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FutureShapers Monthly #121
Bridging Wisdom
& Practice for a Better Tomorrow
emailed
free each month from www.Renesch.com
The written work included here is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution - NonCommercial 2.5 License.
August 2008
In this issue:
1. Readers’ Comments
2. Newsbits
3. August Editorial: "Please Remain Seated"
4. Preview: Next Month's Editorial
5. Quote of the Month - Swami Muktananda
6. Hot Link of the Month
7. Want to Blog?
8. Click and Play of the Month
1. READERS’ COMMENTS
Thanks to the kind
tenth-anniversary notes from subscribers Lucie Newcomb, Cheryl Whitesitt, Dan Weigold, Daryl Alford, Karen Reddering and Dorothea Kraemer in Germany. Here’s one note from
Minnesota:
Hello
John, Thank you for your article, "Thinking Responsibly."
Amen!.... Critical thinking skills are surely important but they only serve us
well when they are based on the solid foundation that only God can give.
Cheryl Whitesitt, Executive Director
MN Future Problem Solving Program
2. NEWSBITS
Journal of Human Values Article
The Journal for
Human Values
has published my article “Humanizing Capitalism: Vision of Hope; Challenge for
Transcendence” in the current issue. The abstract can be seen at http://www.sagepub.in/browse/journal.asp?Journalid=16&Subject_Name=&SubSubjectName=&volid=332&volname=14%3A1+%282008%29&mode=8#vol
August Blog on Overcoming Spiritual Relapses
In my monthly blog at the Global Dialogue Center, I’m focusing on an unusual topic – “Dealing With Spiritual Relapses: Overcoming the Recidivism of Our Egos.” Check it out and post your comments: http://globaldialoguecenter.blogs.com/johnrenesch/
Subscribers
from 36 Countries!
Not all email addresses reveal the countries of origin but some do. Based upon those that are apparent, I was pleasantly surprised to discover this newsletter goes to people in at least 36 countries suggesting there are most likely more since so many people around the world use Google and Yahoo accounts. Here’s the list.
3. AUGUST EDITORIAL
Please
Remain Seated
- Waiting to Die
by John Renesch
In late 2007, RollingStone.com interviewed the
preeminent scientist James Lovelock about his rather gloomy prediction of the
future of the human race (see http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/16956300/the_prophet_of_climate_change_james_lovelock/4
). Near the end of the interview Lovelock warns that despite all our
technological advancement: “we are still tribal animals, largely incapable of
acting for the greater good or making long-term decisions for our own welfare.”
Then, to illustrate his point, he tells the story of an airliner tragedy in
Great Britain where a plane’s fuel tank caught fire during takeoff.
Likening the accident to the
way people remain passive while major disruptions are going on without human
countermeasures, Lovelock explains, "There was plenty of time for
everybody to get out, but many of the passengers wouldn't move. They just
stayed there in their seats as they were told to, and the people who escaped
had to climb over them to get out. It was perfectly obvious how to get out, but
they wouldn't move. They died from the smoke or burned to death. And an awful
lot of people, I'm sad to say, are like that. And that's what will happen this
time, except on a much vaster scale." By blindly obeying the instructions
of the flight crew many people died.
Lovelock then tells his
interviewer unflinchingly, "Some people will sit in their seats and do
nothing, frozen in panic. Others will move. They'll see what's about to happen,
and they'll take action, and they'll survive. They're the carriers of the
civilization ahead."
Today,
the vast majority of people in developed countries are obeying the “instructions”
from the status quo and “remaining seated” while the smoke and flames of
incivility, fear, environmental degradation, separation and specialness consume
us. People in developing countries are mostly doing all they can to provide for
themselves and their families while some others, in stark contrast, are
emulating the way the industrialized countries consume, pollute and exploit
others. The main difference between Lovelock’s metaphor of the airline fire and
the global situation is people on the plane who acted quickly and didn’t follow
the instructions were able to escape the danger and save their own lives. Here
on Spaceship Earth, however, we have to eliminate the dangers because there’s
nowhere to escape.
The
question for the time: Are our existing lifestyles and existences the epitome
of human evolution? Is the world working as well as it can? Is the world as we
know it as good as it can get?
If
your answers are “yes” to all three questions, you can stop reading now since
there’s no better world for us to explore. If your answers are “no” then how do
we move onward, toward that which we sense as possible - some higher
possibility? How do we re-create ourselves as a more evolved species? How do we
create a new civilization, say “Civilization 2.0” or the next Age of Enlightenment?
What will it take for us to become “carriers of the
civilization ahead”?
It seems obvious: the first thing to do is “get out of our
seats” - to awaken from our entrancement and start waking up others who are still
entranced. This won’t take coercion or argument; they simply need to be invited
into a conversation. After all, if someone who doesn’t see any problem wants to
argue with you, why waste your time trying to win an unwinnable argument? Better
to explore possibilities with others who, while perhaps asleep, are more open-minded
when they wake up.
I am often asked “where do I start?” by people who seem sincere
in wanting to do something but don’t know where to begin. My usual answer: “Wherever
you are planted.” Talk to people in your circles and networks. Invite them to
explore possibilities for major transformation in the way people relate to one
another and to our home, planet Earth. If everyone around you agrees there’s
work to be done, move into action and do something. Keep inviting conversations
wherever you are, avoid confrontation and talk with those who are open and
share that sense of unseen possibilities for the human race. I challenge you to
start noticing where you have those opportunities each day and how often you
pass them up. If you are like most people, you pass up most of them, choosing
the comfort of your window/aisle seat to the effort it may take to act
constructively.
When you do engage others, make sure the conversations generate
action, not merely rhetoric. There’s too much opinionism out there already (in my
opinion). The airwaves are full of talk and opinion. It is as if there is some
solace in merely talking and having opinions. Opinions are impotent by
themselves (unless you are a talk show host or an op-ed journalist and you have
a market for them). What is lacking is constructive action, usually because
people get into arguing about what action to take.
I choose to put my conversations and actions into a sacred
context, inviting help and guidance in all I do and say. You may not. Judging
people who disagree with me and labeling them “wrong” doesn’t feel very
spiritual to me. If they don’t see the enormous possibility before us to
consciously evolve, it isn’t a matter of who’s right and who’s wrong; it is
more akin to who wants to play versus who wants to watch. I can’t think of a
better game to play than doing what I can to see us all reach beyond the
conditions and circumstances of today and be all that we can be - together.
______________________________
4. NEXT MONTH'S EDITORIAL:
“It Isn’t a
Question of Intention; It Is Who is Doing the Intending.”
5. QUOTE OF THE MONTH:
"If there is a conflict between your
duty to yourself and your duty to others, that means you have become involved
in some sort of self deception." - Swami
Muktananda
6. HOT LINK OF THE MONTH:
The Shaping Tomorrow Foresight Network helps members to help each other anticipate change, explore best practice and co-create the future through this public site and our main site; members include leading future thinkers, strategists, and change agents from commercial, not-for-profit and governmental organizations around the world as well as many directors and executives. John is a member.
7. WANT TO BLOG?
My blog - "Exploring the Better Future" - is located at the Global Dialogues Center; a new topic every month; take a look and post your comments. I'd love to hear from some of you subscribers!
8. "CLICK & PLAY" OF THE MONTH: (see Audio and Videos)
John on You Tube: a short excerpt from “In Search of the Future” movie (1:13)
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KEYNOTES THAT MAKE YOU THINK!
John delivers "keynotes that make you think" for corporations, associations and conferences, conventions and corporate retreats (see www.Renesch.com) .
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