Through my life and all the changes happening around me all the time, in a sense not much has changed. When I was a kid, I remember the turmoil in the middle east and the cold war and the issues of pollution, crime, wars, poverty and disease. As a history buff it seems these issues have always been a side note to civilization and sometimes the main theme. Technology has always been packaged and sold to us as a great thing, usually under the guise of making life easier and solving different types of issues. I don’t want to get too much into technology here, but it does seem like technology has made somethings easier, but it seems like we have traded easier tasks for more stress. As somehow, it’s made us much busier. And still no solution to our cultural side notes of war, crime, poverty, pollution and disease.
Another side note to our history is religion, and for many, religion is more than a side note, it’s the main theme. Yet with religion at our side it seems the same issues of war, (sometime over religion) poverty, even among the pious, crime, pollution and disease. Different governments from dictators to democrats, communists, Marxists, socialists have promised real change and yet again poverty, war, disease, crime and pollution seem to be the side note or main theme.
Can we agree Utopia is not necessarily living like the Jetsons? It could actually be living more like the Navajo. But regardless, Utopia would be a time or place where there is little to no war and little to no crime and little to no poverty, pollution and disease. Now considering the futility of religion, at least generally speaking, and the futility of different governments and technology, what are we doing wrong? What are we not doing? What could we do to bring us to Utopia on a personal level as well as throughout civilization? When I speak about Utopia I am not speaking about a paradise that has no problems or challenges. I am speaking of a time or place where the dominant quality is benevolent as opposed to malevolent where love is greater than fear. How do we get there?
To get there, most likely we need leaders who emphasize this and of course there needs to be a personal desire for this above all else. Then comes the hard part which is recognizing (in Yoga they called this awareness) the malevolent qualities within me (which contribute to the status quo) which then gives me the opportunity to stop feeding them mental energy and unconscious loyalty. I like to call this “killing the enemy”. This means I would have to deal with my fears instead of succumbing to them. I would have to own my anger instead of projecting it. I would have to recognize my judgments and criticisms as ignorant assumptions that help nothing and then I would need to shift my mind away from these things and put my attention in a benevolent place. Growing a benevolent mind-state like I would grow anything, by feeding it frequently and caring for it constantly. This is the objective of meditation.
Until the majority of us are more dominated by love than fear or more dominated by benevolence than malevolence, civilization will not change. As what we witness in civilization is just a byproduct of our mentality. Yet strangely, if you can make this shift in your own life and mind-state you will notice the benevolent sphere around you expanding. And as you cultivate benevolence and make an effort to spread it, Utopia is ignited within and whatever exists within will eventually come out.
sincerely, bryan