A Progressive Honoring Conservative Values

Some readers who lean towards the right-wing side of the political spectrum have urged me to do a systematic critique of left-wing shortcomings as part of activating a more sacred political vision for America. Truth, after all, rarely lies entirely on one side of any position or argument. They say my primary alignment with progressive values and candidates, even while respecting the importance of conservative values, makes it harder for what I’m saying to reach into the hearts of mainstream folks who might otherwise be responsive.

I respect this opinion. And I also see that there’s a tightrope to walk between being true to my more radical nature and writing in a way that can incorporate the views of others in a more integrative, inclusive whole. My predilection is towards change – the more accelerated the better. I’m an evolution junkie, eager for the next frontier, innovation, or vision. I love pushing the envelope of experimentation. I read history in a dutiful rather than nostalgic fashion. I’m not the kind of person who thumbs through photo albums or reminisces about the past.

And yet, I’ve also become aware that if I simply give free rein to my thirst for the new, I undermine my ability to create enduring structures. Manifesting something requires a certain wariness about change, a suspicion of the newest idea, and a skepticism about the value of the latest vision. It also requires commitment and focus over the long-term. Conservative values often breed better businesspeople for this reason. There’s a greater loyalty to the past and discernment about what new ideas have value. This translates into more attention to detail, greater commitment to staying the course once it is chosen, and a more disciplined relationship with life.

Conservatives often stand on the shoulders of lineage because they have greater respect for the past. They have more reverence for the sacred power of a document like the Bible that has guided long epochs of human civilization. They have an abiding respect for what works about our market-driven economic system. Conservatives also tend to feel more authentically patriotic because they are more proud of our history and what we’ve already achieved. For someone like myself, oriented to our future potential, patriotism is a practice rather than something that flows naturally.

A conservative businessman whom I respect told me that he hasn’t moved a single piece of furniture in his house in 17 years. Once he got it the way he liked it, that’s the way it has stayed. While that detail might be amusing for those of us who prefer change, it’s also indicative of a spiritual orientation towards preservation. It’s no accident that this businessman has built a powerful and profitable company, with very low turnover. He’s in the business of perfecting his commitments rather than finding the newest thing.

Instead of a critique of the shortcomings of the left-wing, then, what I believe is more deeply needed is the practice of honoring what is beautiful in the right-wing coming from a primarily left-wing person. This ultimately accomplishes the same goal, which is to find a place of resonance and respect that transcends party lines and ideology, but it does so by amplifying what is good rather than attempting to negate what is “off.” When progressives fixate exclusively on what is wrong, corrupt, or problematic about current Republican leadership, we tend to create an internal polarization that keeps us in a self-righteous and judgmental position. This fixation entrenches our positions rather than opening us to new possibilities.

I’m not saying we shouldn’t seek truth and champion its public expression. I’m all for bringing shadowy truths into the bright light of day as well as doing everything in our power to ensure that the candidates who most represent our values prevail. But we can simultaneously do this from a ground of respect and honoring the so-called “other side.” The truths we speak when we are honoring will also be far easier to hear by people who don’t share our predilections.

I believe all of us are divine, sovereign beings, carrying forward specific and important tasks on planet earth. We may never understand the full story of why we are here and how we are serving these larger projects, or even whom we are working with. But I’ve glimpsed enough to sense that there is a grander plan that we are co-creating on a spiritual level. The more we can adopt a stance of sacred respect for the role of each of us in that plan, even those who might appear to be our antagonists, enemies, or oppressors, the more we can find ways to collaborate and synergize.

That collaboration must be grounded in an authentic honoring of our unique passions, skills, and predilections. After finding our own truth and our own gifts, though, we need to practice honoring the “other” more deeply. If not, we run the risk of becoming polarized against them and therefore wasting valuable creative energy. The practice of honoring what is foreign to us doesn’t come easily. It may run counter to our emotions as well as the encouragement of our social circles. It’s more satisfying (and easier) to rehearse the litany of complaints and critiques about the “other.” And yet so long as the antagonistic energy grows, we weaken our ability to work together towards shared goals.

