The World Is Feeding The Dark Wolf
LIGHT WOLF | DARK WOLF |
Joy, Peace, Love, Hope, Serenity, Humility, Kindness, Benevolence, Empathy, Generosity, Truth, Compassion and Faith | Anger, Envy, Sorry, Regret, Greed, Arrogance, Self-pity, Guilt, Resentment, Inferiority, Lies, False Pride, Superiority and Ego |
I was thinking today that the world is in the mess that it's in because we're feeding the wrong wolf. And it isn't happening by accident either. I think that our world leaders, most of them anyway, are feeding their Dark Wolf and in turn, it is filtering down into our cultures and into our homes. When I open my social media and start scrolling, it's full of posts and stories about someone somewhere feeding their dark wolf and is equally heartbreaking and infuriating. Which feeds my dark wolf, so I have to be careful about how much time I send on apps that take me away from my light wolf. Not only are we feeding the Dark Wolf, as the Cherokee teachings go, we're starving the White Wolf.
And so while I think it is each person's duty to be self-reflective in an effort to be feeding their Light Wolf, I can't blame the people whose Dark Wolves are winning.
I'm going to go as far as saying that I blame Science for the mess that we're in. Western science is reductive by nature. We say that we try to break things down into their smallest bits in an effort to understand the bigger picture (I blame Socrates). But I think that in doing so, we have been conditioned to reduce everything to it's smallest bits but don't go the extra step in going the other way again and trying to understand how those bits fit into the bigger picture. That part, is the fault of the education system. The traditional model of education rewards those who are the best at memorizing the smallest bits of information and rarely ask students to try to fit all the pieces together. Standardized tests, which the current government in Ontario seems to value so much, do very little to assess and/or evaluate a students ability to fit the pieces together. So while some people in the education sector are trying to move towards a more big-picture way of teaching and learning, our leaders, our politicians and many, many parents want us to "go back," to the way things were when they were in school.
So the short story is this: because Science and Education have spent so long reducing the big picture into the smallest bits, we we don't even know what the big picture looks like anymore. In a lot of our worlds, we have come to consider ourselves as the smallest bits of a big picture and so we fail to see how we fit into the world that has been created around, and for, us. And because we've lost sight of how we fit into a bigger picture, and any sense of agency we might have once had, we don't know how we fit together anymore. The social media and technology are making it easier and easier for us to keep to ourselves, and to create worlds and communities of people that look and think like us, and so we don't spend any time with the "others," like we used to. We don't have relationships with each other any more. And with globalization being what it is, and global conflicts being what they are more and more people, as the Newfoundlaners would say, come from away.
Because we look at information as bit of information and rarely zoom out, our relationships with each other are weaker than ever, but so is our relationship with the places in which we find ourselves. No one really feels like they belong anywhere anymore. We don't learn about each other, we don't learn about where we come from and we don't learn about where we are...because we're too busy looking at the little bits of information and asking "how does this affect me?" We're not thinking seven generations into the future because a) we don't know what world looks like and b) we don't think that we have any power to have an impact on the lives of those living seven generations from now.
The world that we have created has robbed us of our ability to live life on our own terms. We no longer feel like we can act as agents on our own behalf and live the life we are meant to live. We are constantly being shown what our lives should look like and because those images, and that idea(l), feels so far away rates of depression and anxiety, especially in men, are higher than they've ever been. Part of that is because access to mental health supports are becoming a little bit easier to access, part of it is because it is becoming a little more acceptable to talk about our mental health or illness (especially for men). It's becoming harder and harder to become who we are because we're constantly being made to feel like we're not enough.
But let me get back to science:
The reductionist "nature" of Western science has disconnected us from Nature. We know that climate change is happening, but we feel like there's nothing we can do about it anyway so why bother trying? Not only has Science become too complicated for a lot of people to understand it has also robbed us of any agency we maybe once had. And because the education system values compliance over curiosity people don't know how to ask questions, nevermind asking the right questions. Education and Science are about "getting the right answer," but Nature is about trial and error. Nature is about learning and Science and Education is about knowing. Science and Education is not about figuring out how one piece of information is connected to another...it isn't about relationships.
From what I've learned (correct me if I'm wrong) the Anishinaabe people practice a philosophy of "all my relations." It's the idea that we are all related to one another and I love this way of thinking. It's hard to make choices that might have a negative impact on someone else when you think that you're related to them. Most people don't want to hurt, or cause harm to, their family members, and so if everyone and everything is your family you might think twice before making a decision that might have a negative impact on your family member.
We've lost touch with our relationships. We are more individualistic than ever, in fact, hyperindividualism has become a sought after trait. Men are inundated with ads and posts on social media about being "the most respected man in the room," being "hard," being "dangerous," being "in control," being "powerful." But I'm a firm believer in the Africa proverb
If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.
And if that makes me soft, then I'm as soft as pyjamas.
All of the research will tell you that social connections help men live longer. Rates of loneliness are way up, and so are the rates of suicide. That's no coincidence. We live in a world that is touted as more connected than ever before, but men just aren't feeling it. This American ideal of "rugged individualism," is destroying men's lives. It's causing conflicts in our homes, between neighbours, among politicians and cultures.
We need to get back to relationships. Bro-mances are important! Let's talk about love. Wouldn't it be cool if men could say "I love you," without having to add "bro," or "man," or "dude," to the end of it? If we want to do this, we have to stop trying to reduce things to their most fundamental pieces (definitely Socrates' fault), and first principles. Not to say that doing so has no value, because
fundamental pieces and first principles are important, BUT relationships are importanter.
We don't have to keep acting like it's us against the world. I've said it before and I'll say it again: asking for help takes real strength. I've got an amazing support network, and it has literally saved my life, but I've still got work to do in terms of reclaiming my agency and becoming who I am. If you're a man, a bro, or a dude, and you're reading this (or anyone else, of course), know that I consider you one of my relations and
I LOVE YOU.
Shoot me a message and let's feed our Light Wolves sometime!
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