Awakening From Your Anger

Author: davemacq

  • Climate Silence

    silence3
    The cost of silence!

    End climate silence: The most important thing you can do to fight global warming

    Although I am a Canadian, not an American, the statistics of this article and the recommendations of this article likely apply to my country also. Global warming is an international issue, and it is also a moral issue — our failure to respond is an insult to our intelligence, and a reflection on our immaturity as a species.

    Our hubris and our acedia are about to destroy us. We are so unwilling to step outside the cultural norm — that if we do not talk about an issue then it will go away — we are willing to destroy our species in consequence.

    We need to break the silence.

    This is the fundamental premise of The Climate Mobilization, one that I agree with. Again, it is an American organization, and it needs to be an international organization.

  • A Week of Unusual Contemplative Practice

    contactimprov3
    Meeting in spontaneity.

    As of tomorrow, I will be off to a week of unusual contemplative practice; I’m attending a workshop on Contact Improvisation, a dance form characterized by interaction, physical contact, and spontaneity. I’ve only had a brief introduction previously, but I very much enjoyed the combination of high energy and peacefulness in the process.

    I call it contemplative practice partly because the center where I am going blends vipassana meditation, tai chi, and dance practice. The facilitator also acknowledges that, like vipassana: “On the rare occasions that I can maintain this awareness [of practice] while dancing, the dancing is most rewarding, soft, subtle, fast but gentle.”

    For me, some form of contemplative practice is essential to personal maturity as well as cultural maturity. But contemplative practice is not easily understood in our modern fast-paced society. It is not a quick fix!

    In one sense, contemplative practice is the practice and development of awareness, a term that is also not well understood, but a process that was the mainstay of my professional life. My original training as a therapist was in Gestalt Therapy, a therapy that emphasized awareness, contact, and personal responsibility. So, if I ask someone what he or she is aware of, I will often be told what that person is thinking; this is specifically not what I am seeking.

    Awareness is attention to one’s spontaneously emerging perceptions — it is awareness of the details of the sensory world (both the outside world and that inside the body); it is the data underlying what the individual is thinking (wherein the individual blends this sensory data with past experience to create the current story they are thinking). Contact is the active meeting of the world at this sensory interface, and personal responsibility is both response-ability and account-ability, being available to this meeting.

    Nowadays, contemplation goes by many names; it is called mindfulness, meditation, prayer, amongst other terms. Common to all religious systems, it often has (and historically had) overtones of prayer, but need not; in the past decade, it has very much entered mainstream psychology, and is a major skill for the individual so as to center him- or herself. Mindfulness is almost the latest buzzword of psychology.

    shipatseaMy best way of describing all this is via a metaphor — that of a sailing ship. Imagine an old-fashioned sailing ship, with sails, helm and rudder, potentially managed by an effective Captain and a crew of well-organized Sailors. What would happen to such a ship if there were no helm or rudder? It would drift with the wind. Or such a ship without sails? It would go nowhere. No wind, and even with sails and rudder, it would flounder. Plus the ship needs a good Captain and a well-trained crew.

    Now — considering yourself as this ship, what within you corresponds to the rudder and helm? the sails? the wind? a Captain? the sailors? My answers:

    • the helmsman-helm-rudder system: the conscious mind, able to guide the ship once effective decisions are made (and mutiny is no longer an option).
    • the sails: my other-than-conscious mind, that component of myself that actually does the work, the source of my life energy and my vitality.
    • the wind: from whence comes the origin of my life energy. Depending on interpretation, this could be a deeper realm of the other-than-conscious, or it could be my interface with Spirit/Creator/… (your choice).
    • the sailors: my inner chatter to myself, principally the means by which I are aware of my other-than-conscious mind. The transformation of the sailors from that of mutiny (this is a very common situation for many people) to that of an effective working crew is one of the major skills necessary to maturity).
    • the captain: essentially my decision maker, ideally my wise one. This is who I am when I function in the way which really satisfies me, a person with authentic personal power.

