I increasingly become aware of the world in different ways.

As I become more aware, more intimate with myself and others,  as I listen and observe deeply I begin to notice stuff. I begin to bear witness. I wake up.

I am no longer numb to injustice, the suffering, the fact that it is warmer every year. I no longer turn a blind eye or accept what feels wrong or stupid. I begin to think about my choices, I reconsider.

When I walk down the road from my house I increasingly find it difficult to accept as “normal”  the fact that there are thousands of cars passing by,mostly carrying one passenger at the time, pumping carbon into the air. That billions of dollars are being invested planning for and accommodating more of this impoverished vision of what is possible for the future. That thousands of animals are held in concentration camps awaiting mass murder being fed monoculture palm or soy from plantations for which the virgin forests have been cleared. The abject poverty and injustice.

Is this the best we can dream up, we can imagine for tomorrow? Are we going to wake up with the same face tomorrow?

If we can imagine the new day then the new day can rise…………….. As I am writing this blog the editing is becoming very difficult as the system is jamming up probably due to thousands of bloggers writing today, on October 15th dreaming up new future, taking a stand, being awake.

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