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Taking Responsibility for Transforming Iraq

Those who have questioned the moral or strategic merits of the Iraq War have largely been vindicated in the public eye. Prominent Republicans have broken ranks to join the vast majority of progressives in seeking rapid exit from the growing quagmire.

Often absent from the rhetoric in the anti-war camp, however, are concrete and constructive strategies to deal with the mess that America has created. The right generally wants to divorce itself from responsibility for creating the havoc, blaming it on religion-addled terrorists and ungrateful Iraqis. The left often wants to remain in righteous finger-waggling about the lack of justification of the war in the first place.

Neither side wants to take the truly mature route: face the truth that America bears collective responsibility for having created a hornet’s nest of violence and that we have an ethical responsibility to help transform that situation.

President Bush’s strategy of throwing more troops at the problem is exactly the wrong approach to such a transformation. By perpetuating a culture of fear, defense, aggression, and war, Bush’s muscular approach throws gasoline on the fire. We need to end the war by first ending the psychology of war, which is built on enemies and opposition, destruction and violence. Reinforcing the antagonism towards Iraqis as the enemy perpetuates and increases the cycle of violence and the erosion of civilized behavior. Instead, we need to shift towards a psychology of healing, development, and support to end the cycle of brutality.

Our primary motivation in Iraq should thus no longer be war. It must be peace and civilization-building, which is a vastly different strategic objective, often best implemented by different players. To advance into the next phase, it is imperative that we shift our national psychology from one that is obsessed with “success” and “winning ” the war – which ultimately are about feeling good about ourselves -- to one that is focused on creating a strong, peaceful, healthy, and prosperous Iraq – which is more about service.

Mesopotamia is known as the cradle of civilization. Iraq is thus an auspicious place to build a thriving and advanced culture. What if we began by collectively visualizing Iraq twenty years in the future with a thriving culture, peaceful population, efficient government, robust economy, and harmonious co-existence of religious traditions? What groundwork can we support now that would help Iraqis create a superb nation for themselves, one that we might someday want to visit just in admiration?

I suggest a few major strategies that would help accelerate this process:

1. Reduce the number of combat troops every single month. The psychology of war is now exacerbating violence rather than helping it. Gun-toting soldiers reinforce the sense of occupation, an affront to Iraqi pride. A complete power vacuum is unlikely to be helpful, but getting the troops out is equivalent to removing fuel for the fire.
   
   
2. Ramp up, every month, on the number of people who are in Iraq as civilization-builders: psychologists to help heal the scars of war, doctors, construction-workers, technologists, conflict-resolution experts, artists, entrepreneurs, even gardeners. This phase of activity needs to privilege a more nurturing, feminine way of interacting with Iraqis and to focus on helping them with their real day-to-day needs, which starts to dissolve the hyper-masculine psychology of opposition, occupation, and war.
   
   
3. Empower individual Iraqis with more opportunities in exchange for pledging to not use public or private violence. What if, for example, we offered a $100 laptop for free to every Iraqi who was willing to sign a commitment to non-violence? Prototypes of such a laptop have been developed by the non-profit One Laptop Per Child (www.laptop.org) and can be run even in areas without electricity. With government backing, they could be put into mass production and shared with all Iraqis. In that way, we would be offering a positive incentive that provides a tool for learning and a way for them to create new social networks and leapfrog into a more advanced economy, all while building upon the traditional Arabic commitment to keeping one’s word. Even if all 22M Iraqis took us up on the offer, the cost would only be $2.2 billion dollars, the cost of one week of wartime operations.
   
   
4. Make personal bridges – the population of Iraq is only 7% of that in the Unites States. What if we had an integrated program with a goal of having 2% of the United State population create a personal connection with a citizen of Iraq? Web translators could take letters in English and translate them into Arabic before being printed as a personally-signed letter, perhaps with photographs of family. Arabic speakers could be hired to help translate responses from Iraqis. Personal connections and bridges are the surest way to reduce stereotypes and cultural animosity, reinforcing our shared humanity rather than the more polarized identities of war.
   
   
5. Ensure that every man, woman, and child in Iraq has a stock interest in all oil production happening in the country. This mitigates the feeling that America is there to steal their oil and addresses the ownership issue in a way that avoids some of the wealth imbalances in other oil-rich countries.
   

While these strategic directions are only a start, they represent a way of shifting the rhetoric beyond wartime debate and towards collaborative, construction solutions to advancing Iraqi society and healing the wounds of war. Those on the left-wing in the United States need to offer their skills, time, and money in the service of this healing rather than simply expressing anger at Bush and his team for creating the mess. And those on the right must acknowledge that the military approach to this transformation is failing and that a more peaceful, civilization-building course is now required.

The project of healing and transforming Iraq thus has the potential to become a unifying national objective after the extreme divisiveness of war.

Originally published at OpEdNews.com

Balancing Optimism and Realism

Over the last year, I’ve been writing columns that aim to create an evolutionary path forward that brings the higher expression of both ends of our political spectrum together in a more sacred whole. Now, with 11 days to the midterm elections, I find myself at a crossroads: the time is now for specific, short-term recommendations for how to engage politics in a more conscious way in the following days, but I’m still unclear on what to recommend.

The simple answer is to rally for Democratic candidates: taking one or both Houses back from the Republicans can reinstall the checks and balances that are at the foundation of our democracy. Scandal after scandal has racked Capitol Hill. Our political situation has degraded to such an extent that last week’s Rolling Stone’s headline declared it the “Worst Congress Ever,” and showcased ten of the worst offenders who are shamelessly lining their pockets, their family’s pockets, and those of lobbyist friends. And many may well be reelected.

