Gandhi said, ‘Be the change you want to see in the world.’ In today’s world this means, ‘Change your consciousness so others might change theirs.’ How can you do that? First of all, get rid of the old consciousness, and the values and beliefs that support it.
Ask yourself: do you believe that —
- Everyone is separate and rightfully pursues just his or her own interest.
- Life is a struggle for existence; only the fittest (meaning the wealthiest or most powerful) survives.
- In the ruthless competition for fitness the ends justify the means.
- The more money you have, the better you are (and very likely also the happier).
- People owe allegiance only to one nation and one company—the rest are strangers and competitors.
- If we want peace, we must prepare for war.
- Technology and efficiency are the answer, no matter what the question.
- For all intents and purposes the Earth is an inexhaustible source of resources and an infinite sink of wastes.
- The environment can be engineered like a settlement or a highway to fit our needs and demands.
If you hold such beliefs, you are part of the problem. But how can you become part of the solution? Here you must take a further step: adopt new thinking, which means a new consciousness. Einstein said, ‘You can’t solve a problem with the same kind of thinking that produced the problem.’ You can’t shift the world with the same kind of thinking that made it unsustainable.
New thinking is not utopian; it’s already emerging at the creative edge of society. In a number of “alternative cultures” people think and act in a more positive way. They share two fundamental beliefs. One is that the ancient saying “we are all one” is not just fiction but has roots in reality. William James was right: we are like islands in the sea, separate on the surface but connected in the deep.
The second belief regards the sphere of human responsibility. If we are one with each other and with nature, our responsibilities do not end with ourselves, our family, our country and our company; they encompass the human community and the biosphere. Living up to them is not charity. If we are part of humanity, and humanity is part of life on the planet, what we do to others and to nature we do also to ourselves.
When we shed obsolete beliefs and adopt new thinking, we change our consciousness and change ourselves. In these critical and unstable times that change can be the “butterfly” that triggers a storm. It could spread far and wide, and in the end it could change the world.
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A beautiful soliloquy. Thank you.
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