Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Sense of Change

My sense of change in this society is as if we are moving into a direction of newness without knowing what it is meant to be. Could this be the first time in human history where we have had the foresight to see that our current modus operandi will lead to demise of the human race, or at least of our societies and cultures as we see them? In the past the fundamental shifts in our economy have been driven by shifting dynamics within society - be it a new emerging wealthy class who challenge the previously entrenched political-economic configuration (I know that Political-Economy is normally not hyphenated, but because I don't see them as two separate entities - I can not understand a political or economic conversation without the one relating to the other - so for this reason I can not see it conceptually as two separate words/concepts), or a new form of trading or government/state structure emerges that challenges the already existing system.

Today we are trying to shift society without creating a discontinuous event - we are not wanting a revolution we are wanting a conscious shift to occur. We are counting on us as a group of humans to be able to make this shift through choice (though encouraged by circumstances), through reason, through a sense of shared future. This I believe is a unique event in human history. The question then is not what happens during a discontinuous event, but what happens when we have rapid, consciously chosen change? How is this done? How do we do this again and again and again while focusing on, creating and emphasizing a better future for all (including the poor, animals and other living creatures).

I sometimes find myself praying for a revolution that will allow this change to occur. However, I know what revolutions look like and they aren't pretty and they give no guarantee of the ultimate result. This then calls for a creating of a shared vision of what that better future is. Can we change incrementally? Can we change suddenly?

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