While the “take back Congress” refrain may be invigorating, from what I’ve seen documented of the scale of voter disenfranchisement and computer manipulation in 2000 and on an even grander scale in 2004, I suspect that the amount of vote manipulation in this election will only grow. Democrats have rolled over and accepted this disenfranchisement with barely a whimper. If it happens again this cycle, the hundreds of millions sunk into winning elections may well prove to be a bad investment, like betting on a shell game in which the ball has long since vanished from the table.

If elections are not fundamentally clean, all of the electoral fanfare will be for naught. We will sit on election eve watching results come in with the same surreal feeling of the last election, with a gullible media declaring their surprise as contested state after contested state miraculously rolls over to the red column.

One of my most politically-savvy mentors has said the only thing worth spending effort on in this election is to radically reform our corrupted election process. Without voting integrity, we do not have a democracy. To maintain the charade serves no one. Unfortunately, the awareness and safeguarding of our voting process has not reached a critical mass yet such that we can feel confident in the results of Nov. 7th. Will we reach that critical mass in 11 days? Likely not.

If we understand the depth of corruption of our voting process, we may choose to focus less on candidates and more on the voting process itself, making whatever progress is possible in the next 11 days. The trouble with this approach is that it tends to take the wind out of people’s sails – we like to feel optimistic, enthused, and excited by the prospect of advancement. Focusing mainly on vote suppression, theft, and manipulation tends to reduce our passion for politics and our hope for the future. Many begin to write it off as a dirty game that soils us when we play it.

When I assess strategies for this election, what I see is that the first strategy of merely rallying for Democrat victory may prove to be naïve. And the second strategy of focusing mainly on voting manipulation may reduce our passion and vision.

As I reflect more deeply on what would be an enlightened approach to this election, what comes to me is to encourage people to vote sincerely with heart and conscience, to truly express their highest aspirations for America and the world. Voting in this way is an affirmation of goodness, a compact between us and the universe regarding what we would like to see in the world. In this way, our votes are logged in our minds and hearts, no matter what happens in the polling places. Sitting out the election does nothing but undermine hope.

While making the positive affirmation of voting for what we want to see, though, I believe it is imperative that we not shield our eyes from shadowy truths. We need to understand the depth of corruption now happening in our government and in our election process or we become unwitting accomplices. As we cultivate visionary optimism then, we must also cross-train with a dose of more sobering truths. For example, after studying the measures on a ballot and choosing those we feel will truly help us evolve, we might spend fifteen minutes reading Robert F. Kennedy’s brilliant Rolling Stone expose of the last election’s voting fraud:


As another example, we might first make a donation to the DCCC to ensure that Democratic messages are not drowned out by Republican attack ads, but then we could make a parallel “donation” to expose more shadowy truths in the form of buying Mark Crispin Miller’s brilliant 2004 expose Fooled Again for ten of our friends. When we keep a foot in both camps, we balance our optimism with realism while also retaining enough hope to move forward.

Election day is not the final goal but another step in the process of waking up from a long cultural trance in which we’ve become a corrupted democracy. The real imperative is to reclaim our right to be fairly represented in our government, just as our Founding Fathers once had to do. Even a landslide victory for Democrats would result in only one step towards that goal, while another rigged election could prove an equally valuable step if we approach it in the right spirit.

Keeping the long-haul perspective better prepares us to take the next steps if the election results turn out to not be truthful or desirable. Will we follow the lead of the Mexicans and Ukrainians when it seemed their elections were tainted? A lot depends on the balance between our optimism and our realism. Without optimism, our realism can turn into apathy and cynicism. And without a dose of realism, our optimism may naively undermine our actual goals.

So let us all fully engage the political process in the coming days, optimistically voting our conscience while realistically watching with a skeptical eye.

Originally published at OpEdNews.com

Creating a Wonder of the World

With midterm elections looming and partisanship on overdrive, I find myself curiously disengaged. So much energy, money, and time are being poured into short-term attempts to win power, much of it directed towards generating more fear – fear of terrorism on the one hand and fear of further Republican misuse of power on the other.

While Democrats taking control of one or both houses would undoubtedly check some of the most egregious excesses of the Bush administration, it will not solve the fundamental problem at the heart of America right now: we have lost sight of a vision for our future. What do we dream of becoming as a nation?

When this country was founded it was with a noble spiritual purpose, backed by a practical strategy in the form of a Constitution. America was founded to become an oasis of enlightened understanding that could embody a new and more just form of politics and to do that in the service of all of humanity.

In some realms, we have made great strides, becoming a leader among nations. In other realms, we have failed badly, allowing our political processes to be overrun with special interests and our foreign policy to be corrupted by base motives.

If a global poll were taken asking about the world’s most deeply respected democracy, I would wager that we would no longer make the top ten. Other nations have passed us in many measures of happiness, democratic participation, and overall quality of life. Where we now lead is in the categories of economic and military might. We are no longer the conscience of the world and the greatest purveyor of freedom. We are becoming a self-interested empire. I believe that we have nobler stuff in our blood - a higher purpose for our existence than to sit at the top of the economic food chain and feast on our planet’s resources.

A news story on CNN today illuminated our core problem in an interesting way. A global vote is now underway to nominate a new set of Seven Wonders of the World, since most of the ancient seven wonders have been lost to history. There have narrowed down to 21 candidates, including the Pyramids of Giza, the Eiffel Tower, and the Taj Mahal.

Curiously, the only American wonder to even make the candidate list of 21 finalists is the Statue of Liberty – a gift to us from France. Here we are, a country that claims to be the greatest nation on Earth, with the most extraordinary wealth ever accumulated by a single people, consuming 1/4 of Earth’s resources, and we have not constructed a single edifice that would qualify for the voting roster.