    Please note that in all this, the goal is that of integration of conscious and other-than-conscious (a life-long task). Also note that the main source of power comes from the other-than-conscious, be that simply the depth of one’s interiority and/or from a deeper source called God (for lack of a better term).

    The importance of contemplative practice is that it accesses this other-than-conscious — in a secular sense, the depth of one’s interiority, in a spiritual sense, the deeper source called God. So, aside from the fact that the week will likely be great fun (important in itself), it is this that I seek in the coming week of contemplative practice as contact improvisation.

  • Living In Vancouver

    fossilfuels
    When will we end our investment in this?

    Vancouver is proving to be an interesting city within which to live in the era of global warming and its challenges.

    As noted in Metro Vancouver: competing visions fight for the city’s soul, the global fossil fuel industry wants to develop Vancouver as a major shipping port for exportation of fossil fuel products: expansion of the Kinder-Morgan pipeline complex (300K barrels per day to 890K), shipping of U.S. coal from Surrey Fraser Docks, and expansion of a LNG processing plant at Tilbury, Delta, BC (on the Fraser estuary). There is of course the usual rhetoric as to how beneficial all this will be for B.C., and there is probably some truth in this — it will certainly make money for some people.

    All of these projects are apparently dependent on a range of political scenes, from federal to provincial to municipal. For example, the word amongst people I know in the climate activist scene is that they expect the Liberal Government to approve Kinder-Morgan expansion. Such a move by the Canadian federal government is regarded as inappropriate, deceptive, and a betrayal of the principles that the government is supposed to be representing in its promises to the people during the last election.

    Various polls suggest that a majority of individuals are opposed to these expansions, the extent of opposition largely dependent on how directly people would be affected by breakdowns in the transport systems, systems that in the past few years have demonstrated how unsafe they are. Residents of Burnaby (the site of the Kinder-Morgan terminus), for example, are highly opposed.

    And, I have my usual difficulty deciding if any one set of information is reliable. It is very easy to get into data overload, and I have to fall back to “what do I trust?” (Two of my recent posts were on this topic.) I concluded that basically “I trust myself” — which is not a good source for externalities, but is very useful when it comes to decision making as to what I support.

    So, what do I think of all this.

    Very simple. If we are to survive as a species, we must shift away from fossil fuels. This will require major shifts in economies, ranging from local to international. It will certainly require major reorganization of ways of community living as well as massive retraining of those individuals who are employed in industries dependent on fossil fuels.

    Thus, to support the expansion of the fossil fuel industry in any way is simple adding another nail to the coffin of our species. Even if the risks were acceptable, the basic proposal is flawed.

  • Whom Do You Trust? (Part 2)

    trust2
    Trust is learned by risking!

    In the last post, I suggested that the most important question of the 21st century is: “Whom or what do you trust?” Our culture is in data overload, giving major attention to the latest “scientific research” and the latest expert, yet not valuing our own wisdom.

    I was struck by the following statement in the opening of the latest on-line course to reach my desk: “For centuries most emotions were demonized, viewed as weaknesses and avoided at all costs. But recent research has proven how emotion can be a powerful tool in shaping our connection to others and motivating us to change. [emphasis added]” Yes, emotions were demonized, but why do we need “recent research” to prove the value of emotions — is it not obvious?

    My searching for what to trust

    I have six university degrees, all of them in some field of science — 21 years of exposure to world knowledge and 73 years of exposure to life. My major interests are consciousness, spirituality and food-nutrition. In all of this, I am aware of shifting fads, mainly driven by greed, said to be “well researched” or “based on recent research.” Yet these fads are generally driven by premises with which I have long disagreed.

    Despite years of seeking, I have found no better answer to this question of trust than “I trust myself.” But it has taken a lot of personal growth work to get to this point. And I am very fortunate that I have been able to educate myself in diverse fields. Most people are not that lucky.

