What we really need is map to our reality to create a world in which there is no war, no exploitation, no coercion, no hierarchy, less people, no money, cooperation, holistic thinking, non-duality, care for all creatures on Earth, abundance, joy, understanding, passion, and so on and so forth. We need to create a world where there is balance as well. We can all agree that we could have a wonderful world if we all just jumped on board and made it happen. But there is something holding us back. Is it fear? Or resistance to change? Or attachment to the only life we know? We are so socialized in this world we now live in that we cling to it, like an addict clings to his drug. We are civilization addicts.
If you think about it, an addict is someone who continues to use a drug (or other substance) over and over, even though it is having a negative net effect. The addict may get a short burst of momentary bliss or distraction, but it is short-lived and transitory. Let’s look at civilization. It’s only been around for maybe 10,000 years. In that short amount of time, we have used up most of the planet for its resources, extending our power beyond what we ever could have thought, but at the same time having a substantial negative net effect on the planet and all of its creatures. Sure, we made ourselves feel good and powerful, but at what cost? How many genocides did we perpetrate? How many wars have we fought? How many ecosystems did we obliterate? But we don’t want to know that. We just need a new way to extend our power and contract our empathy. We need to remain willfully ignorant of the suffering of the world in order to enjoy our shiny new toys built by 5-year olds in China. Regardless of consequence, we keep doing the things that are destroying us as a species and the planet as a whole. If that’s not an addiction, I don’t know what is.
A symptom of this addiction to civilization is the addiction to oil, which is the fuel this current civilization runs on. Oil powers most of the machinery of civilization, and we will do anything to get it. Take for example the offshore drilling we just did that caused the catastrophic oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. This is analogous to a junkie getting so desperate for drugs that they do something reckless, like rob a convenience store to get the money for it. We needed the oil bad because without it, our civilization (our addiction) may crash, so we were willing to take a large risk in order to produce a small momentary gain. Now it’s turned into a giant mess that is killing more sea life and destroying more ecosystems, further proving that our addiction has gotten out of control. I bet soon enough, rich white men who own this country will inject oil into their veins while the rest of us go through serious withdrawal when most of the oil is gone and our civilization is struggling to power itself with weaker “drugs.”
What is it about civilization that makes it so enticing? I would have to say, bar none, it is the power people get from it. Power is addictive in itself. For some reason, our brains are wired to achieve and sustain power over others. Not all of us are wired this way, but a good majority is. Perhaps it is a symptom of culture, I don’t know. But before the advent of civilization, there was no central hierarchy or coercion, but cooperative tribes where you pretty much did what you wanted most of the time and spent minimal time on survival-related activities. Today, the way the system is set up, you have to work hard and get a “good job” to have any power in this world. You have to gain tokens of power, called money, to be able to get anything accomplished. Cash rules everything around us. Everything is owned today. Money flows from the poor to the rich in disproportionate quantities because those in power are the most addicted to civilization. This simply because they have the most power and would stand to lose much more if it was dismantled.
Those in power are the ones calling the shots, so they want the status quo. They don’t want change because they have it real good right now. They will do anything to maintain their power and control, sacrificing whatever it takes to maintain their addiction. Equal participation in power and equal rights are the scariest thing in the world to the powerful people of today. If everyone truly has an equal voice, imagine the changes that would take place. Well, maybe not today due to the fact that most people are too fearful to abandon the current model in hopes of developing a better one. But just give it a few more decades when more people have woken up and realized that the world is not the way it should be and get frustrated enough to do something about it. We need a bottom-up movement to take down Leviathan. A grassroots effort. We need enough people to envision a better way of life that emphasizes the positives in the world and drops the negative aspects of humanity. No doubt that this will require the dismantling of civilization.
This is not a bad thing. People ask, “What are we going to do without running water and television?” Trust me, there’s plenty to do in a world where we see ourselves as cells of the same body instead of individual cells, all fighting each other for dominance. If you truly think about it, this is a fundamental choice between fear and love. Fear wants us to get bigger locks on our doors and a larger military. Love wants us to work cooperatively as a species and a planet to create abundance and joy. When you see us all as separate (duality) it creates fear. When you see everything in your experience as truly one (non-duality), you embrace everyone and everything and understand that if we’re all in this together, then we surely should not exploit another in any way.
By hurting or exploiting someone or something else, we are in turn hurting/exploiting ourselves. Civilization teaches us this zero-sum competition, fear-based model where someone else’s loss is your gain. It creates the fear-based thinking that we all need to “get ahead,” and be better than our neighbors. What did Jesus Christ say about that? “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” What was he saying here? If you look at it through the lens of fear, it is saying, “Treat others the way you want to be treated.” If you look at it through the lens of unconditional love, it means, “Love thy neighbor because he is a part of you and to harm yourself is the greatest crime of all.” So, still going with the addiction analogy, we are force-fed civilization since birth (our drug of no choice), much like a crack baby who is addicted to crack before it is even born. We have no choice but to adapt to this pathological system and therefore become dependent on it. We are conditioned to view the world as something scary and chaotic so that we hold ourselves back from making real change due to fear of the unknown. Society wants to maintain the status quo. And as long as you are an active part of this civilization, you are aiding and abedding this resource-consuming monster.
So what do we do to break our addiction to civilization? First off, I would say become self-sufficient by learning skills that allow you to live without the aid of civilization. This may take years, but it will be a godsend when civilization finally crashes and you don’t need it anymore. This will not be easy, but it will be worth it. Secondly, it will definitely help to be more cooperative with the people around you so that if you need help, these people will be glad to assist, barring you would do the same for them. It is what I call mutual assistance. Bartering is another term for this. It is certainly more direct than the money economy and if done right, there is no exploitation involved. Third, the basic understanding that many of the aspects of daily living we take for granted are temporary and unnecessary luxuries that humanity has thrived without for hundreds of thousands of years and can be done without. The less you need, the more free you are. Your expenses are your chains. This is probably one of the hardest actions to take because we’ve all grown up with electricity, Internet, television, and running hot and cold water. But these are very recent inventions. We really don’t need them. They are a distraction, a drug as well.
Once we break our addiction to the modern world and all its flaws, we can finally look for a better way to live where we have complete freedom and control about how we live our lives without any central authority telling us what we can and cannot do. A world where we pursue our passions with unbridled enthusiasm and become what we truly are–human. In the absence of a demonic culture, we can create cultures that reward cooperation and diversity, rather than uniformity and competition. We will all be one in helping the body instead of just serving the individual cells. This is my vision. Let’s make it happen.
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