Or how our Sapience can liberate the Self from the ‘Terror Management’ of an engineered ‘Ego’.
An Interdisciplinary Observation on the Phenomenon of Maturation.
Craveat lector : Rather than trying to construct a particular awareness or to manipulate a
certain consiousness, here the reader is invited to join a common ‘stream of consciousness‘
that nurtures the eco-dynamic sensibilities of our Social-Emotional Intelligence
There are at least two ways of reading my ‘articles’. They may be read as a ‘self-contained’ introduction
to a thought, idea or theory, or, alternatively & preferably, can be taken as a ‘hub page‘ into the subject matter.
One may regard them as a vade mecum that goes hand-in-hand with other publications here & beyond which may be
consulted for further analysis or explanations, and/or use the words as vertexes or nodes of a much larger network
of ideas, ultimately leading into the realm of collective consciousness. (Indra’s Net) In order to accommodate this
second approach I keep the level of ‘redundancy’ higher than absolutely necessary. So the attentive reader should not
be annoyed by these repetitions or reiterations, they are in fact intended reflections of the contextual environment.
This is contemplative writing for the mindful reader, so please take your time and try to ‘think more slowly’.
The sometimes very abstract thematic requires a more metaphorical language with peripheral words & images.
This layout allows not only ‘mental breaks’ but also eases the navigation should the reader choose to leave the page or
paragraph and return to it later. As in all my writings, the reader can choose where to begin, end or deviate …
… because eventually, everything will fall into place anyway.
Purview ( scope, competence, cognizance)
Abstract Thinking has enabled us to distinguish our Self from the Rest-of-Creation, and is key to the development of our
mirror-neurons that are essential for empathetic or socio-emotional learning and a myriad of other cognitive functions.
In the classic novel ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’, protagonist Atticus Finch teaches his children that “You never really
understand a person until you consider things from his point of view … until you climb inside of his skin
and walk around in it.”
Without abstraction, there would be no alteration or progression of perception, no sophistication of our
socio-cultural & environmental interactions. With the maturation & cultivation of our abstract thinking we can
implement a different state of consciousness, a ‘level’ of perception where we can find & reflect ourselves in
our social-ecological environment, and in such context become conscious co-creators.
The art of abstractions can ‘bridge‘ the rational with the emotional mind, create ideas, concepts & theories and then
develop values & ethics around its principals. Abstract thinking gives us the 3I‘s of Intuition, Inspiration & Imagination.
It is inseparable from our ability to communicate and develop culture, it’s the ‘language’ of all arts, of musicians,
poets & intellectuals. With it, we can ‘grow wings’, break the confinement of the body, connect us with the other,
– the rest-of-creation, and ‘elevate’ our mind into a realm of metaphysics & philosophy.
But, as anything else, those abstractions can be confusing or ‘lost in translation’. They can easily be misconceived, misunderstood and misinterpreted, leading to miscalculations, misconceptions, fallacies and delusions.
Here it is important to understand that,
in the context of obstructed social-emotions and manipulated empathy,
even our ‘consciousness‘ was altered or severely compromised.
The original, polytheistic meaning of ‘knowing with’ or ‘having joint or common knowledge with others‘
was systematically transformed into an egocentric, ‘me-first’ awareness.
This is where our personal development or maturation process got stuck in itSelf.
Isolated from the common, we lost the oversight & synergy of the collective and we evolved or ‘grew up’ into
a bunch of audacious imbeciles, the Homosociopathis which has now ‘legalized‘ wars against everything.
An altered perception leads to an altered consciousness !
Our history is full of great ideas or theories going wrong, of promising, new discoveries or developments
notwithstanding the test of time & circumstances and flares of enlightenments going dark.
Our lives are shaped, molded & fashioned, more than we know or want to admit, by such false premises
and dysfunctional theories. And since we are often held hostage by deceitful belief systems,
a systematic inquiry into any subject matter should begin with an analysis of the underlying premises,
postulates and presumptions; – an aetiology comprehensivus.
How we Transformed Maturing into Aging.
The discovery & characterization of one Self in contrast & relation to all ‘Others’, is the inception
of our adolescent development. But this adolescence is just an early part of our maturation process
and involves the emancipation & liberation from parental and other heteronomous influences,
as well as the re-affiliation of the new, autonomous Self with the community and the collective.
The realization that the Life or Psyche of our Self is a very complex organism and
that it consists of many powerful & intricate components which are quite hidden from
the undeveloped senses, is our first glimpse of the vastness of subconsciousness.
Subconsciousness is our multisensory awareness, a sensory nervous system
that memorizes & communicates in a language of feelings & emotions.
Rationality & consciousness can only understand this language metaphorically or allegorically.
With the curiosity of the 3I’s (Intuition, Inspiration & Imagination) the mind begins to clarify & untangle these
apparently chaotic Complexes [1]. This, in return, stimulates abstract & creative thinking and boosts
the overall cognitive development of the mind.
Metaphorically, this is like stepping into a room filled with a collection of musical instruments.
An interested mind begins to investigate: how to handle them, how they sound, how they compare and how to categorizes them. When all this ‘makes sense’, the mind develops preferences and starts to play with them …
That’s when we recognize that there is more to it, that somebody, already more experienced with such instruments,
designed & build these apparatuses. We will discover that the sonic ‘images’ we are able to create with such instruments,
are not only moving our own emotions but can also ‘speak’ to the feelings of others. Eventually, we will discover that
others have developed complex, universal languages, orchestrated a sophisticated, emotional communication system
which interacts on this subconscious level of experience.
This subconsciousness of our Self, or the ‘ground floor‘ of our ‘house’, has many rooms, they all have
interconnecting doors & windows to the outside, our environment. This lower part of our ‘dwelling’, called oikos in Greek,
is the operation center of our household or ecosystem. There is an entrance hall with an official front door for
invited guests and chosen relationships.
Then we have a very busy backdoor opening to the great ‘outdoors’, the common or collective consciousness.
This entrance is leading directly into the ‘heart’ of our place, the kitchen with pantry and dining area.
Our ‘house‘ has also a ‘utility room‘, a sometimes very dark ‘storage’ area, maybe a ‘library‘ and a ‘living room’
with ‘entertainment center’ and ‘fireplace‘.
