How do we become that fairy godmother of Sleeping Beauty fame? How do we soften the curse from having left things undone? In other words, how do we transition to the new normal?
First, we need to understand how we brought this "curse" on ourselves. We did so by not asking the right questions and by ignoring the warnings. We have plundered our planet's bounty of finite gifts. We need to learn how we did that and how we can stop. Realizing the seriousness of our situation and getting over our shock and sense of loss, we can then choose to become a participant in creating our new normal, instead of feeling like a helpless victim.
We can ask ourselves how we can begin to climb down our dangerous ladder and how far down we need to go. And what will it look like down there? What positive changes can I make on my descent? How do I foresee my life in the new normal?
What is at the upper rings of the ladder? More than most people usually think about: driving to the supermarket whenever you wish, flying across the country to visit your grandchildren, receiving medical care, setting the thermostat to a nice warm temperature in the winter or to cooling air-conditioning in the summer, washing and drying clothes in machines, driving your own car to work or taking a bus or train, eating foods from around the world whenever you like, setting your house ablaze with electric light, turning on the tap and having cold or hot running water whenever desired, taking out the garbage for someone else to dispose of, stopping for take-out on the way home or going to a restaurant where you are waited on by a smiling wait-person. The internet, iPods, cell phones, plasma TVs, vacations, electronic games, movies delivered to your door, microwave ovens, well-stocked stores, prolific gas stations, Amazon.com and UPS. All of that is at the top.
Clearly, it will look very, very, very different on the lower rungs.
What happens as we begin our long descent down the ladder? We lose our privacy and perceived independence, our dreams and conveniences, our expectations that life will just keep getting better and that technology will solve all our problems. We encounter change, a great deal of change. And change is something we don’t like to have thrust upon us. Also, we will become fearful for we will have no idea exactly how far down we will have to go. Gradually, most of the things we took for granted will cease.
But with all our loss of conveniences and possessions and all that we are used to, we can also gain. What could we possibly gain? The chance to stop the harm we are doing, and to do what is right. The chance to end isolation and loneliness, and to, instead, create a stronger sense of family and community. The chance to learn how to work in a way that we make something of lasting value instead of producing toys to numb the mind or excite the senses.
How do we prepare for our descent? Mentally, physically, and spiritually.
Mental preparation is what I have been writing about. We have created the terrible problems we now face. With our craving for more possessions and experiences, with our inability to control our anger in all its forms, our ignorance of what is truly important, our arrogance in placing our own interests above those of others, and our pride in our accomplishments and technology, we have been living in a manner that cannot be sustained and has only been possible because we are more powerful than others and we got here first.
From a Buddhist perspective, our greed, anger, ignorance, arrogance, and pride of countless lifetimes lead us to being born at this point in time as a human on this planet. We’re here because of our past karmas: mental, verbal, and physical. Our craving, angry ignorant, arrogant, and proud thoughts, speech, and behavior are seeds. Now those seeds have matured and we’re here at the top of the ladder looking all the way down. Like children, we want to blame others for getting us here and for not rescuing us. But the reality is that there’s no one else to blame. We’re responsible for our actions and their consequences. No one else.
From a non-Buddhist (non-karma, non-rebirth) perspective, our greed, anger, ignorance, arrogance, and pride have resulted in our placing our own interests above those of others. When you get the most powerful countries in the world with a lion’s share of earth’s finite resources doing this, the consequences become apparent. First, natural resources become increasingly difficult and expensive to procure. And then, with alarming speed, they are either depleted or so contaminated they are as good as depleted.
So there’s no one to blame. We did it. You and I.
The question becomes what do we do now.
We take a deep, and quivering, breath and start our descent. We face our grief and deal with it. We can use Elizabeth Kübler-Ross’s grief cycle to help us recognize and work through what we'll be feeling:
Yes, Kübler-Ross was talking about the terminal illness of one person while I'm talking about a planet and every being, plant, and mineral on it. But the process is the same.
To move on from our precarious perch to the new normal, we need to understand how we got here and what we're facing, work through stages of loss, and find the way to move forward.
(Tomorrow: Living in Our New World Part 8: Making Preparations)