Very illuminating

What does it take to create a wonder of the world? First, it takes vision, a vision that is breathtaking in ambition, expansive in scope, and typically spans generations. Second, it takes an ability to bring large numbers of people to work together in community towards shared goals, often in extraordinarily creative and innovative ways. Third, it takes a sense of awe, reverence and respect.

We view structures with wonder when they put us in touch with the cosmic dimension of our existence, mirror our soul’s greatest hopes, or touch the sacred core of existence. Beauty, intelligent design, and heroic power must suffuse something in order to inspire wonder in those viewing it. Many of the candidate Wonders were created at the apex of an advanced civilization’s power, concretizing their values and highest aspirations.

A Stealth bomber, for all the innovation and money that goes into it, does not inspire wonder. A skyscraper built for the practicalities of business does not touch the heart deeply. So much of our national creativity is channeled to short-term profit-generation and machines that kill rather than monuments that inspire. For all America’s might, we haven’t yet generated a symbolic structure that is worthy of our presumed greatness as a civilization. We have not yet come together in a vision of ourselves that is bigger and nobler than individual self-interest, that reverentially and humbly bows down before something vaster.

What if we moved away from focusing on our military power and endeavored to build a truly wondrous structure, an enduring edifice that is worthy of our noblest aspirations as a nation, something that can thrill generations for thousands of years, something that transcends partisan politics and ideological warfare and nationalistic loyalties to represent our shared humanity. I’m envisioning a national temple of sorts, one that is inclusive of all the world’s people and all the world’s religions. It would reflect the extraordinary land we’ve been given and send our blessings forward into the future.

Ancient Egyptians dared to take on such a task with their pyramids and have left a legacy of awe that has spanned millennia. With our expanded technological prowess and larger population, what could we achieve today?

What if we were to dedicate this sacred national monument to peace, liberty, and global justice, and build it for thousands of years to come, infusing it with our deepest reverence and our most heartfelt prayers. Directing a few of the hundreds of billions that we now spend on the military could put such a project in motion, especially if the money were matched by philanthropy as others commit to creating a truly wonderful expression of our shared dreams. Churches have learned that a true spiritual community requires a structure around which to gather for worship. We could do the same as a country.

Such a manmade symbol would help in our transition from a fear and accumulation-driven people into a more mature nation, committed to projects bigger, nobler, and more enduring than our own individual lives and more constructive than warfare. A monument might not seem philanthropic at first, but it would help inspire us to take a larger view of the meaning of our lives, which ultimately leads to true philanthropy.

The strident, short-term warfare of today’s election season might seem an odd time to make such a suggestion. But perhaps if we take seriously the need to turn our collective awareness towards wonder-inspiring legacies for millennia into the future, we can begin to dream together again, as well as find opportunities to use our might to create a peaceful, sustainable, and wonder-filled future.

Originally published at OpEdNews.com:

Sacred America Series #30
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Lady Liberty

Recently, I was reading Thom Hartmann’s 2005 article on political branding, which led me to reflect on the psychology of political identity. While his analysis was fascinating, I came to different conclusions about what the left really needs right now. The right wing has succeeded in wrapping itself in the flag of patriotism, creating a political identity of loyal, religious Americans who are strong and self-reliant. The right’s visual logo is the flag itself. Hartmann is quite accurate in portraying the right as having done a more effective job at creating an enduring identity than the left, regardless of what we think of the actual policies.

I see three main options for the left to improve its positive branded identity and thus create a more effective political movement. First, it can rekindle the class struggle against oppression – working and middle classes versus the upper class – that has served as a primary identification for the left in the past. This struggle has noble motives and a long history behind it. Hartmann advocates this route, linking it with the founding impulse of our country. However, I think this strategy has some real limitations, including being built on opposition rather than vision, limitation rather than abundance, and polarization versus our sense of interconnection.

The second option is to try to occupy the same ground as the right, reclaiming the flag, American patriotism, national self-interest, etc. This approach reframes the left’s policies as more effective paths to the same goals as the right professes, such as financial success and security. Recent Democrat candidates have often taken this angle, trying to be more patriotic, fiscally responsible, and tougher on terrorists than their Republican opponents. The challenge with this option is twofold: claiming aspects of identity already monopolized by the right is a long, slow fight, and the actual symbolism may not be as resonant for many left-wingers, many of whom do not feel a teary-eyed devotion to the flag or as strong a sense of American patriotism.

The third route, which I believe is the most evolutionary path for the long term, is to transcend class-based or nationalistic identification and connect the left’s sense of identity to something more universal, heart-centered, and principled. This approach sees left-wing policies as expressions of care not just for a few Americans but for the entire planet. It evokes an image of us carrying the torch of democracy and freedom not merely to advance our self-interest but to bring more light to the world. This is ultimately a spiritual impulse, but one that isn’t confined to a particular religion.

The clearest and most powerful symbol we have for this compassionate, universal mission is the Statue of Liberty. First, she was a gift from France and is thus symbolic of our strong relationship with other countries, which breaks down the isolationist impulse nationalism can trigger. She is carrying a torch, which has multiple levels of symbolism connected to light, freedom, and expanded awareness. She also compassionately welcomes the poor and the huddled masses of the world, who come to create a better life for themselves. On a still deeper level, she is symbolic of the sacred feminine in its powerful form, not subservient to a masculine God but carrying the torch of transformation with confidence.

