talkingaboutus.org

Here I want to specifically present and support the concept that humanity still has much growing to do and what this means in relation to the individual, or you and I. I also want to suggest that we are largely ready for a new way to see and address ourselves, each other, our civilization and our world but we need to fully understand what this would initially require of us.

I believe since the beginning of our history human beings have been naturally growing towards greater self discovery, and unity.

As evidence of this, I cite the historical development of human equality.

In our early history, we lived in societies largely composed of positions that could range from slave to monarch.

Somewhere along the way a crude version of equality was perceived, and it grew in some of our minds and practices.

When the American colonies seceded from Britain, it was not so much a revolution as an evolution.

The governmental identity of the young colonies transformed into a totally new entity that, as declared by itself, saw all men as equal.

This was a sincere declaration, but it was nonetheless based on limited understanding. Because after a time, the way the U.S. understood equality and humanity went through further evolutions. The abolition of slavery, the realization of women's right to vote, desegregation, and the protection of black American's right to vote were some of the most relevant evolutions of perspective that followed.

It is widely accepted that the United States Declaration of Independence which set the standards for equality was conceived and endorsed by some of the greatest minds of the day, or any day. Yet even the very authors of this document do not appear to have seen the extent of what it really meant. As their young country moved forward, they and many of their fellow citizens believed that they were living in the land of the equal and free. This was in accordance with how they understood these concepts at the time.

The point here is subtle but, I believe, very important. Those that believed the U.S. fulfilled what the declaration of independence stated, did not realize that they had not grown into the extent of their own convictions.

Throughout my writings I will repeatedly be suggesting to you directly and indirectly that you and I are operating within a paradigm, or level of growth, which is to say we've taken the framework of how we currently understand ourselves our civilization and our world and turned it into the full extent of what these things are. If you look back you will recognize that we have grown through paradigms or levels of understanding throughout our individual lives as well as our history. The experience of infancy, childhood, adolescence, adulthood, all have been paradigms. As human beings gain each one of these new levels, our tendency has been to not recognize that all evidence suggests there are totally new dimensions to what we've presently come to understand, just waiting for us in the wings. This is the human condition. But the moment we stop merely passing through levels of understanding to realizing what this suggests about what we currently believe we understand, we have suddenly stepped out to a new vantage point. What is this vantage point? The recognition that all evidence suggests that we have ways in which to grow that we neither presently foresee, nor understand. Additionally, it would seem to be greatly in our favor to remain open to seeing or understanding things in totally new ways instead of so fiercely and automatically guarding our present perspective as something that is final.

As I've indicated, I've walked through nearly two thousand miles worth of people, talking to them about what keeps humanity from breaking free of our old cycles and the troublesome developments of our modern world. Realize that I've been there, face to face, with hundreds of people when I suggest that there is a place in virtually every one of us where we are exhausted.

This is not something that grips us all the time, but that subtly haunts us in the form of a waiting in the backs of our minds for the next blow. The next atrocity human beings will commit against each other, the next betraying of the trust we put in our officials, the next system or segment of our world that we're told is breaking down. The next thing that gets heaped upon the pile that is straining our faith in humanity and hope for the future. It seems many of us feel helpless as this pile mounts and so we try to bury ourselves in our personal pursuits. But we can not escape the knowledge that inevitably, something is going to come crashing through and re-familiarize us with how overwhelmed and distantly sad we feel underneath it all. In addition to this I feel that, as these blows seem to come with increasing frequency, many of us hold off a private sense of dread that there is one or more coming that may be so terrible, we might not be able to recover.

One thing I'm here to affirm is that we don't have to just sit and wait for things to happen to us. We have far more effect, far more power than we realize. But to optimize this effect we have to be willing to try something new.

People are hungry for something new. They are virtually starving for a world that is more genuine and sensible and for something they actually dare believe in.

If you feel this way, I urge you to stay in touch with that desire. Use it as a motivating force that you will be willing to follow into uncharted territory. Because I'm telling you right now, there is a more genuine sensible world available to us and we're going to go looking for routes to it here but they will come only through a will to give something new a chance.

But do we understand what that really involves?

To get new results something new must be done. This is a truism. That means we---you and I---have to be willing to first look in a new, unfamiliar direction. By definition this direction is going to seem alien to us because we will be gauging it with what we are used to.

I believe we are in a very special time now. The common person is gaining glimpses of a more objective or complete perspective on themselves. We are beginning to recognize our larger connections and, although with less clarity, our disconnections.

We are becoming ready to shift emphasis from needing to feel right or needing to believe all of who we want to be is who we are, to pursuing truth, because we are beginning to perceive that this is connected to the quality of our lives.

Humanity's most recent level of growth has had to do with defining and trying to define everything. We have tended to operate at and define from the surface of what we perceive. I believe the next level of growth has to do with seeing beyond the surface of what we have defined and are operating in relation to. Beyond what is apparent. Beyond the separation and isolation that is definition, to what connects and unifies beneath. Beyond the narrow perspective of the self and the other to the broader perspective of us. Beyond the divisive, incomplete images we've built around ourselves and others to the genuine nature of what these images misrepresent and hinder.

Many of us will not understand or see the relevance of what unfolds at this site.

I believe we all need to regularly and very intently take our attention right to the fringe of what we are capable of understanding and doing... and push, and that is also what we're going to try to do here.

That is why it is so important for those of us that do understand some or all of what is discussed here to talk about it with others and develop it and interpret it and spread it around.

As this project grows, I urge you to help me turn this site into a conversational hub by logging in and placing any comments, perspectives, questions, criticisms, requests for further explanation, etc. in the applicable comments area or forum. This site is made for us: for you as well as I, as a tool we can use to get at deeper understanding through interaction. Furthermore I ask that you discus with others in your daily life what you find here that you think is relevant.

I firmly believe it is very important that we talk about us. Please help me do it!

So to summarize, I believe if we want a more genuine and sensible world, it begins with becoming open to and comfortable with the concept that we are still growing and that you and I do not understand the ways in which we yet have to grow. loosen your grip on what you think you know. Adopt the intention to accept any truth that you or we find here. Realize we are not looking to find somebody's idea of what is good and bad or right and wrong. We are looking for relevance and truth and functionality.

Up next: This is our time.

Go with care. -fellow human