Ebola outbreaks in Africa, conflicts in Russia and the Ukraine, fighting in Gaza and Israel, civil unrest in the U.S., food and gasoline price increases, government gridlock, and water shortages: The headlines make our heads spin and cause our hearts to race. It feels like things are falling apart and we are on a life raft in a sea of change. It reminds me of a remarkable 1982 film, Koyaanisqatsi: Life Out of Balance. It was a film of powerful images that showed the dysfunctional state of our world, but with no dialogue.
Godfrey Reggio, the film’s director, explained the lack of dialogue by stating “it’s not for lack of love of the language that the film has no words. It’s because, from my point of view, our language is in a state of vast humiliation. It no longer describes the world in which we live.” In the Hopi language, the word Koyaanisqatsi means “unbalanced life.” The impact of this unbalance on individuals is increasing stress, depression, addiction and anger.
But like all crises, there are also opportunities for positive transformation. Here are some things I think are helpful to consider:
- Recognize the Opportunity Within the Crisis
If a raging tiger broke into our yard, we’d immediately recognize the danger and run for our lives or fight to survive. But economic, environmental, and energy changes occur slowly enough that our brain doesn’t register them. We have to use our creative imaginations to see the danger we are in.
In his book and video series, The Crash Course, economic researcher and futurist Chris Martenson describes the three major forces that are impacting our future: Economy, Energy, and Environment, how these big three Es interact, and how they determine our prosperity or decline.
Our Industrial Civilization has been driven by the use of more and more of the Earth’s resources. As Richard Heinberg points out in his book Peak Everything, our use of fossil fuels is damaging the environment and we’re reaching the end of “cheap oil” that drives our energy economy. But if we understand the trends and address them wisely, Martenson and Heinberg believe we can move towards Peak Prosperity.
- We Can Learn from Indigenous Tribes.
One of the beliefs that many Indigenous people hold is that we must consider the impact of our decisions seven generations in the future. Think how our world would change if we shifted our focus from “what’s in it for me, now” to “how will this impact my children, grandchildren, great grandchildren, great, great grandchildren and all future generations.”
Best-selling author and cultural critic Jerry Mander has challenged dominant cultural mind-sets in books such as Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television and In the Absence of the Sacred. In Paradigm Wars, he and co-editor Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, a leader of the global indigenous people’s movement and chair of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, document the momentous collision of worldviews that pits the forces of economic globalization against the Earth’s surviving indigenous peoples.
By learning more about what Indigenous people are doing in support of their land, we can all learn ways we can better take care of the life-support system that is our earth. Tribal peoples throughout the world have learned that we must live in balance with the community of life.
- Heal Our Addiction to “More.”
I’ve worked to help people overcome their addictions to drugs, alcohol, gambling, over-eating, and many other addictions that harm people’s lives. One of the men I counseled said, “I’m actually addicted to ‘more.’ Too much of anything is never enough.” In her book, My Name is Chellis & I’m in Recovery from Western Civilization, Chellis Glendinning says, “You and I are not people who live in communion with the Earth, and yet we are people who evolved over the course of millions of years to live in communion with it. We exist instead dislocated from our roots by the psychological, philosophical, and technological constructions of our civilization.” But just as alcoholics recover from their addiction to booze, we can recover from our addiction to using more and more of the earth’s resources.
- Develop an Attitude of Curiosity and Adventure.
Anytime we face the ending of a way of life, there is a certain amount of grief we all experience. We can’t just “move on.” There is a process that we must go through. Elizabeth Kubler-Ross and others described a series of stages when we deal with the death of someone we love:
We go through denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally acceptance. We go through a similar process as we face the big changes as we move away from a culture of domination to one that lives in balance with the earth. At first we deny what is happening. Global warming can’t be as serious as the scientists say, for instance. We get angry and want to blame someone for the problems we see. Maybe it’s the “immigrants” or the “tea party.” We want to make a bargain with the future. Maybe there will be some technological breakthrough that will save us. We become despairing and depressed about the future of human beings. Finally, we accept our situation and realize that this may be humanities greatest call to adventure.
We have a wonderful opportunity to change our way of life from one that’s based on our addiction to “more” and continued growth and expansion to one that is based on “just enough” to allow us to live well and joyfully. Let’s try out new possibilities and find new hope.
- Use Stress Reduction Practices for Rough Seas.
At whatever stage of denial or acceptance we are, there is a lot of stress. The truth is that everything is connected. If we are poisoning the Earth with pollutants, we are poisoning ourselves. If there is disease in Africa it impacts us all. If we are running out of clean air and water, we all suffer. In order to get through these times of transition we need some easy to use, yet powerful stress reduction tools.
In my book Stress Relief For Men I describe four energy healing tools that can help us. These include Earthing or Grounding, Heart Coherence, Attachment Love, and Emotional Freedom Techniques or Tapping. Keeping our heads above water and staying calm is absolutely necessary as we move ahead with our lives.
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Dear Jed,
I know some people, including me, that have tried to change life and lifestyle trying to live better and healthier. Living in the countryside, with basics… But in the end, we also turn up being stressed and neurotic, alcoholic,…. as very often the financial situation is making this lifestyle difficult. Even when trying to create your own work, it still his difficult to get basic money out of it. One of my methods of not getting stressed out, is not watching the TV and certainly not the news. With all the negativity coming from it, it is impossible not to get stressed and anxious and depressed. Also living in a very small community, I notice that there is a complete lack of community awareness and solidarity. There is also a complete lack of environmental awareness. And a lot of gender agressivity. So in the end, the idillic back to nature, to authentic lifestyle, stress free, is not so easy …. But we keep working on it.
Thanks for your interesting article.
Eva
Eva,
These are definitely times of massive change. And it makes it difficult for everyone. Finding ways to survive and prosper is something I’ve been doing and teaching to others. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.