As George Lakoff has pointed out, the values of the left are intrinsically more connected to the mother, to compassion, and healthy feminine qualities. Trying to use the American flag for the “branding” of the left is thus not a good fit. The flag symbolizes a political union of states. It is more linear and masculine in its design as well as its implications. Lady Liberty, by contrast, is a feminine symbol that evokes the compassion at the heart of democracy, the ultimate goal of which is liberation and happiness for all people. She is both beautifully symbolic of America’s special qualities AND she displays a more planetary concern for humankind.

In an age of hypermasculine government, retributive military action, and cutthroat business, the left needs a visual identity that embraces the feminine in its most powerful, compassionate, and beautiful form. It also needs to claim the sacred impulse that is at the core of progressive policies and platforms. Without that spiritual core, the level of connection people feel to the left’s political identity will remain weak. We need to feel the heart of the left. Lady Liberty is the best visual symbol we have for what we truly love – the liberation and advancement of all humankind. For Christians, Lady Liberty represents the same kind of love that Jesus expressed in his embrace of prostitutes and lepers, sinners and even Romans – a love that transcends class, race, and social status.

Lady Liberty thus represents the true heart of America and is a far more potent and accurate symbol for our mission than the American flag. Orienting the left’s identity around transcendent values via a strong connection to the Statue of Liberty begins to construct a new identity that is uniquely American AND global, spiritual AND religious, working-class AND elite. I see the potential to create a whole national awareness campaign driven by the left and using Lady Liberty to rekindle our commitment to what is most beautiful, noble, and generous about America. As that new, more encompassing view is reinforced, the left can re-emerge as stewards of America’s next political evolution.

Originally published at OpEdNews.com


Sacred America Series #29
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The Republican Party Needs to Feel the Consequences

Everyone has a different motivator for growth; some are drawn by the creative excitement of exploring the unknown, while others are motivated by fear of negative consequences. When considering the growth of a whole country, we need to recognize the range of people’s motivators and act appropriately. Carrots and sticks both have their place.

On the left wing, “stick” motivators are often considered unsavory and somewhat barbaric – words like punishment are rarely used. On the right wing, the “stick” motivators are inherently more valued, from military retribution to capital punishment. Underpinning the right wing orientation is a belief that humans need to be accountable for themselves and their actions, and therefore they need to feel serious consequences when they do something against the law or societal standards.

Instead of debating whether this is the best motivator for human growth, let’s approach the issue more pragmatically: conservatives are saying that they personally do not trust human nature without “stick” punishments to keep people in line. This can also be read as a confession: we need strong consequences for mistakes to ensure we take personal responsibility.

A revealing thing is happening with this fall’s election. Republican candidates across the country are scrubbing two things from their websites, speeches, and campaign materials: George W. Bush and the Iraq War. One race I read about prominently featured web pictures of the candidate with John McCain at a fundraiser and made no mention of the fundraiser that featured the President. Across the board, Republicans are trying to make the elections focus on individual candidates and local politics. What is really happening is that they are tacitly admitting that they have made two major errors of judgment: lock-step support of a misguided President, and an expensive, botched, and deceptive war with Iraq.

In both areas, Republicans chose unification behind the party line instead of critical thinking, healthy challenge, and democratic processes. In both areas, they have made serious blunders with financial, political, and human consequences for the American people and the world. By largely omitting mention of those two areas in their campaign platforms much less proposing real and innovative changes moving forward, they are trying to escape the consequences for their leadership failures.

Instead, all of America is bearing the consequences of these decisions. Even many right-wing pundits are seeing George W. Bush as having led America in the wrong direction, and there are few people who do not see the Iraq war as a failure.

This brings us back to the conservative approach to motivation. If the Republican Party does not feel serious consequences for the failures that it is now tacitly admitting, it will not improve, reform, or come back into integrity. It has wielded power these last few years and there is nowhere else to lay the blame for major mistakes. If elected Republicans refuse to offer solutions or to bear the consequences, instead playing a shell-game with the American people, it is beholden upon Americans from across the political spectrum to reduce the party’s power.

Accountability is at the foundation of conservative values. If the Republican Party has fallen prey to the seductions of power and is refusing to hold itself accountable for its actions, then conservatives and moderate Republicans should join fellow Americans from the other side of the political spectrum in ensuring that the party has a major loss of power in the fall. That would send a clear signal that the American people want leaders who are willing to take ownership for mistakes and work to address them.

If we have the usual Democratic-Republican tug-of-war with a high percentage sitting jaded on the sidelines, that will not happen. However, if Americans as a whole admit that something has gone quite wrong with the Republican party right now, it becomes a trans-partisan issue to rebalance the scales of power. Conservatives who can’t bear to vote Democratic can abstain from voting or vote Libertarian. For moderates who see that both major parties are potentially problematic and need to be balanced, voting Democratic ensures there are some checks on Republican power in the next two years.

I see it as a moral obligation for all citizens of America to ensure that the Republican Party breaks the spiral of power intoxication, ethical decay, and arrogance that is leading it far away from the healthy expression of conservative values.

We Americans need to remember that politicians are our employees. And when political parties as a whole go awry, it is beholden upon us as the employers to ensure accountability. Otherwise, it is we the people who bear the consequences rather than those who are the source of the decisions.

Originally published at OpEdNews.com

Sacred America Series #28
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Learning from Hezbollah

The recent war in Lebanon was devastating on many levels, from the loss of human life to decimated infrastructure to massive ecological destruction. The long oil slick that rivals the Alaskan Valdez spill and has engulfed much of the beautiful Lebanese coast provides a sickening reminder of the aftermath of war – everything is affected by the black ooze.