Within this ‘picture‘, any reasonable mind can see that it takes skill & knowledge to run or operate this household,
here the Self, independently & economically. (Clearly, the Ecology precedes Economy !)
Obviously, all the housekeeping & maintenance of the Self largely depends on outside circumstances as well as
other incoming ‘goods & services‘ which all require our extra care & attention.
The often painful self-definition and self-constitution of the individuation process reveals our close
relationship & interdependence with the ‘Rest of Creation’.
To sustain a healthy existence of our Self we have to transcend the confinements of the Self and
join the common & collective. This sounds like a paradox but is the principle behind all maturescence:
A mature tree shares its ripe fruits with the ‘common ground‘,
becoming a benefactor for the whole while nurturing itself !
This initiates a new kind of Self-consciousness which recognizes the coexistence & correlation of everything
and finds its co-creative belonging or ‘place’ within society & Life.
Interaction & cooperation with the outside world, our environment or the collective,
demands versatile communication skills and the ingenuity of our inherent
Social-Emotional-Intelligence
or as Alfred Adler once put it:
“To see with the eyes of another, to hear with the ears of another, to feel with the heart of another.
This seems to me an admissible definition of what we call social feeling.”
Our immature consciousness just separates & distinguishes things. But with growing awareness we recognize
that things & issues are more complex and deeper ‘rooted‘; that there’s more to the obvious ‘than meets the eye‘.
That’s when we begin to ‘read between the lines, look behind the words and see beyond the pages‘.
The path to adulthood is quite treacherous and can become severely imbalanced & disharmonious, leading one into
a ‘dead-end’. To resist such malignant profusions and avoid any cancerous overgrowth, we need to learn to navigate
the transformation, and find our balance in e-motions… – because everything is in motion !
Analyzing such emotions can give us a better understanding of what causes them and how they are affected [2]
by consciously or subconsciously induced, or manipulated feelings. By discerning nuances in character,
properties or qualifications, and by assessing environmental circumstances & conditions, we enter a
discernment process, which makes us more insightful, responsible & considered with our judgments.
To differentiate between personal and pre- or trans-personal experiences, (a process known as principium individuationis),
and to distinguish emotional contagion from empathy, is one of the most important aspects of our
social-emotional Intelligence; and a trait which gives us the ability to comprehend the difference between
conscious choices and impulsive & hasty decisions, between ‘Thinking Fast and Slow‘
In this context, Erich Fromm suggests that we need a certain degree of autonomy to be empathetic [3] .
The ability to obtain, consider & elect different perceptions enables us to learn from multiple interpersonal &
trans-personal experiences and foster this sapience or wisdom which we so proudly accredit to our species.
From Maturation Process to an ‘Arrested Development’
or how the Self got stuck in Oneself.
Unfortunately, today’s societies provide no or very little support for a healthy maturation process.
We do not want people to wake up, emancipate themselves or be autonomous; we just want them to obey
the rules and regulations of the system and properly function as ‘cannon fodder’ or ‘cogs in the wheel’.
Therefore we have trimmed these social-emotions off our intelligence and turned the ‘education’ into some
convoluted, psychosocial conditioning.
The individuation process has now ‘matured‘ or evolved
into personalization & individualization.
A few thousand years ago, during the transition from hunters/gatherers to farmers/herders, some strange ideas
of monoculture and human superiority entered the minds of our ancestors. A toxic combination of a linear, hierarchic
belief system, paired with the ideas of appropriation, divine entitlements & righteousness began to infest our thinking.
Soon this ‘mental disease‘ developed into a psychic pandemic which is now spreading like a virus or meme,
horizontally across societies and vertically throughout generations.
Since this mental disease has corrupted all our cognitive abilities, manipulated & distorted our perceptual realities
and crippled the very core of our species (our social-emotional-intelligence !), it has also severely compromised our
science & education. Even the psychoanalytic & psychotherapeutic professions seem to be affected,
supporting & bolstering the hysterical contagion rather than rectifying the archetypical causes.
This common consent is still placing its intellectual ‘structures’ on the spiritual hysteresis [4] of this
preposterous belief system, causing all kinds of new collective delusions, epidemic hysteria or group-thinking [5].
Neuromarketing, advertising, political propaganda, memetic– & social- engineering are just some of the less conspicuous
but very effective applications for such mind-boggling psychology. The more obvious & caustic ones are used in
clinical psychology, our ‘education’ system and the military. In recent years we have added cyber-warfare,
internet memes and AI-technology to this folly.
Instead of revealing the inception of this disarray & decomposition, mainstream psychotherapy tries to re-inaugurate,
reassemble or rebuild this illusive & dysfunctional structure of anxiety & distress, the supervised version of life which
is imposed upon us from ‘above’.
Instead of rejecting the discriminating & spirit-crushing methods of this brutal system, a standardized psychology
supports & affirms the social & economic stratifications and validates or justifies
the guidelines of mental & physical classification.
A politically correct ‘Psychology’ has now developed valuable ‘techniques’ to isolate the individual from the collective,
to estrange us from our natural environment and to replace our social-emotional ‘interface’ with an artificial and
strictly anthropocentric concept of ‘communion’. This systematical alienation & stratification has a long history and
is fundamental to all social engineering of hierarchical structures.
Today’s ‘individuation’ process has become an entrapment, confining the individual to it Self while creating a desperate
desire for communion & belonging. Controlling all access & communication to the individualized subconsciousness has become the key formula for engineering consent among the ‘good citizens‘ !
In the beginning, this paternalistic concept was just rejecting autonomous behaviour by demonizing it as wild, barbaric or uncivilized, calling it chaos & anarchy. Then, when we became more sophisticated in propaganda, marketing and other
mind-bending methods, we introduced more permissive but psychological subversive methods to shape & mold the
unsuspicious mind, and so to recondition the behaviour of the masses.
From the Roman ‘Bread & Circuses‘ to the propaganda apparatus of the 20th century with its mass rallies, radio speeches
and big billboards, social engineering has evolved into a gigantic, multimedia-entertainment industry with cyber-networks
all around the globe, bombarding humanity 24/7 with indulgence and other benumbing distractions [6].