    I am committed to developing for myself what I call an integrated worldview. I seek a framework for living wherein I am able to fall back on basic principles that guide me in responding to what life offers. This framework must fit with my life experience, and if necessary, I will change the frame to accommodate what life offers. I will not dismiss what life offers so as to hold onto the frame.

    The most effective way in which I have done this is to periodically examine my Truths? list — short statements of my beliefs, revisited every year or so to assess if what I have written is still true for me. I started it almost 30 years ago, and it now comprises over thirty pages. It remains incredibly valuable to me.

    I recognize that there is much that I do not understand (yet is not to be discarded — it is authentically what life offers). Thus, (metaphorically) I carry a large container of “not knowing.” In contrast, much of what I encounter is someone else’s explanation of what life offers — I do discard much of this, unless it offers truth.

    What I trust

    • I trust my Truths?, my searching for understanding.
    • I trust my own experience (which I corroborate with my integrated worldview): my civilization is in trouble; there is massive social inequity (the dynamics of power); there are more people on the roads and in the stores (increasing population); there are more people being anger and frustrated (increasing world stress); the world is getting warmer (global warming).
    • I trust the mystical experiences with which I have been gifted: the universe is greater than I am, and I am not in charge. I trust the events of synchronicity that I have experienced — many unexpected turning points have occurred in my life; they have changed me in untold ways.
    • I trust the universe as based on four basic premises, what I consider as the moral imperatives (mainly as presented by Thomas Berry in The Great Work): community (everything is connected to everything else), diversity (everything is different from everything else), subjectivity (interiority becomes more obvious with complexity), and change (everything changes over time).
      • When these principles are followed, life succeeds. When any one of them is discarded, violations occur.
    • I trust scientific principles, but not scientism. (What is often called science these days is often simply data collection based on a particular premise or bias.) I trust the consensus of knowledgeable people, individuals who are recognized experts in their fields, when the underlying principles are consistent with my worldview.
      • I trust consensus decisions in native or indigenous communities more than I trust such decisions in ivory tower universities or multi-national corporations: some communities are closer to the earth.
    • When the data and/or view does not fit my worldview, yet seems to be consistent with sound science, I hold the information in abeyance, “not knowing.”
    • I trust the dynamics of authentic democracy.
      • As such, authentic democracy requires I trust the dynamics of nonviolent civil disobedience (but there is risk — the more anger, the less nonviolent behavior).
    • I do not trust processes based on the dynamics of power — power corrupts.
      • When basic principles are circumvented so as to validate data, I do not trust such processes.

    I trust others when it is clear to me that they are seeking their own growth.

  • Whom do You Trust?

    trust2

    Whom or what do you trust? I suggest that this is one of the central questions for living in the 21st century.

    What information to you accept as authentic so as to guide you in responding to the difficulties of this century. Most people are in data overload. For example, if I do a Google search on any given topic, I will almost certain find a million hits (in 0.98 seconds!), and I won’t know what “hit” to trust.

    Yet I am frequently aware of how tenuous is my grasp of the complexity of modern life. More and more I rely on others to provide me with accurate assessments (and that they are relying further on others to provide them with accurate assessments). It is such a conundrum.

    Over the past hundred years, we have begun to reach the limits of our current form of civilization based on power, technology, and consumerism. There has been huge inequity in how we treat ourselves as human beings, and huge duplicity in the many examples of greed and mismanagement (on my earlier post Reflections On Hope, Part 1, I listed many examples).

    So what is there to do, especially when many people now are at risk of burnout as we confront the issues of global warming. And global warming is only the symptom of the many issues to be resolved.

    The TIC Process

    The current way in which most people validate new information is to use what is called a TIC process. They translate (T) the new information into language they can understand more easily, they interpret (I) into their own system of meaning, and then they corroborate (C) this meaning with groups that they already trust. For example, if I want to process information about new electric cars, I translate (T) the information into my current understanding of cars, think about (I) what cars mean to me, and then go ask (C) my friends what they think about electric cars.

    That can work well for many simple issues. But it falls down in a number of ways.