While Hezbollah’s hatred of Israel and terrorist activities certainly bear partial responsibility for the war, I also think we have something to learn from what they did in the aftermath of the pummeling. Instead of focusing all their efforts on a losing fight with a superior army, Hezbollah moved rapidly into the devastated areas of Lebanon with Iranian money and committed manpower to start the rebuilding. Money that could have been spent on more guns and rocket launchers instead went to families that lost homes, who received an average of $12,000 apiece. Hezbollah’s response to the damage has been noticeably more efficient and effective than the government’s.

The result? A groundswell of popular support for Hezbollah in Lebanon and throughout the Arab world.

What this means is that, after some $1.6B of Israeli military expenditures, the destruction of Lebanon’s infrastructure, and massive loss of life, Hezbollah came out stronger than they began as an organization. Even from a coldly calculating military view, Israel has had a lousy return on investment. And it illuminates the problem with “fighting terrorism” in the way America and Israel have largely tried to do – with stunning displays of force and military dominance. In an age in which stories circulate at Internet speed and global media networks feed on images of devastation, those who aim to “shock and awe” must understand that “shock and awe” quickly turn to “horror and hatred.” Images of devastation affect us in a deeply emotional way and it is difficult to see the purveyor of massive destruction as righteous for long.

A similar pattern has played out in Iraq. For a time, the media spin about Iraq worked; the “coalition” forces were seen by many as liberators. And yet, over time, that story has lost efficacy. The ongoing death tolls and devastation have hammered home a different view of America as self-interested occupier. In the court of world opinion and certainly in the hearts of Iraqis, the United States has lost the moral upper hand and is now in the long, humbling process of coming to terms with being seen as the villain.

In both the case of America’s war in Iraq and Israel’s in Lebanon, there has been a fundamental imbalance in the ratio between aggression and compassionate support, with a heavy skew towards aggression. Hezbollah did not defeat Israel on the battlefield, but they did in the hearts and minds of the people. They did so by offering committed support in the rebuilding rather than superiority in the aggression. By funneling so much money and effort into helping victims of the war start to rebuild, they prioritized caring for the Lebanese people over their own military activities. Israel primarily spent its resources on military aggression and has not spent them on compassionate support in rebuilding from that aggression, except at home. With damage in Lebanon estimated at $3.6 billion, there is an opportunity to rebuild a network of support and trust. If Israel is not a leading participant in that and Hezbollah continues to lead the way forward, the result will be an increase in Arab hatred of Israel and a strengthening of Hezbollah, which in turn fuels terrorism.

Historically, the United States understood the importance of following an act of military aggression with extensive compassionate support. After World War II, we poured money and resources into Germany and Japan to rebuild their infrastructure and their economies. We demonstrated that our wartime destruction was ultimately in the service of helping the Japanese and German people free themselves from unhealthy regimes and succeed as strong peoples. Without redemptive, compassionate support that follows a military triumph, the seeds are sown quickly for still another war.

Today, American efforts to rebuild Iraq have been pathetic; our military prowess in the first phase of the war has been followed by an ineffective, corrupt, underfunded, and half-hearted effort at nation-building . If we had instead planned from the beginning to spend more money, creativity, and human power on peaceful nation-building than we spent on conducting the war, we might have shown that we had the sincere long-term interests of the Iraqis in our hearts. That in turn would have laid the groundwork for a real ally in the Arab Middle East. Similarly, if Israel spent twice the money and creative thinking on rebuilding Lebanon now as it spent on attacking it, it could better demonstrate that it has the sincere interest of their neighbors at heart. Ultimately, generous help is what creates allies. By itself, aggression only creates enemies.

The result of today’s imbalance towards aggression as the primary strategy to deal with terrorism is that both the United States and Israel are wasting massive amounts of money, rapidly losing support in the world community, and creating far more destruction than is necessary. In today’s interconnected global media, the horrific images of the results are seen across the world.

The only effective military strategy left, then, is to make compassionate, philanthropic support the primary focus rather than blowing things up – the optimal ratio today might be three parts compassionate aid for every one part military action. Without a shift in the balance, we will continue to invest our precious resources in spreading devastation, fostering terrorism, and compromising our moral leadership.

The world now needs to feel our good heart far more than our strong arm. It is ultimately our generosity, not our capacity to shock and awe, that offers a real solution to terrorism.

Originally published at OpEdNews.com

Sacred America Series #27
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Consecrating the Warrior

One of the most vexing questions for those who want America to evolve to the next level is how to handle the warrior qualities that we’ve developed in our country. We are a country steeped in violence, from our high murder rates to our lust for bloodsports to our excitement at crushing an “enemy” in battle. Like the Romans who encouraged and cultivated martial culture through coliseum “sport” and battlefield glory, Americans have been trained to love violence in film, games, and sport, which has fed our growth into becoming Earth’s dominant military power.

Many peace activists and pacifists believe that we will simply outgrow our martial tendencies and that we will no longer harbor aggression once we evolve to the next level. Peace, in that view, becomes a transcendence of the more primitive qualities that now often dictate human behavior. We just evolve into an idyllic and sanitized human nature in which we all just get along peacefully.

I believe that our evolutionary path forward requires something different. Once a capacity is built, it is human nature not to want to lose it. Right-wing fears of giving more power to the United Nations reflect this desire to retain the power, strength, and dominance we’ve achieved rather than cede it to a larger political structure. America’s resistance to the Kyoto Accords also relates to fear of loss of power. Even if rational analysis reveals that larger global structures hold greater promise to solve problems such as war and global warming, emotionally it is quite hard for Americans to relinquish the power that we’ve amassed. “We’re number one” has become a national attachment.