America needs to evolve to another level of its expression; current challenges on a planetary level demand nothing less. The easiest way for this to happen is for conservatives to understand that systemic change is required and that change-oriented progressives carry many pieces of that next level. Progressives, on the other hand, need to honor that we cannot build that future in an enduring, stable, grounded way without the business savvy, discernment, and respect for tradition that conservatives more often carry. Such a mutual honoring across party lines can accelerate America’s evolution to the next level of our maturity as a country.

Originally published at OpEdNews.com

A New Constitutional Convention?

The Constitutional Convention that led to the creation of the United States of America took place in the late 1700’s at a time when the population was below two million. Slavery formed the foundation of large parts of the economy, especially in the South. The right of women to vote was almost inconceivable. There were no cars, trains, or airplanes, much less mass communication systems or large corporations. Nor were there organized political lobbying forces for special interests. We had a ragtag military that had miraculously taken on the most powerful military force in the world. America was basically a startup operation, long on hope, short on experience.

The Constitutional Convention convened a group of white men, most of aristocratic heritage, with some bold dreams for what a new-and-improved political blueprint might look like, drawing from the best Enlightenment thinkers, the political model of the Iroquois, and experience with the Articles of the Confederation. It was not a particularly inclusive group, with no representation for women, African Americans, or Native Americans, among many major stakeholders in the future of the country. Plus, the framers were definitely products of the European culture they had inherited. Even given all these limitations, though, the group was able to accomplish something historic – a political blueprint that could shape what would become the world’s most influential country.

For that accomplishment, Americans have shown a touching level of devotion. The Constitution has become, in many ways, a sacred document, revered with the honor normally reserved for the holy books of major religions. This stems from its eloquent presentation of sacred truths, its practical power, and its resiliency – the ability to change with the times when a sufficient mass of the government or people feel an amendment is required. It is both timeless and amendable by the times.

Given the extraordinary benefits that were unleashed in the act of the framers creating a visionary and practical framework for a new country, might we be able to do something parallel now, in the first decade of a new millennium? It need not necessarily be called a Constitutional Convention but the function would be the same – to harness the best thinking and practices to create a visionary and practical framework upon which a great collective future can be built.

Our times have emergent challenges that simply didn’t exist in the late 1700’s, ranging from global warming to shrinking oil supplies. As good as the framers of the Constitution of the United States were, they did not have the benefit of 200 years of experience with democracy. They did not have Darwin’s theory of evolution, the technology of the Internet, Freud’s forays into the unconscious, or the sciences of complexity, to name just a few key developments. They also lacked the global perspective that comes from seeing our planet from space and hadn’t bridged the best wisdom of both Eastern and Western culture.

Our worldview has transformed in thousands of extraordinary ways in these last two hundred years. What would a practical framework drawn up now that includes the best wisdom, insights, and practices from those two hundred years look like? It might start with the principles that have been carefully honed in the Earth Charter, and then translate them into a practical social-political-scientific-spiritual framework that could guide our next stage of collective evolution. This would not necessarily be a replacement for the US Constitution but a parallel that has the benefit of including new insights from physics, biology, psychology, sociology, diplomacy, technology, spirituality, medicine, and many other domains. A state-of-the-art, visionary framework for building an emerging global culture.

As the number of democracies multiplies around the world, what can we learn about best practices from the many experiments? What can we glean from an intense study of the successes and failures of the American experiment? And how can we be more inclusive in a new spiritual-political vision by including the wisdom of marginalized voices?

If we were to answer these questions in a coherent new way, giving shape to an emerging consciousness, we could lay down the guiding tracks for a next American Evolution. Like the Founding Fathers, we do have the power to become the architects of our destiny and rise to meet the great challenges of our day.

Originally published at OpEdNews.com

Declaration of Interdependence

When contemplating this week’s column, my thoughts turned to the idea of creating a Declaration of Interdependence, which would be designed to encourage a more mature expression of the American impulse.

Synchronistically, Jason White of Propeace.net contacted me this very week and had already written a good article on this same subject (http://www.propeace.net/node/473). A Google search turned up an even richer history; the concept had been proposed in 1944 by Pulitzer-winning philosopher Will Durant, launched with a Hollywood gala, and began something of a small movement before being entered into the Congressional record in 1949. Historian Henry Steele Commager took the second major stab at such a Declaration in 1975. Beyond that, a team of five from the David Suzuki Foundation launched a declaration at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio, concluding poetically with,

“At this turning point in our relationship with Earth, we work for an evolution: from dominance to partnership; from fragmentation to connection; from insecurity, to interdependence.”