    • Human beings respond best to issues that develop quickly — witness how quickly we respond to fires and/or tsunamis. However, the development of climate change is so slow that, from year to year, it is difficult to convince oneself that there has been a change. It is therefore hard to recognize to what extent we live in dangerous times. And if I ask others to corroborate, they are in the same dilemma.
    • Another factor is the process of pluralistic ignorance, a situation wherein an individual (often the majority of people) privately rejects a norm or behavior, but incorrectly assume that most others accept it, and therefore the individual goes along with the behavior so as to “fit in.”

    For example, if I see someone lying on the side of the street, and simultaneously note that passersby are simply walking around the individual, I am also highly likely to walk around also — I will assume the person is drunk or some such. But what may have actually happened is that the first person to respond simply assumed that the individual was drunk, and walked by. Then the second person saw this, and also walked by, and so on, creating a cascade effect in which a person having a stroke or seizure (or other) is ignored.

    As human beings, we are very reluctant to step out of our preconditioned responses. In Public Perception of Future Threats to Humanity …, the research indicates “a majority (54%) rated the risk of our way of life ending within the next 100 years at 50% or greater, and a quarter (24%) rated the risk of human beings being wiped out at 50% or greater.” Yet where is the massive social response?

    • Then, to what extent is my trusted group knowledgeable or biased? Consider the issues about Donald Trump — I will get very different answers of those I ask depending upon their political background. Politics is such a diverse field that it is difficult to get useful corroboration.

    Combine all this with the disinformation scandals (the tobacco industry, the agribusiness industry, the fossil fuel industry, et cetera) that have been propagated over the past fifty years, then it is no wonder that we have such a slow response to global warming. Our world has become so complex.

    We need a different way of evaluating information. For example, Steven Pinker in The World is Not Falling Apart (2014 Dec 22) suggests that “an evidence-based mindset on the state of the world would bring many benefits.” There is some truth in this, but in my many years of being a physician, I have seen too many examples of misrepresentation in so-called “evidence-based medical practice.” It is an accurate truism for me that “believing is seeing,” not “seeing is believing.”

    In the next post, I will discuss what I myself trust.

    To be continued.

  • The Management of Burnout

    burnout3
    Burnout is best prevented, but still treatable.

    In the previous post The Nature of Burnout — Part 2, I indicated that burnout is the predictable long-term outcome resulting from over-functioning in the third limb of emotional triangles. To describe the management of burnout thus is quite simple:

    • Stop the over-functioning
    • Operate from the principle of: High intention; Low attachment

    However to do this requires that the individual has resolved his or her personal difficulties, those difficulties that pull the individual into the third limb of the triangle. As a therapist, I had ongoing opportunity to explore this process; I used to tell people that I was being paid to do my own personal growth.

    Therapy is a complex process. It is a relationship between two people wherein they explore the personal pain of the “client,” with the therapist as the “resource.” But all clients come with the hidden agenda that the therapist will fix the issue with which the client is struggling. (The long-term clients would say that the client was responsible for the issue, but the hidden agenda was still “fix me.”) And while doing so “fixing,” the client will do his or her best to resist and/or sabotage the therapist. Furthermore, it is relatively easy for the therapist to get caught in this agenda, especially if the therapist is invested in the issue. Sounds complicated, right? Yah!

    therapy1As the therapist, my attitude was essentially that I was there both to support the client and, more importantly, to challenge the client — to create an experience wherein the client had the opportunity to experience the internal conflict associated with the issue. I was not especially interested in talking about the issue, as compared with creating a dynamic which frustrated the client, while at the same time, doing so in an environment of safety. Thus, for me, I treated the third limb (client and issue) as a guitar string. My job was to tweak the guitar string, and make a sound. What the client did with the sound was of little interest to me — that was the responsibility of the client.

    I used to tell people that I had three rules when working with them:

    1. I would do no more than 50% of the work (occasionally more, but not reliably so),
    2. if at all possible we would have fun (people learn better when they are having fun), and
    3. if anyone was to be frustrated, guess who (because it was not going to be me).