Finally, we got everybody somehow involved in online learning, gaming or banking, and of course shopping;
all securely amalgamated in the selfie-culture of social-media, the main breeding ground of
collective hysteria and altered memories – (Mneme)
Since the key to the collective consciousness rests in the individual mind, it is absolutely necessary to ‘access’ & persuade
enough individuals to ‘move’ the masses. Naivety, combined with high emotional vulnerability and great neuroplasticity
make juveniles the perfect candidates for such subliminal interference [7] and other Emotional Contagion.
Social psychology and other behavioural sciences have made great progress in the manipulation & deception
of emotions and other subconscious functions. The trick is to social-emotionally disengage & isolate the individual
from its inherent, environmental entanglements [8], and then replace, or better yet, substitute these natural
desires & aspirations with new, shiny, tailor-made ‘solutions’, with all the new perceptual values needed to raise
a compliant & manageable asset or commodity, either as labour or consumer.
Of course, such socio-psychological interventions & meddling causes subliminal trauma & anxiety in the minds
of the people and lowers their psycho-immunity [9], their mental resistance against hysterical contagion
and other mental disorders.
Sophisticated emotion elicitation & behavioural sciences, together with social media & entertainment have made
great progress in the stimulation & seduction of our multisensory modalities. The unsuspicious mind is
manipulated & controlled by the mood induction of imagery [10] and scent marketing, while its perception is
deceived by musically or sound-induced empathy [11] and other emotions. All this, in addition to the
epigenetical & trans-generational traumata that have already shaped our minds to an incomprehensible degree [12].
“The consequences of passing down the effects of trauma are huge, even if they are subtly altered between generations.
It would change the way we view how our lives in the context of our parents’ experience, influencing our physiology
and even our mental health.” – Brian Dias at Emory University and the Yerkes National Primate Research Center
The result is a new, sophomoric & complacent Self
with an altered perception of reality !
So, how did we end up here ?
Once upon a time, new abstract interpretations of distinction & contrast created a more simplified concept of
separation by ‘outlining’ the differences. Now we had ‘this side’ of a dividing ‘line’, the ‘Beginning’, and the
directly opposing, the ‘Other Side’, ‘the End of the Line’.
– and ‘My house‘ wasn’t ‘your house‘ anymore !
By
adding
a three-dimensional
perception to this linear geometry,
we arrived at the principles of a pyramidal
structure, and by way of abstraction, a hierarchic worldview..
——————————-
With the ‘DIVINE’ division of all things, it was our life, or psyche, versus everything else out there.
This meant primal separation from the rest of creation and the dissolution of
our spiritual integrity with the whole.
Of course, any contextual analysis will lead to the belief system,
the philosophical background of the story, our history.
According to the Abrahamic religions, this birth trauma was not rectified or amended by stories of comforting communion
with the collective, but got amplified by the separation anxiety of its possessive creator who wouldn’t share or let go
of his creation. This ‘one & only’, jealous God [13], with his suspicious fears, envious resentments & pervasive distrust
stood in sharp contrast to the sociability of our species. On the contrary, deceived, betrayed & abused by our ‘FATHER’,
we got punished, humiliated & abandoned.
The Expulsion from the ‘Garden Eden’ established the first property ‘lines’,
separated us from the eternal life,
created an ‘inside’ or ‘outside’ of the fence
and divided us into ‘Haves & Have-Nots’.
Depressed & traumatized by such primordial experiences, confused about the nature of our Self and the troubling events, anxiously looking for guidance from ‘above‘, our life became a desperate struggle to find a way out, a way back to the
‘Garden Eden‘, our lost ‘Paradise’. A new kind of ‘archetypes’, or mythos took possession of our lives by sneaking in
thru the wide open backdoor of our collective subconsciousness. Captivated by the monotony of omnipotence, our ‘new’,
monotheistic self-realization mutated into an idealized, consecrated self-image, the ontogenesis of our neurotic behaviour.
Again, Alfred Adler about such mental disorder:
“Neurosis is the natural, logical development of an individual who is comparatively inactive, filled with a personal,
egocentric striving for superiority, and is therefore retarded in the development of his social interest,
as we find regularly among the more passive pampered styles of life.” Individual Psychology of Alfred Adler.
– does this sound familiar ?
In her book ‘Neurosis and Human Growth‘, Karen Horney analyses the origin and dynamics of neurosis.[14]
She concludes that a neurosis is a distorted way of looking at the world and oneself, which is all determined & governed
by compulsive needs rather than by a genuine interest in the world as is.
When this distorted perception became compulsive, our natural maturation transformed into an obscure individuation process
or got stuck prematurely. The result, – a frightened & obedient population sheepishly following any ‘Good Shepherd‘,
constantly looking for great leadership, the ‘Almighty Lord’.
K. Horney in ‘Neurosis and Human Growth‘:
“A person builds up his personal idealized image and if it were not for the personal character of this image,
he would not attain a feeling of identity & unity. He idealizes his particular ‘solutions’: then compliance becomes
goodness, love & saintliness; – aggressiveness becomes strength, leadership, heroism & omnipotence;
– aloofness becomes wisdom, self-sufficiency & independence.”
Such neurotic behaviour has become customary and is now the new standard of compliance,
our consent with the law & order of the hierarchic, dualistic belief system.
Enormous technological & agricultural advancements required significant social & economic alterations & adjustments.
But what initially looked like simple modifications to our mental attitude became a mighty substratum for social engineering.
Roman ingenuity introduced & incorporated the monotheistic dogmatic [15] [16] into the political order of an Empire
and the Judeo-Christian religion provided the perfect ‘mechanism‘ to align all the social-emotional forces and to keep
the society of an imperial regime together. The economic foundation of the pyramidal system was based on the principles
of land grab & exploitation and built on the backs of the ‘have-nots’, – the enslaved, serfs & peasants of the old world.
Then, with rapidly growing technology and more than enough people or ‘cannon fodder’ available, new economic follies,
without any ecological authenticity [17], emerged.
Strange but consequential ideas of value, also known as the diamond-water paradox, turned the multitude of people
into a commodity, now called producers & consumers. Today’s ‘prosperous’ economies depend on constantly growing
supplies and the ever-increasing consumerism of the population. Natural, ecological dependencies turned into
addictive & compulsive behaviour. From eating disorders, prescription-drug abuse and dept-enslavement to gambling,
sex & comfort addiction; – the ‘show must go on‘ !
To guarantee the continuum of this madness, the entire population has to follow these concepts of
parasitic consumption, as directed by the incompetent economic & political authorities of today.
With a rapidly growing population, of elitists, criminals and other sociopaths, the ‘control of the masses’ has become
the master-key to political power and economic success; The manipulation of the collective consciousness has become
the new ‘kingmaker’ for the shrewd & unscrupulous of society. Within our social species, this sociopathological mindset
is spreading like a virus and is passed-on to generations to come …
– now coined by Paul Levy as malignant egophrenia or the Wetiko !
Our ‘Life’, took a psycho-pathological trajectory a long time ago and is now on a collision course with the real eco-dynamic
of our planet. Our species, the homo-sapiens, the man-of-wisdom, has evolved into a socio-psychological phenotype
which has ‘maneuvered’ [18] itself into a new form of ecological isolation where ‘humanity’, or better, the idea
of Ourselves, has become a disturbance, a parasite to the ecosystem of this planet, our ‘home‘.
Even when this exceeds our insular comprehension, so let me be clear about this:
‘Mother Nature’ has the ability to develop complex & effective immune systems
and has displayed often enough her great survival ‘skills’.
In terms of ecological dynamics, this would means the physiological rejection of our species !
The psycho-dynamic of this linear, hierarchic worldview, combined with mono-cultural idiocy, has fueled chauvinistic,
fascistic ideas and other theories of Anthropocentrism and a Higher Self. When the Abrahamic laws outlined the
entitlements of divine property rights, intolerance was justified by righteousness & exceptionalism, ownership
separated the individual from the collective and the social orientation of traditional societies was deconstructed.
The new, idealized individual became presumptuous, dominating, self-obsessed & complacent, a character in constant
struggle or competition with ‘the Other’, always in a race to the top.
We entered a new cultural era of mobbing & bullying.
This compelling but utterly incongruent [19] paradigm, self-complacent and intolerant by nature, forced its way
into our lives and has now caused widespread personality disintegration and worldwide social dissociation.
Mainstream psychology has followed the compromised standards of science & education,
it has given psychological maturation a different meaning.
Personal development or growth has become a misconceived Self-actualization,
an egotistical, narcissistic individuation process which has developed empathetic
feelings towards dominance & tyranny. [20]
Applied psychology has become the most effective, scientific instrument to create & maintain collective delusions,
designing common consent and selling us wholesale insanity. But the re-engineering of our social behaviour
by re-conditioning the individual psyche has had disturbing effects on our self-consciousness
and the mental health of our entire species.
Then there is an other, often overlooked or understated phenomenon, profoundly deceiving
our perception and severely damaging our intellectual capacities.
The Discreditation of our ‘Love-for-Wisdom‘ (Philosophy)
For our Neolithic ancestors, the agricultural transition into a mono-culture required fundamental and often drastic
modification or adjustments of their mental & physical conditions. Since their societies were inherently conscious
of all kinds of interdependencies, and consequently very concerned about the environmental & spiritual consequences,
they were always looking for supernatural sanctioning.
From the Egyptian monism of Aton, the teachings of Zarathustra and the Hindu concept of Brahman to the
‘King of Gods’ and father figure of Zeus, it took tremendous mental twisting & muddling to transform
indigenous spirituality and dismember its social-economic integrity.
This ultimate confirmation or justification came with the linear, hierarchic orientation of monotheism and the induction
of a new kind of archetype, an omnipotent, patriarchal father figure, a supreme creator of worlds & nations,
ruling with a ‘iron fist’ from the top of ‘His Pyramid’.
The philosophical fallacy did not just begin with the systematic segregation & dissociation of universality & omneity
or the inauguration & consecration of spiritual & physical proprietorship; no, the ‘God-Father-Only‘ ideology did
far more damage to the individual psyche, and consequently to the social-emotional behaviour of our species
than we are willing or allowed to admit.
This discrimination of femininity and the degradation of women to breeding machines and incubators of cannon fodder,
has further corrupted the socialization process in its ‘roots‘; children are raised to perform & follow their
economic mandate, while older people are often considered a useless liability.
But, as the real nature of Life is multidimensional & complex,
our actions have become way more consequential & entangled than any-One can imagine.
The desecration of the Holy Sophia, – the bearer of Wisdom, did not just sanctioned the exploitation & violation of ‘Mother Nature’, but also ignored the primal dynamic of harmony & balance and relinquished our congruence with the nature of life.
Stratification comes with promotions & accreditations
as well as demotions & denunciations.
The ‘dynamic nucleus‘ of the father-figure-archetype is a strong male leader at the prime of his reproductive life,
where respect & admiration are built on strength, wealth and indisputable authority. As the ‘King‘ of creation, He is
very protective of his ‘Empire‘ and, according to scripture, he is suspicious & jealous of any competitor.
In the hierarchical classification, everything & everybody is measured by their tangible performance, anything
less productive or prosperous becomes less valuable for the scheme, is made disposable or becomes an adversary.
This explains the great burden of expectation & hope we put on our younger generations.
We expect them to pay our debt to ‘Mother Nature‘ and hope they will win our fight against cancer and global warming;
– needless to say, in this fight or war, there is no place for losers, the timid or unfortunate !
And then there are these terms of ‘uselessness’ or ‘non-productivity’ and all our animosities towards decay & death,
all the things we categorized as wilderness, weed or dirt, the worthless garbage we dispose, the old stuff we get rid of.
– Of course. He is also the Father of all senseless exploitation & consumption !
With all these patriarchal assumptions we have created a global society that often enough views the physical impotence
of older people as a handicap or obstruction to progress & success. Younger generations, especially in the West,
have now developed a distaste for ‘archaic’ advice or counsel and a general disregard for the ‘outdated’ experience
of the elders. Our rapidly growing industrialization with all its support systems leaves no time for further reflection,
contemplation or similar delays.
The slowly accumulated Wisdom or Sapiens of
of our forefathers was overrun by
the impulsive hoarding of property
and the insensitive use of technologies !
Rapidly growing technologies and ever-faster developments
demand quick responses and an ever-faster ‘thinking’.
This makes us, the operators & controllers of the system,
more & more reactive, even compulsive,
rather than proactive & responsible.
This race against time, a growing phenomenon these days, becomes a race against
the machine and the Artificial Intelligence behind it. A race we can not win because the rush is bypassing our
rational & slow thinking. All the quick decisions we are forced to make, are driven by the uncontrolled emotions
of our neurobiology; and this is exactly the ‘domain’ where we ceased to develop & grow our intelligence.
When ‘Tempus fugit‘, time flies, this may give us some short pleasure, a brief enjoyment or a quick satisfaction,
but it does not grant us a break for critical thinking or an opportunity for our analytical mind to ‘kick in’.
The speed or rush of the race is a great emotional thrill while the stress of the ‘fight-or-flight response‘ becomes
a powerful stimulus for our Epinephrine. This makes the speediness and the ‘weightlessness’ of the ‘flight’ a great
excitement and an enormous temptation for body & mind. The Self gets trapped in a constant chase for more buzz
and all kinds of new arousals, turning the naive, unsuspicious mind of the immature into an adrenaline junkie at best.
Creating & fulfilling desires has become big business, pushing for more & more self-gratification, twisting the
social context [20] out of self-actualization and selling us ‘good times‘ & ‘happy pills’. – And more Hope to go around !
The linear, hierarchic principles of segregation & stratification did not just outline
the entitlements of physical & intellectual properties [21][22],
but also introduced a concept of a Life, restricted-by-a-time-frame.
Time is absolutely relative, but the perception of those timely limitations turned our maturation into an aging process
and left us with evaluations along the lines of new, fresh & young vs. old, outdated & obsolete.
With all these qualifications, time became just another commodity. Now time can be bought or given, it can be taken
or spend like money and, as with any other stuff, people want more time and can’t get enough of it;
– they don’t like to become old and are longing for youth.
But with no time for introspection and with all ‘eyes on the prize’,
the maturation process of our Self-consciousness is very much neglected.
With no care or cultivation, the consciousness of the immature
can easily mutate into a delusional [24] irrationality of belief & faith,
a deceptive reality which keeps the Self in a state of childish
ignorance & vulnerability.
While this infantile mind is susceptible to all kinds of ambiguities of
intellectual persuasion and systematic indoctrination,
the subconscious Self is starving for emotional affinities [25] and
social affections. Such a shadow of a Self is just primed for cheap,
mindless indulgence and substitute satisfactions.
Wisdom
is not only the Essence of Common Sense & Rational Thinking,
but also Controls the ‘Gateway’ to our
Subconsciousness.
The self-obsessed archetype leaves no room for ‘useless‘ stuff, disposes old knowledge, discards the wisdom of the elders
and contradicts every conservation law we came to know. But, as we can witness every day, nothing gets lost or is
‘discarded’ in our natural habitat; everything is useful and has its function in real life. It is the older generation,
‘our elders’ who have the experience & knowledge, and it would be wise to continue to conserve this source of information
by sharing it freely across society and passing it down to new generations.
Wisdom mitigates & contextualizes our individual knowledge & experience
with the perceptual view of others and the affordances [26] of our environment.
Isn’t the (Self)-preservation of old wisdom
giving conservatism a different meaning ?
But since we have abandoned such Philosophies, -our Love-for-Wisdom, by subordinating the Holy Sophia, -our collective
wisdom, we consider knowledge & information valuable possessions, commodities we can trade & monetize.
Consequently, all our collective wisdom, common knowledge & information, even our common sense is now privatized
and broken up into highly profitable commodities which are traded on all kinds of marketplaces, thereby
manipulating & corrupting every aspect of our lives. Even education has a price attached, and any personal maturation
is measured along the line of accumulating tangible assets, profitable knowledge & information.
We have confused maturation with aging
and are forgetting that it needs ripening for germination.
Growing out of its anomie, an infant senses that all aspects of its ‘Self’ are affected by others, and are formed & molded
by outside forces. Anthropomorphic archetypes are those primordial or universal energy patterns that form our behaviours,
attitudes & values, both individually & collectively. With growing consciousness children begin to recognize these
heteronomous forces and learn to distinguish them from their own competence, aptitude & genius.
Between rejection & acceptance, this process usually induces a lot of rejection or even defiance toward restrictive
regulation or control and can become quite antagonizing & confusing for the adolescent. This is when the maturation
enters an especially sensitive & receptive, but also very vulnerable phase of development.
Unconscious about the misappropriation of our spirituality,
we left the backdoor to our subconsciousness wide open and unattended.
Driven by sociopolitical, commercial or spiritual motivation, the systematic manipulation of behaviour & performance,
the ‘education‘ or conditioning of our future generations, is as old as the self-preservation or survival instinct
of our species. But unprotected by the common knowledge & wisdom of a healthy social environment,
open-mindedness & vulnerability leave the immature exposed & susceptible to all kinds of psychophysiological
manipulations & persuasions, all designed to capture, control & exploit the young prospect in any way or form.
This age of inexperienced juvenility is also the time when the anthropocentric, mono-cultural worldview introduces its
mental attitude and ultimately forms & shapes the character & behaviour of a person. With the individual compromised
by these philosophical misconceptions, the monotheistic world-order takes advantage and induces its hierarchical
constitution right into the psychosocial development of maturation.
Then let’s not forget, we get indoctrinated with this fallacious belief system from an early age.
Not only religiously or ethically motivated institutions are affected, but also agnostic & science-based
institutions have fallen for these absurd presumptions.
HIS Story, our History often includes narrative fallacies,
causing additional misunderstandings & misconceptions !
In such discriminatory, chauvinistic, xenophobic & jingoistic cultures, everything concentrates on selection, separation,
protection & enforcement so that the ‘Chosen-crop‘ or elite can grow & expand, get bigger, stronger & faster.
Consequently, our maturation process is also just focusing on picking & choosing, stacking up on all those qualifications
that get us ahead of the game and make us more outstanding & special. This is of particular importance in a globalized
economy where everybody has to struggle with a growing number of competitors on all levels of society.
