Power And Nurture, still, again!

The sign of mental illness is how a single unit fits into his world.

I call this unit MAN. He is beautiful, creative, strong and troubled. He can't get away from his worries because he knows too much and spends most of his time trying to unthink all the thoughts rushing into his mind.

This applies to WOMAN too if she arrives at a position where she has some control over her life. But first she has to break through the cloak and mythology of what society has told her - she represents.

Great Britain caused a lot of suffering while it was looking for success, for wealth, and civilized behaviour among its citizens. I don't know if it's possible to be in control. I think it's more of a desire based on social status and conditions which cause suffering for many. 

We want to be in control of our own lives but there are too many of us competing for space in the city or town and on top of that is influence from powerful sources who want other things, like wealth, popularity, love and friendship. So we attempt to create systems to organize life for the greater good.

There is one thing I want to remember. Very few people seek control. They seek belonging, community, being appreciated, loving and being loved. But the media seems to be bored whenever we talk of love. We tend towards generalizations that we fear and generalizations that make us feel better.

It has helped me to understand two forces of energy. Power and Nurture. When a society is built on power for power's sake, we end up causing a lot of suffering for those who have the least power, while those who have the most don't know what nurture is.

In times of war we train humans to be strong by ignoring and denying their nurturing feelings. We think of them as weak. If you're planning to kill and bomb the enemy to think about feelings is painful.

It raises all kinds of torture for the mind. It dismisses the soul. It ridicules the suffering of the enemy. It responds to conscience with anger, it finds someone else to blame. (You're just trying to make me feel guilty). 

Attempting to win wars with strategy, schooling, judgement that we are doing the right thing - all's fair in love and war, we end up hard, insensitive, looking for scapegoats to blame. We make a show of winning as we kill thousands and millions.

Or we choose to create societies that keep us busy, patting each other on the back. Being kind to ease our conscience, setting up boundaries of who we can trust and who we can't, dividing good guys and bad guys. Then we question ourselves to ourselves, forever, endlessly, blowing up in anger when something triggers.

How long can we live like this?