The left tends to dislike the mentality that fuels martial dominance. The right tends to be identified with it. Neither side is really providing a true path forward for how the virtues that are foundational to martial dominance can be harnessed in the service of the evolution of all humanity. I say virtues because the disciplines required to become martially strong are not easy to master. To become physically, emotionally, and mentally outstanding is no easy task. America is a young nation and to rise to military dominance so quickly has required remarkable excellence, from the economic engine that provides the money to the science that provides a technological edge. Almost every country in the world has vied for military dominance at some point and the fact that we’ve achieved it is a mark of excellence.

That said, now that we’ve become “number one,” what do we do with that warrior power? Empires can and do rot. They become stagnant and self-indulgent, like a professional athlete who retires and becomes a coach potato. Is that America’s fate? Or will we find better uses for our accumulated prowess?

I see two main things that need to happen for America’s warrior qualities to be consecrated in the service of the next level of evolution. The left needs to embrace the virtues and disciplines that undergird warrior strength. They need to see the competitive fire of sports, the driven intensity of business, and even a strong and effective military as engines for the good. The full embrace of warrior disciplines will allow more left-wing and higher consciousness folks to demonstrate the physical, emotional, and mental strength that those on the right require of their leaders, and thus be embraced as political leaders. I see it as a good sign when left-wingers can comfortably embrace weight-lifting, boxing, or hard-core capitalism.

The right, on its side, needs to outgrow narrowly-defined self-interest. When the warrior is harnessed only in the service of narrow interests, it becomes increasingly narcissistic and even demonic, to use a loaded religious word. That’s part of why a fair number of right-wing folks start off by developing strong, self-reliant, and noble virtues but then evolve into, for lack of a better word, jerks. Their warrior virtues become increasingly self-focused and their sense of care and compassion for others diminishes. They become good at amassing power, money and strength and increasingly selfish about what they do with it.

Liberals, on the other hand, tend to dissociate from the warrior side, or diminish its value. So they may become less adept at being strong, productive, and self-reliant. They resent the amassment of power and money by conservatives and want it to flow more “equitably” rather than simply compete for the resources in the capitalist game. Their warrior side tends to come out in their right-wing critiques, which often are strong on intellectual logic and weak on personal accountability. To use the words of right-wing pundits such as Ann Coulter, they become “whiny wimps.”

The way I see it, neither is in balanced, right relationship with the warrior side of their being. One identifies with it for mostly selfish gain while the other splits from it in a way that abdicates power. The path forward for America, I believe, requires a different relationship with our well-honed warrior qualities, one that consecrates them in the service of something higher.

A truly sacred warrior consecrates his or her “sword” for the liberation or betterment of all beings. Not just Christians or Americans or Muslims or Crips or Jews. Everyone. Even our animal brethren. Gandhi was a kind of spiritual warrior, expressing his warrior qualities in the form of intense personal disciplines and social action. He and his satyagrahas acted for the liberation of India AND the transformation of the British empire. America’s founding revolutionaries were not just trying to get out of paying taxes, they were fighting for the right to create a new kind of political structure that would advance human freedom for the entire world. In World War II, Americans stepped up militarily to stop Hitler’s march, a great and noble service for the whole world.

Contrast those acts with the current-day occupation of Iraq, in which recent polls show some 91% of Iraqis opposed to the occupation of U.S. troops. We can no longer sincerely claim that we are in service of the Iraqi people. We have to admit that what was originally presented as an effort to liberate Iraqis from Saddam and advance freedom is really about US greed for oil and a military presence in the Middle East. The occupation is not a case of us using our martial dominance for sacred purposes, although that kind of rhetoric was required to win popular support in the beginning for the war.

Because we are the most powerful nation on Earth militarily, it is essential for us to evolve that martial dominance into something that truly serves the planet. Human nature being what it is, it is unlikely that we will simply relinquish the dominance we’ve achieved. However, the dominance can be consecrated sincerely for the whole. Such a political consecration, though, can only happen when a critical mass of American citizens begins to evolve a different relationship with their own warrior side, taking the middle path forward of embracing warrior qualities and virtues while using them for the good of all beings.

This is ultimately a path of love, which integrates all aspects of our full nature and offers them up in a spirit of generosity. Such a path reduces violence rather than reveling in it. When America’s martial dominance and warrior virtues can be equally offered up in service to Israelis AND Lebanese, Americans AND Iranians, then we will begin to create a world that is truly at peace.

Originally published at OpEdNews.com

Sacred America Series #26
If you’d like to read these weekly articles exploring a sacred vision for America, you can visit www.stephendinan.com or sign up on the distribution list by sending an email to stephendinan-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

Preparing for Leadership

America is heading for a crisis in the coming years, a crisis precipitated by the growing recognition that we as a nation have become a significant cause of the planet’s major problems. Crisis is a term that engenders fear in many, but crisis also holds the seeds of positive transformation. Those who see crisis only through the lens of danger tend to become afraid and move away from dealing with the truth of the situation. If we can also hold crisis as a gateway to new possibilities, then we become more hopeful and more curious to examine every facet of a crisis, thereby discovering gems of insight and pathways to transformation.

Let’s look at just three critical challenges for humanity where America has become a primary source of the problem. First is global warming, one of the most insidious threats to humanity, with hundreds of millions of people and many of the major coastal cities of the world in jeopardy if any of the major ice shelves melt, as is now happening in an accelerated fashion. America is by far the leading source of the CO2 that is driving global warming. We are also the largest nation to refuse to sign the Kyoto Accords, designed to curb global output. Global warming is a scientific fact now, and we know what accelerates it. The real questions are how disastrous the damage will be and how quickly it will happen. If we’re trying to come up with a viable strategy to prevent global warming, we need to address America as the single biggest source of the problem.