By manipulating the maturation process and so re-engineering the socialization, the classic individuation [29]
became a systematic individualization, discriminating the individual from the collective and separating it
from the substance & context [30] of its organic environment.
After the antagonistic principles of this malicious philosophy had divided everything down the lines of gender,
race & nationality, the emerging ideologies began to separate emotions from the rational intellect (remember the
left vs right brain myth), ultimately leading to a rationalization of segregation & disengagement.
Now, this paradigm of isolation & distinction is systematically isolating us from the collective and has disconnected
us from the rest of creation, our environment. – And so the venomous misconception went viral…
it became:
Me, Myself & I
vs
everybody & everything else
out there
With such misguided ‘self-consciousness‘ and compromised insight,
the Self can only become selfish, egocentric & narcissistic.
Mesmerized, absorbed & consumed by self-indulgence & self-gratification, the whole psychophysical perception
gets out of whack and the distorted perspective loses sight of the contextual reality [31];
and with it goes the entire socio-ecological conscience of the Self.
A compromised Social value orientation transformed our ‘self-evaluation thru social comparison‘ into
an ill-conceived scheme of self-realization or self-actualization.
This imbalanced & demented mindset is systematically ‘handed down’ to new generations by science & ‘education’,
and is methodically [32] spread thru all kinds of ‘social’ media. This kind of manipulation or ‘social engineering‘ has
turned the population of this planet into a bunch of immature & psychotic individuals, still believing they are
in charge, but instead of being in control, are in a state of epidemic hysteria.
Driven by the exponential increase in technologies and an ever-growing population, the individual finds
itself trapped in a stressful ‘Race to the Top‘. With this constant struggle for dominance & leadership,
comes a constant fear of being overlooked, left behind or trampled down.
Now all kinds of leadership programs ensure that the principles of mobbing & bullying are profoundly embedded
in the collective sub-consciousness of modern society; leaving us at the mercy of a mob of sociopaths on one side,
and a majority of traumatized & frustrated people on the other.
Wealth in form of tangible possessions has become
one of the great separators in our societies.
All the inherent, more heterarchical, holarchical [33] structures of society & community got severely mutilated or destroyed.
Instead of indicating political misjudgments or economic miscalculations,
fixable by social-economic re-engineering, reformation or revolution,
today’s social-economic situation is rather reflecting the symptoms
of a widespread & deep-rooted mental disease,
incomprehensible by current mental capacities.
The self-righteous & contemptuous nature of the monotheistic paradigm not only contradicted
all common sense of ‘Social Beings’ but also desecrated our spiritual kinship with ‘Mother Nature’.
As our Social-Emotional Intelligence got infested with such mental virus, the core values of
social communion & coexistence were compromised and transformed into an obscure form
of Abstract Intelligence with a delusional perception of life & reality.
The sapiens of our species slowly degenerated into insipiens.
As we removed the social-emotions from our Intelligence,
so did we drop the Sapiens, or wisdom, out off Homo-Sapiens,
we created the HomoSociopathis.
About the Eco-dynamics of Organisms
Homeostasis & Feedback Mechanism [34]
The anthropocentric definition of Communion :
In a general sense communion is the sharing of thoughts or feelings with another person or group of people.
In social psychology, along with agency, communion is considered a component of social perceptions
and the processing of social information. Agency is the degree which an individual has control over their life
and their own decisions, and is the personality area related to the pursuing of goals and advancement.
Characteristics of communion are involved in the formation and maintenance of social connections.
Communion is also related to components of morality, warmth, nurturance, sociability, and group perception.
As we can see, in its purview, this definition completely ignores the fact that humanity can only
exists in a greater environmental context, in correlation with its natural habitat.
Our spiritual connection to ‘Mother Nature’ was traded for some insensible & dumb doctrines,
while the interrelationship with our habitat was ‘axed’ & ‘trashed’ a long time ago.
Monocultures not only violate the harmony & balance of nature but also contradict all fundamental principles of life.
Since growing-up is a psychosomatic, organic process, we just have to look [35] at our natural habitat
and see how it behaves. Here lie the animating principles that direct our life or psyche.
Just as ‘it takes a village to raise a child’ so does the health of any living organism depend on
the dynamic matrix of its supporting environment.
Removed or disconnected from its sustaining network, an organism is vulnerable and can become weak & deficient.
Prolonged separation or isolation from its contextual ecosystem causes distress, trauma and countless other
psychosomatic illnesses. Then, when the immune systems of the organism are exhausted
and the counter-measurements depleted, it manifests those imbalances & disharmonies,
leading to deficiency diseases or excessive overgrowth we sometimes call cancerous.
In order to maintain its homeostasis and systemic functionality, an organism will seek reunification & re-connection
with its life-sustaining network in order to begin a healing process; (Religare, the evolutionary origin of our religious behavior.)
Any development, maturation or growth follows a nonlinear dynamic that is comprehensive and will include every
other natural phenomenon out there. Consequently, there is no simple question-answering system in real life.
Of course, we can follow such dialectics or use scientific methods, but most of the time the answers will be
as presumptuous & prepossessed as the probing paradigm, either confirming or contradicting the assertions.
The answers yielded are narrow-minded, limited in their scope and often conclusive.
They are the consequence or ramification of previous, outdated & futile resolutions, all claiming to be justified,
true & final. Instead, those answers are simply repeating & reconfirming the same old mistakes or misconceptions.
Just Answers are never Solutions !
Viable solutions can only be found on that ‘different level of thinking‘, as Einstein pointed out, which engages
the sense of wholeness inherent in our social-emotional-intelligence and enables the rationalization & abstraction
of emotions, as well as entrains the dynamic & corresponding interactions of our environment.
Real Solutions are organic & synergetic, ‘malleable‘ & ‘conductive’, they are adaptable & fluid, and they have
the plasticity to fill the gaps & voids between the phenomena and all ‘actors’ involved.
Such fluidity & permeability requires total immersion into the matter without losing sight of the fact
that everything pivots around the self-consciousness of the observer.
If such singled-out self-consciousness is manipulated, compromised or malfunctioning,
the individualized perspective gets very narrow-minded and the whole perception becomes distorted
and reflects an ‘objectivity’ which projects a warped & misleading reality or truth.
