All life forms want to live.
It’s not easy.
As we grow older, it becomes increasingly clear that life is full of peril.
It has always been and always will be full of peril.
Everywhere we turn, all life forms struggle to survive and reproduce.
As a consequence of that struggle, everywhere we see inequity, injustice, violence, and suffering.
Most suffering is caused by one word: ignorance.
Humanity, for all the power that it wields knows far too little about what sustains and optimizes life.
Our ignorance results in countless problems.
Some claim that “ignorance is bliss.”
If so, the bliss of ignorance is short-lived and ominous.
- How do we reduce ignorance and suffering and expand knowledge and justice?
- How do we solve our problems?
Albert Einstein observed accurately that,
“We can’t solve our problems from the same level of thinking at which they originated.”
- What level of thinking are we at?
- What level of thinking do we need to get to?
- How do e get there?
It’s not easy to get to the “next level of thinking.”
Today, many people operate out of hardwired, instincts and emotions associated with the primitive origins of our brains.
At the same time, billions of people operate out of deeply embedded, antiquated, divisive, and dysfunctional religious beliefs that are the products of the infancy of our intelligence.
These primitive instincts and emotions–a biological reality–and antiquated, divisive, and dysfunctional religious beliefs–human fabrications–are a lethal combination of behaviors not overcome easily.
Yet, these primitive behaviors and beliefs must be overcome.
Our understanding of reality and its behavioral demands, and our social and political attitudes, behaviors, and beliefs must rise to a higher level.
If we are to sustain humanity, advance our civilization, and succeed as a species this is not optional.
- Humanity is on a collision course with reality.
- A rise To a higher level is imperative.
- Fundamental life-sustaining changes must be made.
Journalist Edward R. Morrow wrote,
“The obscure we see eventually, the completely apparent takes a little longer.”
That’s a curious statement: “the completely apparent takes a little longer.”
Mark Twain, commenting on life, said,
“What tedious training day after day, year after year never ending to learn common sense.”
- The completely apparent.
- Common sense.
As we get older, we find that common sense is not that common.
Common sense to an uncommon degree is what the world calls wisdom.
Wisdom about what?
About life.
About the architecture of life, i.e., the way it works.
About the dynamic interdependencies among Earth’s complex systems, our own bodies, and all lifeforms.
- What makes life healthy?
- What sustains life?
- Is there anything in life that is sacred?
The world of religion, typically associated with supernatural entities, has owned the word “sacred.”
But it is the secular meaning of sacred, in fact, that is transcendent and governs life:
Sacred is that in life here and now which, at our peril, we cannot violate, damage, dishonor, or destroy.