    In so functioning, I had high intention (to assist the client), but no attachment that I would do so — I was response-able for my own integrity, but I was not accountable for the client’s outcomes or life.

    The management of burnout requires the following:

    • acceptance of authentic powerlessness
      • I must be clear as to that for which I am responsible, am accountable, and have authority
        • I must be aware and watchful of the enticement to be accountable for the larger system
      • having an appropriate vision of what is my role in a given system
        • my focus must be on my own integrity, even though my contribution may be to the greater good of the system
          • I must be able to congratulate myself for having achieved the outcomes I want, even though nothing happens within the larger system
        • I must provide myself with significant self-care — so that I do not rely entirely on the larger system to provide reward to me
          • this means that I manage my own emotional energy, especially when the system is not functioning effectively
            • if I am angry or frustrated, this means I am invested in the third limb! Clarity is needed, not passion
          • other aspects to which I can attend include:
            • write a lot in a journal, even if just scribbling (writing discharges energy more effectively than typing on a screen)
            • do anything small that makes a difference
            • find a supportive community, one focused on authenticity

    There are other things I can do, but for me, these are the basics.

  • The Nature of Burnout, Part 2

    Burnout1Apologies to my readers — I indicated in the first post The Nature of Burnout, Part 1 that there would be a second, and I got distracted. So here we go.

    To review what I said last time, “burnout occurs when I am overly invested in outcomes I cannot control — sooner or later, I become exhausted, and I call it burnout. Burnout therefore is a measure of the extent that I have not accepted my own powerlessness in life.”

    And: the resolution is effective leadership, in particular that leaders lead others, they manage themselves. In leading others in a particular project or direction, they encourage followers who want to do the work of the project, and therefore do not need to be pushed. As well, the leader manages him- or herself, focusing on the positive features (of self and other) that are controllable, and finding creative ways to utilize the negative features that are always present (again, of self and other).

    My best way of examining both burnout and leadership is via the concept of emotional triangles as described in the last posting The Nature of Emotional Triangles. Burnout occurs because of over-functioning, being inappropriately or excessively invested in the third limb of emotional triangles.

    Self-differentiation versus burnout

    Healthy responses, those of self-differentiation, are responses that are within the control of the individual. The individual (#1) can take a stand regarding an issue, or can extend care (love) into relationships with people (#2), or can work to clarify the nature of the issue (i) for that individual. All of this requires courage, often stepping out of the cultural rules of how to behave “in public.” Alternatively, the individual play with the emotional energy contained within the triangle; learning to play with emotionality is probably the most complex skill to be gained by individuals (it took me about ten years to be satisfied with my ability to play).

    Unhealthy responses to a situation are those wherein the individual (#1) attempts to control others, or the ways in which another responds to an issue (i) — these are interventions into the third limb of the emotional triangle, and in the long term are ineffective. Per se, these types of interventions are common, and as long as the other person (#2) chooses to be cooperative (they are getting paid, they like the outcome, et cetera), there is no problem. The difficulty occurs when the other does not want to cooperate (consider the example of parents interacting with angry teenagers). At this point, an intervention into the third limb becomes ineffective, resulting in resistance, and ultimately a place of stuckness where the first person exhausts him- or herself.

    This is a common source of burnout

    Another major difficulty occurs when three management concepts are out of balance or are misinterpreted: responsibility, accountability, authority.

    • responsibility (response-ability) is the ability to respond — to have the skill to deal with whatever is the issue or task. It can be taught to others (if they are interested), but not given away per se.
    • accountability is the obligated need to accomplish a task, either by oneself or delegated to another. Accountability can be delegated, but not circumvented, to those capable of response-ability.
    • authority refers to permission to accomplish a task. Again, it can be delegated but not circumvented.

    Imagine you are accountable for a project, but have no authority to accomplish it. You need resources, but have no way to obtain them. What will happen, especially to you? Or, imagine you have authority and accountability for a task, but no skill (nor is there anyone available who is skillful). What will happen to you?