Second, in the realm of global peace, we in America have often seen ourselves as fighters for democracy and freedom. During moments of greatness, such as World War II, our warrior class has indeed held back the forces of oppression and sacrificed nobly for the good of the whole. Now, though, our increasingly botched war in Iraq tells a different story: America is not seen by Iraqis (nor most of the world) as a liberator but as an occupier that is heavily invested in Iraq’s oil assets and less interested in her people’s freedom. Similarly, our enormous financial and military support of Israel, even when it acts destructively, also undermines the sense that America is truly looking out for the good of the whole. In both situations, America is now amplifying the violence in the Middle East rather than expanding the peace.

Third, in the realm of democracy and a free press, America has also become a significant source of the problem. Our democracy is in peril, not only from the obvious causes of corporate corruption and special interest groups but also from the truths that still lay half-veiled, such as the apparent theft of our last Presidential election. Our government is increasingly swallowed by debt while politicians grant sweetheart deals to corporate backers. Our money and tax system have been distorted by the privately-held Federal Reserve Bank. Our electoral integrity fails international standards and our media have become consolidated and fearful of doing their job of countering public abuses with rigorous truthtelling. The contrast between Mexico’s reaction to an apparently-stolen election and ours was dramatic, which reflects our docile press combined with a too-cautious Democratic party and a stunned-into-silence electorate.

The truth is that an unaccountable, moneyed, and powerful elite now pulls the strings of the United States government and press with remarkable ease and devastating effects. We are no longer a leading example of a healthy, functioning democracy with a fully free press but of a proto-fascist state merging political and corporate power, smoothed over with a thin veneer of democracy. Worse yet, we tend to support and advance governments that are favorable to our economic interests, even when they are oppressively anti-democratic. In this way, we are often a barrier to other countries becoming more democratic because we reinforce oppressive regimes that are profitable for us.

Those are only three dimensions of the crisis humanity is facing , and yet they are essential. Sustainability, peace, and democracy are foundational to a healthy global civilization. America needs to step back into positive, forward-moving leadership in all three realms or it will bear a heavy responsibility for the suffering that ensues. For example, how will we feel as the world’s leading producer of CO2, if one of the large Antarctica ice sheets melts, destroying the homes and lives of hundreds of millions of people with increased global sea levels?

So the question then becomes, “What can we do on a personal level to help America step into healthy global leadership on these issues?” My answer is to become leaders ourselves, each of us becoming a catalyst for positive transformation – an example of the changes we want to see in our systems.

As the cracks in America’s image become more evident and the repercussions of our failures become more damaging, we are going to need a whole new generation of leaders, ones who can embody new paradigms of living, foster innovative solutions, restore healthy democratic processes, and serve the planet rather than just self-interest.

Each of us can become one of these leaders. Indeed, it might require ALL of us to become one. Here’s my advice for how to prepare to help America choose an evolutionary path in the coming crises:

1. Personal growth – become adept at working with the many tools for personal healing, conscious empowerment, and spiritual growth. Coaches, bodyworkers, therapists, meditation teachers, acupuncturists, priests, martial arts senseis, seminar leaders, and intuitive readers can all be valuable allies on your path at different times. Get over judgments and figure out which people, practices, and resources can be most helpful to you on your path of growth. Learning to utilize these resources is part of becoming a clear and effective leader, and it will also allow you to ably guide others as well. The clearer you are, the better you will lead. Shadow work is particularly important since leaders operate in an amplified field of energy. At higher levels, the pressures, attention, and responsibilities increase along with the power. Most people who ascend to leadership have not spent enough time working with their shadow issues around power, sex, and money and thus begin to distort around those issues as the voltage amps up.
   
2. Continual Education – Leaders need to understand the full breadth and depth of current problems. Today, this means keeping a finger on the pulse of new developments in everything from technology to politics. Read synposes and books from the far left to the far right, as well as those that look at shadow politics, without dwelling too long. Get some of your information from the mainstream media while spending equal time investigating independent or overseas media sources, especially on the Net. Sign up for niche email newsletters that can provide you with a rapid way to track developments in various fields. Watch milestone movies such as “An Inconvenient Truth” and strongly encourage others to do so as well to ensure the largest possible audience. If you do all this, you’ll have a pretty good sense for the whole truth of our current situation.
   
3. Practice – Look at every situation in which you find yourself as an opportunity to practice leadership. This could be anything from volunteering to run a church discussion group to managing a team at work to making wise household decisions. The kinks, challenges, and problems of our leadership will manifest in whatever realm we choose to exercise it. That’s why it’s good to have lots of practice in more forgiving environments before taking on more substantial worldly roles. If you don’t work out the kinks in the small environments, you’ll do so on a bigger, more public stage with larger consequences. While you grow in your leadership, practice empowering others in their leadership since great leaders are masterful at developing other leaders.
   
4. Spend time in both mainstream and alternative cultures - Mainstream culture tends to have more grounded systems of preparation and more effective skills trainings to develop expertise in leading organizations, companies, and systems. Alternative culture tends to have a lot of important visionary ideas and innovative solutions, many of which can’t get traction until people embrace mainstream disciplines. Spending significant time in both cultures is helpful preparation for leadership.
   
5. Mentors – a key component of developing leadership is finding people you respect that exemplify greater excellence in your chosen domain and then establishing a mentor/mentee relationship. That may entail an apprenticeship, regular coaching, or simple friendship. Effective leaders template off other effective leaders and seek out people who can help them develop to the next level.
   