Local governments, environmental groups, and various historians have all been drawn to the concept and a grassroots movement aims to turn September 1st (or perhaps Sept. 11th) into an international Interdependence Day.

Instead of seeking out more original subject matter, then, I instead want to reflect on why this loose movement is important, especially for America at this turn in history. The reason is that we increasingly have a mismatch between the predominant level of our thinking and the level of the problems that we face. America’s collective psychology is stuck in a hyper-independent mode, which becomes problematic when the challenges we face are systemic and interconnected. Strong assertions of independence, in the form of unilateral decisions, military action, and self-interested economics may be tolerable and even desirable at one stage of development. But for a country that is the only remaining superpower, such a stance destroys the foundation of trust, collaboration, and synergy that is required to truly resolve today’s international challenges.

In short, America is now too powerful to remain merely independent. Either our collective psychology grows into a more mature stance or there will be some sort of corrective to our power. Developmental psychologists have shown that the achievement of an autonomous self is an important step but not the ultimate destination of our growth. Independence is something normally achieved in the early twenties, usually during a period of rebellion against our families of origins, shared values, or ideas. We differentiate ourselves from the matrix out of which we’ve grown in order to find ourselves and express our unique gifts for the world.

Once we’ve made that developmental leap, though, the game isn’t over. We must then start taking the needs of others as seriously as we do our own. Perhaps we start with a marriage partner, then children, a business, or a church. Our compassionate care expands to widening circles. Right action becomes defined less by what we want and more by what is good for the whole network – our family, our community, and our planet. Political leaders, in particular, are charged with wise stewardship of collective resources; a hyper-independent stance is a handicap for them doing an excellent job.

The hallmark of mature adulthood is thus the capacity to think, feel, and act through the lens of interdependence and it is this kind of mature consciousness that we now require.

America’s Declaration of Independence from England was a major advance on many levels, from political to spiritual. Our national character grew into one of rugged individualism, forged in the face of adversity on the frontiers and the triumph of human ingenuity and willpower over life’s challenges. This built a strong, can-do character, epitomized by our entrepreneurism, which has become the gold standard for capitalism the world over.

Today, though, we are increasingly faced with the failure of rugged individualism to adequately respond to today’s challenges. George W. Bush, for example, is a strongly independent man – he does not bend or waver. He sticks to his guns and is parodied as a cowboy because he has the strongly masculine qualities of a frontiersman, grounded in warrior virtues. While such a stance is a wonderful advance beyond dependency and victimhood, it isn’t adequate to work effectively with an increasingly interconnected and interdependent world, which is part of why his approval ratings are plummeting.

A worldview grounded in individualism is stymied by situations of systemic and relational complexity because it is not hardwired to take the needs of the other into adequate consideration. By advocating for only one’s own interests rather than skillfully addressing the needs of the whole, individualism trends towards positional stances and the use of aggression to assert the primacy of “our” needs. In turn, this fosters a social climate of fear and attempts to provide security through armament. This proves inefficient and ineffective when situations call for collaborative solutions that are based upon trust rather than dominance.

So, while the Declaration of Independence represented a momentous and bold evolutionary step in launching our country, it’s no longer adequate for us to fixate on our independence when faced with 21st century challenges. As the most powerful nation in the world, we need to increasingly step into the role of mature, adult, global citizens who are acting from care for the whole rather than simple self-interest. The various attempts to create Declarations of Interdependence are all reflections of the same recognition that we have a higher and nobler destination.

What if America were to gather the same caliber of leadership as came together for our founding and forge an enduring new pact, this time with the world. This new statement would reflect and reinforce our interdependence with the entire planet, while honoring the sovereignty that is a pre-requisite. If such a national statement were not possible, perhaps the same end could be achieved more organically out of a network of Declarations of Interdependence, from local city councils and schools to global NGOs.

In either case, when America begins to take our commitment to interdependence as seriously as we do our commit to independence, that’s when we will again light the path forward to a more sustainable and peaceful planet.

Originally published at OpEdNews.com


Sacred America Series #16
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