For millions of years, our collective consciousness has helped us to avoid or master harmful situations.
Even the rudimental ‘instincts’ of our collective sub-consciousness are not just vital instruments for survival,
but with the right cultivation, they can become a sophisticated guidance system in Life.
Those inherent faculties have given us the ability to develop a Social-Emotional Intelligence [36]
and the capability to correspond & interact with our environment by fusing multisensory consciousness with subconscious experiences and amalgamating individual cognizance with the common sense of the collective.
By understanding oneself we understand each other and our ecosphere.
Carl Rogers: “A person cannot teach another person directly; a person can only facilitate an Other’s learning.”
Hunches or Intuitions, individually or collectively, are deeply incorporated in the collective sub-consciousness of our Life.
Intuitions turn into Inspirations, transform into knowledge and fuel our Imagination.
‘Life’ belongs to a modus operandi which only plays out in the ‘ballpark’ of the collective as a whole,
merging the past with the future in the Here & Now.
Feelings are the mental experiences & interpretations of emotional & physical stimuli.
Vice versa these feelings trigger all kinds of voluntary or involuntary emotions & reactions in us.
In a healthy maturation process, we learn how to manage these feelings & emotions by using self-reflection
and other socio-psychological techniques. Instead of just ‘bouncing off’ our emotions, we reflect them
with our ‘next of kin’ and incorporate our whole environment in the process, and so become more independent
of any manipulated empathy or superimposed ‘consciousness’.
For thousands of years the use of psychedelic drugs or entheogenic phanerothyme
has played a decisive role in the ‘Dissolution of the Ego‘ or the ‘Unbinding of the Self’.
Like ‘shamanic helpers’, these organic substances facilitate a journey into the great realm
of subconsciousness and can induce an ego death that enables the individual
to transcend into a more inclusive, collective consciousness.
By contributing to the network of life, by weaving & interlacing Oneself into the fabric of the common, we are learning
to share our collected experiences and begin to mature into a more comprehensive, collective consciousness.
Our Self becomes a ‘node’ or pivotal link, a medium that is able to ‘read’, identify & utilize the different
psychological & sociological implications or entanglements in a more sensible way.
On this level of consciousness, all our rational & emotional experience & knowledge amalgamate into something
that was once considered the most valuable trait of humanity, – Wisdom. This ‘wisdom’ is not the
intellectual property of one, but conserves the essence of our collective knowledge & experience,
and is commonly shared as unassertive counselling.
Joining the realm of collective consciousness incorporates, not only our own species, but includes our
entire habitat or environment. The realization that all phenomena are somehow interconnected – and that each
phenomenon contains all other phenomena – makes a mature Self act like a catalyst.
The Self becomes a synapse, facilitating synaptic communication within the collective ‘Network of Life’.
Synapse from Greek synapsis “conjunction”, from synaptein “to join, tie or bind
together, be connected with”, from syn-“together” + -aptein or apse “to fasten”.
Of course, this collective ‘Network of Life’ [37] has replaced Darwin’s Tree. The simplistic theory of
evolution has ‘evolved’ into a Dynamic Interaction Network of Life which is rather focused on nodes
and relationships than on linear progressions.
To find our original individuality we need to learn to reflect our Self in all the uniqueness of other Beings.
Then, when we are able to see & respect the uniqueness within us and every other thing out there,
we have matured and can become a Dynamic & Interactive member of this Network of Life.
Instead, our entire species demonstrates a terrible immaturity paired with ignorance and contempt for all ‘Others’.
Never grown out of their egocentric childhood behaviour, many ‘grown-ups’ are still trapped
in their anthropocentric delusions & misconceptions. ( Just watch the news !)
With age, they just grow into a more assertive version
of a misaligned personality.
All the desperate attempts to engineer our way out of the ‘Dead End’, our socio-ecological fiasco,
are just reflecting an immature & imbecilic species that got lost & confused in its ambitious ‘pipe dream’ of
building ‘castles-in-the air’ and is now panicking in total hysteria.
How can we change anything without understanding what went wrong ?
After Growing-up & out-of comes Growing-into & together.
Maturity transcends the Self into the Collective.
We all inherited from our forefathers a heavy burden of trans-generational trauma
and other epigenetically transmitted infirmities.[38] [39]
To rectify or heal these emotional and quite often psychosomatic maladies, our comprehensive analysis of the misleading
narrative has to be a more multi-perspective [40] approach, an interdisciplinary etiology comprehensivus.
This change, or better paradigm-shift in thinking, will require a self-reflection by stepping out of the confinements
of the linear, hierarchic paradigm, a complete redefinition of our responsibilities within the ‘network of Life’
and a re-calibration of language & communication.
Most efforts to ‘save the planet’ are rooted in a collective, apocalyptic trauma [41], symptomatic for an
anthropocentric & childish self-pity [42], born in fear of a ‘downfall’, a collapse of our ‘house of cards’.
(- where ‘house’ comes from the Greek ‘oikos’ or the ‘eco-‘ in eco-system or economy)
The general population is still full of hope & illusions about life, love & values, struggling with the most
basic tasks of sharing and cleaning-up their ‘behind’, even the most ‘mature’ leaders of our societies
are quick to point fingers at each other and often forget their ‘table manners’.
From mental- & political-power to hydro-, coal- & nuclear-power, men behave like
‘the sorcerer’s apprentice‘ [43], a hubristic species unable to manage its very own affairs & powers.
Most great technological & scientific inventions went ‘sideways’, from wheels & gears to combustion engines & automation, from nuclear energy to computing & the internet, they all got out of control.
Our immature population is now controlled by the multimedia marketing & propaganda of the most ambitious
bullies of society, the ‘influencers‘ of politics & commerce are now manipulating everything from our
breakfast to elections and back to our common ‘home’, our ecosystem.
New experiences and unknown stimuli can be perceived as a threat and be terrorizing to our immature &
untutored senses. If neglected & unaddressed, these sensory phenomena can cause deep fears & anxiety,
and if not made conscious, create this great angst in our individual & collective subconsciousness.