6. Walk Your Talk – If you are committed to sustainability and the environment, minimize your ecological footprint and offset your carbon every year to become carbon neutral. If you believe in compassion for all beings, become a vegetarian. If you believe in the importance of integrity, be disciplined about always telling the truth. Even the simple, quiet acts that no one will ever see have an effect on your leadership capacity. Those who do not walk their talk create barriers to effective leadership because their words are not as authentic, real, or powerful. Integrity is a true leader’s greatest source of power.

Our ability to grow slowly into our clearest, highest, and most effective leadership—a process that takes time—will determine how helpful we can be in the years ahead. Even if our acts now seem small, they are helping to accelerate humanity’s journey to a better way of being together on this beautiful planet.

As this occurs, some of the fearsome problems we face will create some of the most extraordinary advances. I believe that America can become the world’s leader in transitioning to a sustainable, renewable, and healthy economy that takes us away from oil dependency and the perils of global warming. Our military can become an effective force for peace, harmony, and sincere assistance. And we can fulfill American’s founding vision of being a beacon for democracy and freedom of expression, helping other countries to do the same. Each of these transformations will become quite natural when we reach a critical mass of people who are prepared to lead the way.

Originally published at OpEdNews.com

Sacred America Series #25
If you’d like to read these weekly articles exploring a sacred vision for America, you can visit www.stephendinan.com or sign up on the distribution list by sending an email to stephendinan-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

Loving the Enemy

Sacred America series #24

After more than a month away from my Sacred America writing series, a time filled with equal parts romantic adventure, spiritual exploration, and rest, I find myself wanting to return to this series with a different spirit - less intellectual interpretation of political patterns and more visceral honesty about navigating these times.

This is edgier territory for me. My heart wants to recoil from the evening news, with stories of accelerated global warming, terrorist threats, and the ever-tightening vise of fear. It is easier to be aloof, seeing it all as the perfect unfolding of the human race growing into a new stage of maturity. It is far harder to open fully to the people and animals of our planet as they face apocalyptic horrors. It’s simply devastating to immerse in the grief of a Lebanese widow, the outrage of an Iraqi youth stripped of dignity, or the desperate hunger of a Sudanese refugee. How much can I open to these situations and retain a positive outlook, one infused with trust and a spirit of possibility?

One of America’s gifts to the world is our visionary optimism, but that gift often carries a shadow of hubris and indifference to the plight of others. President Bush’s recent stance that an “enduring” cease-fire in Lebanon could only happen after Lebanon’s infrastructure was sufficiently devastated serves as a case in point. The belief seems to be that we and our allies need to be heartless and brutal, strong-arming the world into submission to make us “safe.” Noticeably absent has been a sense of true compassion for the Lebanese, which might have led to a more balanced embrace of the troubled psychology on both sides of the conflict. The end result is that the Lebanese people are devastated, Israelis are even more reviled in the Middle East, and America’s credibility has been dealt another crushing blow.

Perhaps the saddest part is that much of America’s aggressive posturing in the world is paired with a supposed dedication to Christ. Last month’s vacation with my wife connected me to a far different side of Christianity, the side that could build the splendor of the Chartres Cathedral, inspire the prophetic peace of St. Francis, and fuel the extraordinary service of St. Patrick, who returned to the land in which he had once been enslaved to dedicate himself to ending slavery and uplifting the Irish people.

Jesus’ most radical teaching was to “love thy enemy as thyself.” This teaching is at the sacred core of his work, challenging us to open our hearts so wide that we exclude no one, even those who attack or wrong us. Instead, we are asked to forgive those who wrong us not just seven times but “seventy times seven times.”

Who among us has lived this teaching fully? It is certainly not easy – millennia of biological survival programs drive us towards domination, violence, and revenge when threatened. But with humanity’s amplified capacity to destroy, if we let ourselves be driven by our biological codes, we accelerate the forces that are taking humanity over a deadly cliff. I believe that we have no other choice but to take seriously Jesus’ radical heart practice if we want to survive. If we cannot find love for those we now see as our enemies, the spiral of retribution and fear continues, thereby preventing us from rising to meet the great challenges of our day.

The golden possibility of a healthy, prosperous, and sustainable planet will remain out of reach so long as we squander so much of our money, talent, and time on defense and aggression, protection and control, dominance and fear. The 21st century is humanity’s time of reckoning. We will evolve or we will self-destruct. I believe it is as simple as that. The difference between the two paths is not technological or even political but psychological and spiritual. Ultimately, it comes down to the question of how wide we are willing to open our hearts. Only when we extend our love to all of humanity can we begin to collaborate effectively on the otherwise unsolvable catastrophes that loom before us.

So as we hear of terrorist plots and watch devastating wars, let us dare to practice what Jesus taught. Instead of feeding the cycle of fear and contraction, let us instead encourage a spiral of love, holding both sides in a vision of sacred healing. It is indeed a practice and may not come naturally. But when we speak, think, and act from this stance, we can begin to reverse the downward spiral of humanity’s heart. This includes extending our love even to the very politicians and leaders who sound the drumbeat for war and retribution. Can we include them in our compassion as well, sending them blessings of peace and love? Even if they take the role of the aggressor, they too are stuck, afraid, and wounded. “Forgive them, Lord, for they know not what they do.”

The ripples may seem small from opening our hearts wider at the very moment when our biology screams for protection, but the acts of healing and compassion that result are the only thing that can propel us beyond our wounded reactivity to discover our shared humanity.

Will we be part of the spiral that uplifts humanity? Or we will allow fear to seduce us towards our collective demise? We make our choice with every breath, every thought, and every deed.

Originally published at OpEdNews.com: