All the problems in the world, whether big or small, can and will be resolved when we learn to understand ourselves and become fully independent. In-dependence means to depend on your ‘self’. Unfortunately, your ‘self’ is a part of you that you probably don’t even know, never mind know how to relate to. Your ‘self’ is your nature, in other words your body (sensations), heart (emotions), head (thoughts), and soul (sacredness). It’s your being. Remember we are human beings!
Now the reason we are all so disconnected from the life force of our nature, is culture. Culture is not an inherently bad thing. Humans are complex social creatures, so to survive and prosper it made sense that we organize into cooperative groupings adhering to certain agreed norms and values. The difficulties have come in how these groupings understood and handled our individual human natures. Any so-called antisocial behavior was highlighted and sanctioned, and it wasn’t long before our wild natures were seen as the biggest problem. The civilizing of human beings to be ‘good’ and ‘conform’ was where culture and nature started to clash instead of collaborating. We became externally divided (interpersonally) and internally divided (intra personally) as our wild natures were suppressed and dominated by our civilizing culture.
Now this splitting of the human, from our inherent being, has been an extended process over the past 3000 years. Our resulting dysfunction, written in the pages of human history, highlights our gross inability to live in harmony with each other and our environment. We are now bordering on complete self-destruction and need to catch a big wake up. Nurturing our natures and learning how to be truly independent at a body, heart, mind and soul level should be the most important subject on the school curriculum. When we understand how to relate to our inner selves, where all human potential and collective wisdom lies, we will instinctively know how to act in relation to each other and our environment. But if culture, through current socialization, education and religious practice chooses to dismiss our wild and wonderful human nature, we will remain internally divided, dysfunctional and unable to creatively solve the myriad small and big problems that face us every day. If you would like to experience true independence, please contact me – psychologist in Fourways.