..续本文上一页emselves and so lack courage. To me, that”s a very clear statement of what”s going on now, because we are at a point where we feel very badly about who we are as a species. There is all this self-loathing and the messages we give each other are filled with what”s wrong with us. Whether it”s at the inpidual or organizational level, we”re focused on pathology and use a lot of very negative terms to describe our experience.
Then if that self-loathing is combined with a culture that emphasizes control, it holds you accountable for making things work all the time—without failing, without feeling confused or overwhelmed by uncertainty. We hold each another accountable for achievements that are in fact impossible, because we can”t pretend that chaos doesn”t erupt in our lives and that we have it all figured out. We just can”t pretend that. But our organizations insist on that illusion and make us feel badly for not being able to live up to it. These world views converge on us and we”re left loathing ourselves and feeling overwhelmed.
Yet I also know people have a clear recognition that most of us are good and want to serve others. We know compassion is available in our selves and that we will experience compassion from others. So many people are realizing that the only way to go through this increasingly crazy time is to focus on ourselves—not in a narcissistic way, but understanding that the source of peace and the place to find rest is within.
Pema Chödrön: The thing that intrigues me is how society and organizations can encourage the things that meditation fosters at the inpidual level. It was very much Trungpa Rinpoche”s vision that we work at both the inpidual and community levels. He talked a lot about enlightened society—about creating communities that foster this trust in the goodness of human beings. We think too small; we are confined by our beliefs, and one of the main beliefs that confines us is in our own inadequacy, our own imperfection.
Before you can truly know what compassion is, you have to develop equanimity towards that which is threatening, disagreeable or fearful. Equanimity and compassion don”t come from transcending these things; they come from moving closer to what scares you, threatens you, causes you to become aggressive and selfish, and so forth.
This requires a lot of courage, but I find that”s a message people can accept. Interestingly, the idea of developing courage doesn”t seem to trigger people”s inadequacies. I think they know they have some courage. The problem is they think they”re supposed to be courageous in facing the outside world, whereas what is so profoundly transformative is the courage to look at yourself. It”s the courage to not give up on yourself, even though you do see your aggression, jealousy, meanness, and so on. And it turns out that in facing these things, we develop not self-denigration but compassion for our shared humanity.
One of the things you ask in your article is, how did the shadow disappear in our pursuit of looking for the light
How is it that the shadow just disappeared, when things are actually so unpredictable and surprising
We have to realize that these very things are the seeds of loving-kindness towards oneself and real compassion for others.
Margaret Wheatley: One of the things I”ve learned from science is that what”s true at one level is true at other levels. So if processes are true at the level of the inpidual, we are going to find they also work at the level of community, organization or nation. For example, I see these same processes at work at the national level in South Africa. Their effort to face the truth of apartheid through the Truth and Reconciliation Commission has been a powerful teacher to me.
The process started with the…
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