    When these three functions are mismatched, the individuals concerned are at high risk of burnout. And in my therapy practice, I encountered many examples “in the real world” where they were mismatched!

    Coming next: The Management of Burnout

  • The Nature of Emotional Triangles

    The basic emotional triangle.
    The most important diagram of my life.

    Apologies to my readers — I indicated in an earlier post The Nature of Burnout, Part 1 that there would be a second, and I got distracted. However, to do the topic justice, I need to discuss the nature of emotional triangles first. So here we go.

    In looking over what I have written in the past few months, I am surprised that I have given so little attention to this concept, a core concept in how I respond to life. Briefly I described them earlier in “You Should, Part 3 (Emotional Triangles).” This concept is actually my best way of examining many concepts, especially both burnout and leadership.

    An emotional triangle is any two people and a third person or issue (human beings relate both to people and issues). An important aspect of the triangle is what is called the third limb, the side of the triangle that I do not directly touch. It is a relative term, referring to the side opposite any given person; for example, in the triangle involving me, you and this posting (the issue), my third limb is the relationship between you and the posting; your third limb is the relationship between me and the posting. Thus, given the number of people in my life, and the number of issues (my own and those of others), I (and every person) exist in thousands of interlocking emotional triangles (the number of emotional triangles increases exponentially as more people and/or issues are added). The interlocking is what we refer to as stability, but it is also our stuckness — systems by definition attempt to maintain stability.

    There are three laws of emotional triangles (with corollaries), applicable to any emotional triangle:

    1. I can only change myself, and my relationships with others. I cannot change others.
      • When I become anxious of others and attempt to change them (the third limb), the results are not predictable.
      • Unless the other chooses to cooperate, the other will resist, and eventually do the opposite of what I want.
      • As a result of this resistance, my exposure to pain will increase.
    2. If I change, others must change. We are connected.
      • If my change is effective in responding to the system, others will sabotage me; they will resist my change (because they will also be required to change).
      • Sabotage will occur even if my change adds health to the system (systems have an inherent need to remain stable).
    3. Change requires I stay connected.
      • My presence impacts others. If I leave, the system will revert to its original state (unless my original impact was so great that the system has established a new equilibrium as a result).
      • The essential skill is for me to remain non-anxious as the system responds, especially as sabotage occurs.

    SerenityOperationally, this is the Serenity Prayer in action (God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference). What the Serenity Prayer does not identify is that the sabotage is predictable, and actually guaranteed to the extent that my change is effective in response to the system. It is a measure of success!

    Although these laws may seem very simple, they are also incredibly subtle in how they play out in life; they had a major impact on my life once I learned how to live them. I will have more to say on this when I do some posts on the work of Ed Friedman, one of my major mentors (now deceased). Ed wrote three books, all of which I strongly recommend to anyone interested in emotional process:

    • (1985) Generation to generation: Family process in church and synagogue. New York, NY: Guilford.
    • (1990) Friedman’s Fables. New York, NY: Guilford.
    • (2007) A failure of nerve: Leadership in the age of the quick fix. M. M. Treadwell, & E. W. Beal, Eds. New York, NY: Seabury Books.1990

    The essential skill of leadership and of managing burnout is to recognize the predictability of sabotage, and to remain non-anxious as I respond further.

    To re-iterate what I said in The Nature of Burnout, Part 1:

    Leaders lead others; they manage themselves.

    Coming next: The Nature of Burnout, Part 2

  • The Climate Mobilization Pledge

    We are at war, and we are losing! (Bill McKibben, 2016 Sep 6)

    I’ve indicated previously that I have joined The Climate Mobilization (TCM). What follows is the pledge I am making as part of this process.

    I’ve joined TCM because I strongly believe that our civilization is on a suicide course regarding Climate Change, and that the only hope for our survival (in any form of effective civilization) is to engage in a massive political mobilization. Actually, it may be our only hope for survival as a species.

