Identity
“Identity
is dynamic, not fixed or static. It is an evolving program of inner
development.”
Wayne
Teasdale (The Mystic Heart)
We don't know exactly
when or why human beings developed self-consciousness, but it was
very early in our existence. Conscious intelligence is defined as
“the ability to reason how cause and effect are related, to
understand change, and to be insightful.” According to E. O.
Wilson, it emerged in human beings because of the need to manage
complex social situations. “...to feel empathy for others, to
measure the emotions of friend and enemy alike, to judge the
intentions of all of them, and to plan a strategy for personal social
interactions...the human brain became...highly intelligent.”
If you study a pride of
lions you will see fairly complex social interactions within a
limited range. A pride orients itself around its alpha male and
female. Same thing with a band of gorillas—there's the dominant
silver-back, to whom everyone else defers. The rules are clear, and
those who try to disturb them are punished, sometimes killed. As
human beings have evolved, we have learned how manage difficult
interactions without punishment, or death. If we had not developed
this ability, our evolution would not have been assured. The ability
to negotiate complex social interactions requires a high degree of
consciousness—both of self, and of others, of conditions in the
environment, and of the potential of any given situation to go one
way or the other.
Identity, whether
individual or national, is a fluid thing. I am not the same person I
was as a child, and neither are you. To try to hold onto my childhood
identity now that I am an older adult would be pathological. As we
learn, as we experience the various stages of maturity, as our world
reach expands, our identity changes because our consciousness
changes. Our world-view changes. As a nation, we are no longer a
cowboy country, we no longer have a slave-based economy, and we
aren't pioneers. The country has evolved past the industrial age of
cotton ginning, steam engines and open air smelting of raw ores. We
are entering an age in which we do not yet know what will replace the
industries of yesterday, and that is disorienting, but trying to hold
onto those industries would be as unnatural as my trying to keep my
childhood identity.
Greater consciousness is the way
forward. Each of us must become truly self-aware, and leave behind
the backward-tugging of herd mentality. So far, our evolution has been
forward. Let's hope that trend continues.
In the Spirit,
Jane
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