Good Week to all of you!

There is several times when I am writing to you in which, by wanting to include everyone,  I identify my readers by “us”, and I do it in the widest sense possible.

We, human beings, whose demography covers the entire planet. We, sentient beings who can think towards the future, and prosper… In his book, “Climate Wars”, Harald Welzer says that “in no other cases is it addressed in the first person of the plural than in climate change articles and other actual environmental problems.” (When we say we did this – we need to change it…)

But this lay out an obstacle when trying to define who really belong to that “we”. Is it ALL OF US? I believe so… but clearly there are a lot of people who start from scratch with very different life conditions. Hence, you could give more responsibility to one person over another by his decision making. As Welzer well exemplifies, it is not the same a Chinese country girl from the president and chief director of an energetic multinational business.

Answering the question: Who is “we”?, Welzer says that “What exists in reality are individuals that can be counted by thousands of millions, that act in extremely diverse cultural contexts, with extremely diverse economic opportunities and resources to political power in the highest moment of complex survival communities.”

And he strikes back gently: “The use of “we” implies a collective perception of reality, and such thing does not exist, not even within the worldwide problem context such as global warming.” And it really hurt reading it. Because even though you cannot argue the objectivity of the phrase (we different beings growing up and learning from different experiences), I believe that collective perception can be achieved, or at least that’s towards where we need to aim. It sounds as utopia to think of a happy world where everybody gets along just fine, people gather up to play some tunes, to chat, work with passion, positively, enjoying, loving… – but what is this guy saying?

I am saying that we are forgetting the power of culture. What a group of people think, and believe, transforms into an idea… and ideas transform into actions, and actions transform into experiences we live and share with others. The idea, transforms itself in culture. And culture permeates in every social plane and daily living, and who we are in the world. And the expansive wave that is produced in the way we think and act thanks to culture is even greater nowadays given the levels of communications and social networks we have created and sustained. I believe the implications of this social connection that exists today all around the world were not yet studied in deep and we cannot know how good can humanity react when the need for change knocks our door.

What matters are ideas to emerge with a subtle background of good vibe towards the common good. And I believe that there lays a nexus to agglomerate the concept of “we”…

Not separate, but together.

“before starting to put forward an ecological healing, we need to achieve mutual understanding and a mutual agreement among us about which is the best way to proceed in a collective manner. (…) the healing impulse does not come from encouraging the functional position, but from mutual understanding. And this (…) depends entirely from individual growth and transformation,” Ken Wilber. Sex, Ecology, Spirituality: The Spirit Of Evolution. Gaia Editions. Spain, 2005.

By moving aside EVERY socioeconomic or professional difference, we can all act with a subtle feeling of improving our environment, and in a wider sense, the entire planet. Again, every one of us, from where we are standing, can do something. As a teacher, president, mother or father, merchant, son, brother, executive director, construction worker, friend, manager, waiter, student, engineer, road sweeper. The engineer can happily ask for a true environmental impact report, and the road sweeper can be proud of cleaning the streets, contributing to reduce contamination.

Here we are, talking about it, that is something!

Hug,

Brian Longstaff.-

Comments