    The planet will survive. Life will likely survive. We may not!

    All of this will not likely occur in my lifetime. But I/we will be leaving a degraded world for our children and grand-children. I would like my grand-children to know that I am doing what I can to create a better world.

    Climate Change is a problem of our entire civilization, not a national issue. The Pledge is international, and can be adapted for any nation.

    CLIMATE MOBILIZATION INTERNATIONAL PLEDGE

    Climate change is causing immense human suffering and damage to the natural world. It threatens the collapse of civilization within this century. Confronting this crisis is the great moral imperative of our time.

    I CALL ON CANADA’S GOVERNMENT TO:

    1. Immediately commence a social and economic mobilization to restore a climate that is safe, stable, and supportive of human civilization. This heroic campaign shall be carried out on a vast scale, transforming our economy at wartime speed.
    2. Reduce our country’s net greenhouse gas emissions 100 percent by 2030 at the latest and implement far-reaching measures to remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere.
    3. Enlist a multitude of citizens in efforts to rapidly expand our carbon-neutral energy and agricultural systems, conduct groundbreaking research, and implement large-scale adaptation measures. Full employment will be achieved.
    4. Conduct this mobilization in accordance with the United Nations Declaration on Human Rights and ensure that the essential needs of the civilian economy are met during this time of transition.
    5. Establish the following imperatives as our nation’s top foreign policy priorities: A 100 percent reduction of global net greenhouse gas emissions at emergency speed, and the deployment of comprehensive measures that remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere until a safe climate is restored.

    I will enlist fellow citizens from all walks of life in this campaign. If sitting politicians fail to mobilize, we will elect leaders with the courage and foresight to enact these demands.

    I WILL:

    1. Vote for candidates— on every electoral level — who have signed the Pledge to Mobilize over those who have not.
    2. Advocate publiclyfor an emergency climate mobilization in the halls of government and in the media.
    3. Mobilize my skills, resources, and networks to spreadthe truth of climate change and the hope of this movement to others. When I spread the Pledge to Mobilize, I will do so with respect, truth, focus and courage.

    Thus I pledge to mobilize, in defense of civilization and the natural world.

    MY INTENTION (in the next four months)

    1. Initiate a Vancouver-based chapter of Climate Mobilization.
    2. Organize a support group within System Change Not Climate Change – North Vancouver regarding anger and burnout within the spectrum of Climate Change
    3. Present workshops on Anger Management (Blowing Out The Darkness) and Burnout (The Bottom Line) as a supplementary support.
    4. Present an online Anger Management program: Angry? Change Your Life in 90 Days (a free email program).

    Any interest: contact [email protected]; any support welcome.

     ==========

    I’ve chosen to focus on TCM because I believe that TCM has an effective vision, and an effective platform. From my work as therapist (using the concept of the force field of change), I know that change requires three things:

    • an effective vision of the future,
    • an honest appraisal of the present, and
    • a shift in the balances of forces that maintain the present
      • augmenting the positive forces, and
      • reducing the negative forces.

    As TCM notes, their immediate vision is that of full-scale climate mobilization; they are less clear of the long-term vision, but at least they allude to the need for long-term cultural change. Their appraisal of the present as a suicide mission is correct for me.

    I agree that their focus on augmenting political will is accurate as to what must happen in shifting the culture. And they recognize the need for dealing with the negative forces, the Climate Lie. Finally, although heavily Americanized in their language, they attempt to build coordinated cooperation between agencies.

    Thus for me, TCM covers all the bases — so this is where I want to put my energy of making a difference. At the personal level, my strength is in reducing the negative forces, especially in dealing with issues of anger and burnout (long-term, I do want to find a way to utilize my strengths — which will almost certainly be necessary in the coming years).

    For now though, my need is to build a local organization within TCM, one that can make a difference. I’m new to being an activist, but I have (I hope) relatively few illusions as to how difficult it is to shift the system. As necessary I fall back on the adage of how does one eat an elephant — one bite at a time.

