Culture

The current infatuation with multiple cultures in America seems enlightened on the surface. However, it is important to bear in mind that cultures often stand in the way of greater human progress. Idolizing a culture without a critical and analytical eye is childishly naive.

I was aghast yesterday as I listened to an NPR quiz show. The guest celebrity was a rap singer who was overtly and unabashedly bragging about his American subculture of violence, robbery and drug abuse. The audience seemed to find this quite humorous. I found it disturbing and symptomatic of a sick society.

Similarly, the recent fascination in America with Islamic cultures seems a natural reaction to being aggressively attacked on September 11th, 2001 by a wealthy Saudi madman and his minions. However, the equivocation of cultures which behead women for adultery and hang young men for being gay to American culture is just plain stupid. Many Americans seem unable to take the critical step to investigate a culture's full spectrum of positive and negative traits. I speculate that this is based in intellectual laziness or a delusion that smiling at everything about a culture will keep people from that culture from creating mayhem.

Human cultural development follows patterns which can be readily discerned by studying history critically and analytically. This implies the use of science, a foreign culture indeed for many contemporary Americans, it seems. Science isn't about being blissfully ignorant. It isn't about denying the unpleasant in hopes that it will go away.

Multiculturalism in America can serve a wonderful purpose to enrich the greater American culture. However, the present approach media and politicians are taking toward multiculturalism is shallow and inane, generally. Blanket acceptance of any culture as "great" or "cool" is counterproductive. Fostering the elements of any culture which advance universal human rights and world peace is common sense. Learning the difference takes time, study and openness to truth.

Identity

Identity can be the foundation of individual human development in early life, yet it can become a retardant to individual human growth in later life. Young people need to develop a sense of self in relation to their environment to grow out of the narcissism of adolescence to a socialized and independent adulthood. Recent psycho-social research in wealthy countries shows that this process is prolonged into the third decade of life as prosperity and longevity increase in societies.

In later life, the reflexive animal fear of change, stimulated by progressive experiences of loss, trauma and the unpredictable nature of life, often leads people to form a rigid self-concept: 'I don't do that. I wouldn't go there. I must have my this or that.' These collected 'I do's' and 'I don'ts' form an identity that can become a prison, which confines and stifles.

Liberation from identity comes with the understanding of the inevitability of death. I am not referring to the trite 'We are all dying' attitudes seen in popular media. Understanding the inevitability of my own death has come with touching death. I have been close to my own death twice. I have nursed hundreds of dying patients. I have washed bodies for burial. I have lowered the eyelids of people I have known and loved in life. This has brought me liberation from elements of my identity which were indeed narrowing my life.

Identity is best kept fluid in practice. Always expanding and sometimes contracting. Openness to the new, balanced with faithfulness to truth, mindfulness and compassion, allows for personal growth. A vital, growing person need not worry about identity, as long as his/her growth is based in responsible and loving practice toward the human beings in his/her life. I am quite sure that love of others, rather than identity, is the core of any mindful and compassionate practice.

Peace

World peace requires individual peace. To realize this is to realize the magnitude of the issue. The achievement of individual peace by millions of individuals who are still struggling for survival on a daily basis will not occur in one lifetime or many lifetimes. This is the challenge of the person who is committed to peace. Maintaining individual peace and hope for world peace under the real circumstances of today requires rigorous practice.

Aggression

Human life comes with aggression. It is simply part of being an animal. It is hormonal. It is hard-wired. Learning to first recognize aggression in one's own consciousness and behavior is a challenging practice. Road rage, cutting into lines, racing others to check out counters...these are easy examples. However, the harder examples are the subtle forms of aggression that occur when we compete unconsciously with others. This competition is increasing as the world becomes polluted and overpopulated. Resources are dwindling. Capitalism encourages aggression. In fact, anyone who is awake can see the increase in female aggression in the new economy of the US, where women are striving with men for economic equality or dominance. This alone explains to me why capitalism does not bring peace. An economic (survival) system that is based on aggression has not and cannot possibly foster world peace. Propaganda about professional (capitalist) sports as a medium for cooperation and peace is so obviously flawed, when one considers the history of violence at Olympic games and the increased occurrence of drug abuse and corruption in the whole arena of professional sports. People increasingly find surrendering their aggression in capitalist societies frightening. It is the surrendering of a significant defense against poverty and the delusion of control. Yet, no human, male or female, will evolve beyond basic animal behavior and consciousness without surrendering voluntary aggression as a first step to enlightenment, mindfulness and compassion.

How to practice the surrender of voluntary aggression in daily life? First, it is important to recognize the simple physical signs and behaviors of aggression, such as increased heart rate, blood rushing to the face, increased vocal volume, clenched jaw and/or fist, increased driving speed, rushing, and many other signs which must be observed, accepted and recognized in the moment they occur. Otherwise, how can anyone practice control of aggression?

Then what? The daily practice to control aggression by recognizing impulses to be aggressive takes many years to develop. It also requires patience with and acceptance of one's own animal instincts. That is, patient acceptance that we are indeed animals. If a person is wedded to religious notions of man as non-animal, that person will never understand his aggression. Let alone control it and evolve away from it. He will live in denial of it.

Finding and fostering affection and compassion in one's life for oneself and others equally facilitates the process of managing and evolving beyond aggression. I recommend it. It takes time, meditation, determination, and, above all, practice, practice, practice.