Then, especially when our personal life-networks and communal support-systems are incapable of explaining
or unable to help, the heteronomous forces kick in, take over our ‘education’ and start managing these
terrorizing phenomena while offering to save our body & soul.
This compromised ‘starting block’ to get out of the mess is just supported by some hopeful, infantile thinking that
‘the king will come and prince & princess will live happily ever after in their beautiful castle-in-the-air’.
The immaturity of our society is obvious, the inability to build consensus and to collaborate is disturbing.
Any social cohesion is systematically replaced by the authoritarian & chauvinistic principles of autocracy
or some form of Fascism. Feudalism, capitalism, all forms of socialism and even ‘democracy’ are just quick
fixes for an unconscientious wealth & power distribution, just amendments to an insane ‘economic’ scheme,
justified by the artificial metrics of a linear, hierarchic world-order with its divine entitlements
With such manipulated & misguided perception our species, as a collective, is mentally unequipped
to solve the most pressing issues of ‘housekeeping’ & coexistence, unable to co-create the coefficient
symbioses that would guarantee a harmonic cohesion with our ecosphere.
Humanity, as a collective, is still stuck in the infant development of the Ego. This arrested development is an
unflattering entry on the ‘resume’ of our species. Any mature mind quickly comes to this realization and wonders
what went wrong and how to rectify the situation, if not for himself, so for his kind and for future generations.
Maturity has an Obligation,
Wisdom has a Desire to Share:
all its Experience,
all its Knowledge,
Everything indiscriminately!
The Next
Let’s See the ‘Writing on the Wall’
and Mold our Self into the Collective Common !
All the silly attempts to stop the linear motion or reverse the outcome, just reveal a grave disconnection from
the dynamic & synergy of real life. The childish 5 or 2 minutes to midnight on the Doomsday Clock are just as
preposterous as emission trading or carbon taxation. Such ill-fated ideas are fueled by some delusional
economic science and an anachronistic belief system. Real Life goes on, the cycle continues and it is merely
debatable how far beyond the ‘point-of-no-return’ we are right now.
A few of us, and these might be the only ones I’m addressing here, have realized
that it is 00:12 rather than 11:58 on the ‘Doomsday Clock’.
Now, the time is more than ‘ripe’ to analyze why & where our mentality of the time,
‘der Zeitgeist‘ of today, got stuck in this terror & agony that precedes our fall into the abyss;
and yet, the ‘terror management‘ continues to do its sinister job to keep the masses docile and in check.
Most of us have overlooked or are refusing to see that this so much feared ‘Great Demise’ is already happening,
the downfall of our civilization is well underway. They are still dwelling in the promises of hope and keep chasing
‘carrots’ of happiness & success on the treadmills of our economic machinery. We keep ourselves busy
playing survival games which give us no time to think-about or to pay attention to the ‘Writings on the Wall’.
Every maturation process has to face the abyss,
has to overcome the fear & terror of Death,
before transcending into a new realm of Life.
This Initiation, Rebirth, Resurrection or whatever else we call it, is the turning point where growth turns into ripening
and context & purpose begin to matter more than techniques and tangible properties.
All this is a very organic & dynamic process and applies to the individual
as well as to the collective development of our species.
The ‘wild’ reactions of our planet, our habitat, are just a natural response to centuries of unconscionable abuse.
‘Mother’ Nature has been very patient with us and taught us well, but then, when we lost respect for Her and
all the Rest of Creation, the balance tipped !
Then, when we took possession of Her and started mistreating Her as we did with countless other species,
with our peasants, slaves and all the deprived & have-nots on this planet, all the ‘warning signs’ went up.
But, in spite of all warnings, we continued to misbehave like a bunch of uncouth, juvenile hooligans, and nothing could stop us.
In hindsight, it wasn’t technology, chemicals nor weapons of mass destruction that sealed our downfall,
but rather our collective numb- & dumbness, our sick mentality that got stuck in schoolboyish brawls over the ‘loot’.
It was this arrested development of our species, our devolution into HomoSociopathis, that finally triggered
the immune response of our global ecosystem.
Obviously, we have lost our mental ability to find & share our common ground, misplaced our social-emotional ‘tools’
to build consensus, to interact, cooperate & co-create. All hopeful thinking that humanity, as a whole, will wake-up,
clean-up its act, lay down its weapons and come to a consensus, is absolutely delusional.
More disappointment & frustration will make everything just more traumatic.
Since most, if not all our attempts are still based on a dysfunctional paradigm with all its eco-political fallacies
firmly in place, all efforts will be in vain. The eco-dynamic will continue to take its course and, in this context,
will require synergetic solutions which will have to be detached from all monocultural philosophies and
completely freed from the ‘economic’ restraints of any current political order.
Now, if you look closer, you can sense a panic-stricken community of scientists, environmentalists and
political reformers, all scratching their heads in disbelief. The rest of the population either drowns in
self-delusional complacency or in simple naivety. Scared & frustrated as usual, many seem to flock back into
their religious or political familiarities, looking for comfort, shelter & guidance in strong authority & leadership;
– and yes, that’s precisely what they will get, again.
“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” [44]
Without an individual healing process of the mind,
all activism is just a re-activism,
repeating the old mantras of hope, using the same old principals
just with newer technologies in green camouflage.
I appeal to the few of us who understand that this is ‘as good as it gets’
and who recognizes that there is no turning back.
Mistakes were made and the best we can do for ourselves and maybe future, vestigial humanoids,
is to prepare an analysis of our intellectual misconception and a comprehensive etiology of the
philosophical & psychosomatic causes that derailed the maturation of our species.
Together with such thorough analysis of our social-economic misunderstandings,
we need a linguistic redefinition of our role & place in Life in general,
and our responsibilities in the commonwealth of this planet in particular.
The Maturation Process Molds the Self into the Collective Common.
The Synergy & Dynamic of our Social-Emotional Intelligence
can then Develop the Sapiens, the Essence of our Species,
to Transcend us into the Next …
All that is, lives.
Nothing is annihilable.
Even Moldering is transition
to new Life.
…and don’t forget,
it’s 12 minutes after, and it is your Sapiens we need right now !
Of course with Social Emotional Maturation
comes an increase in Eco-psychological Sensitivity
and a Rehabilitation of certain intrinsic Spirituality.