  • Reflections on Hope, Part 2

    Focus on what you can control about what matters.
    It is easy to become overwhelmed.

    In the last post, I reviewed the negative forces that I believe impact the likelihood of catastrophe as the outcome of global warming. I want now to reflect on the positives concerning my hope for a mature culture.

    As stated, I strongly believe that, if we are to survive as a species, we must more towards maturity; we must move towards:

    • the many features of justice and love that have been advocated over the centuries (the features that represent our greatness as a species), and
    • the ability to have power over the processes of power (the nemesis that has plagued our civilizations for thousands of years).

    In the past few years, I have often stated that, as individuals, human beings are capable of incredible greatness, but as a species we are psychotic.

    There are many positives, but unfortunately they are not as easy to describe as the negatives. My struggle in this post is to organize the positives in such a way as to convey hope. Here I define hope as “evidence in the present for what I seek in the future.”

    The positive forces include:

    • large numbers of people and organizations making headway in technology, social justice, and other forms of cultural transformation.
      • In particular, Gilding in The Great Disruption (2011) notes of human beings: “They were slow, but not stupid.”
    • the huge diversity in the creative ways in which change is beginning to occur in our civilization, thus increasing the possibility of self-organizing systemic change.
      • major advances in science and technology.
      • much better understanding to complex systems, leading to better understanding of resilience and sustainability.
      • much more powerful theological understandings and challenges, with an emphasis on community and correction of systemic injustice.
      • many examples of the convergence of science and spirituality. For example, Shinzen Young[1] notes: “the world of rigorous science and the world of deep meditation have begun a courtship dance.. . . a new knowledge powerful enough to rapidly alter the course of human history for the better.”
    • numerous social challenges by diverse organizations, ranging from 350.org to native communities, seeking greater attention to ecology and the dangers of global warming.
      • It is essential that these forces affiliate, but it is equally important that they provide diversity, so as to provide the opportunity for creative resolutions to difficult issues.
    • the recognition that profound change usually comes out of left field. It is not predictable how and when it will happen. As example, I think of the many times in my life that major change occurred in a day or less when events came together in synchronistic ways. This was true of the mystical experiences I had, and it was also true of both my decision to settle in Orangeville Ontario (1992) as a therapist, and my developing a day retreat center (1996) for anger management — profound change within hours.

    When I look over the above, it does not look like much in the way of evidence! Much of it is very subjective.

    I am also influenced by my own mystic experiences that have been transformative of my life, especially that of a three-year period of Cosmic Consciousness, an experience of profoundly knowing that “all shall be well,” a trust in the goodness of the universe.

    Furthermore, I am very aware that to live into the power of the negatives is to create a self-fulfilling prophesy that we are all doomed anyway, so why bother? I am not willing to do this; thus I choose to be active in response.

    However, each person will have to struggle with their own despair in this horrendous issue. I have deep compassion for this struggle — in my dissertation, I noted a statement of the 17th century scientist-philosopher Blaise Pascal: “those who study acedia do not come away unscathed.”

    It is helpful to me to remember that the Chinese pictogram for crisis is a combination of the symbols for danger and for opportunity. There is also the Chinese curse: May you live in interesting times!

    I believe that my primary journey as a human being is to become more loving — and the issues of global warming certainly provide that interesting opportunity. I hope we will survive (and thrive in) these dangerous times, but I also recognize it seems like a coin toss as to what will really happen.

    Onward — what are the blocks that stop human beings from maturing.

    [1] Unsolicited email, 2016 September 9, Shinzen Young on The Science of Enlightenment. http://www.soundstrue.com/store/the-science-of-enlightenment-4028.html?utm_source=bronto&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=R160909-Young&utm_content=Shinzen+Young+on+The+Science+of+Enlightenment&_bta_tid=03664472911054719897476254701099948306789889130588936207319080890795520&_bta_c=e94jagz6u5gkgkt5ov9doso5l5l82.