A psychologist argues that recognizing our fear and helplessness about global crises can lead to more generous action beyond our own groups. She warns against tribal thinking and calls for continuous questioning instead of fixed answers.
I'm sure you would agree with me that we're all facing now times that we never conceived, that would be here, where the world itself is truly imperiled and that we're dealing with a crisis that we've never had to before. It's all too easy and common for us to go to one extreme or the other, to either be apathetic or to be caught up and embroiled in emotion. And as was emphasized, in awareness that heals. It's a time where it's so important that we're aware of our feelings. In this case, it would be feelings of fear or helplessness or concern, anxiety. And to look for and to find and be proactive our caring and our responses that could possibly be beneficial in facing the world. It's natural that we turn the inner focus of awareness that heals to the outer world and that we start to look at, well, what are our feelings and, and how can we respond in a way that's going to be a benefit to the world. Now, all of us were raised to where it's perfectly natural and healthy to care for ourselves and our family and to really be protective there. But we've reached a time being at the global warming age where we can't afford not to consider being a percentage more generous to the greater world to help it to survive. Another place that we also need to look at is the almost universal tendency throughout mankind's history of favoring and trusting the nation in which we live, or the tribe in which we live, or the political party in which we follow. And we see ourselves as innocent or good or trustworthy, and we see the other as guilty, not as trustworthy. This inevitably leads to war and conflict. But by recognizing that this is the case, we can start to see. Now, wait a minute. It's much more about shades of gray. There's no absolutely innocent country, and at the same time, we can't afford just to take care of our families as much as a priority as we used to in the past. So a healthy look at psychopolitics is really recognizing that of course we want to continue to take care of those we love and ourselves. But we need to look at, is there a way that we can be more generous, or more accurately, how can we be more generous to include elements of the world that so badly need our time, money and energy to be more devoted to it? So I believe, and I hope you do, that it's a time where we not only need to make more moves, but we really need to stay in a state of questioning because we're not going to ever arrive at a permanent answer or a fixed state of this is exactly how we give we need to see okay, I can give in this new way now and stay in questioning. How can I keep this moving? How can I continue to be a benefit and to fulfill the life that I want to fulfill? Hopefully this resonates with you, this idea of continuously questioning, given that we're in this new stage of life and that you'll join me and I millions of others in questioning how we can join together to create better benefit for the world. Now, if this resonates with you, I'd love to hear your comments and enter into a deeper dialogue with you.
