During the past years of this 21st Century, it was and still is very appropriate that humans were provided with a greater opportunity to appreciate and concentrate more on Good Will. We finally have all the possibilities (right brain) and all the probabilities (left-brain) that are available to humanity as our nation moves further into a new world of Information and Transformation, but is this enough? Let’s check it out.
In the book, “Consciousness Explained,” (1991:23) C.S. Dennett suggested that a special phenomenon began to dominate our social culture as our world reached the end of the 20th century. He believed that a dramatic shift in the way humans think about love and life occurred because we were becoming more sophisticated as a society. He felt that people used to talk and think about love in ways that were practically unavailable – except to children, and to those who can somehow manage to suppress their adult knowledge regarding love. He added that we used to love to tell those we loved that we loved them and to hear from them that we were loved also.
To children growing up in our society then, love was a pure simple unconditional feeling and a fairly reliable thing. Considering our current world now, are we now better or worse as adults? Are we not quite as sure anymore if we know what love is as we once thought we did? Has there been a dramatic shift in love consciousness that is causing true love to be less of a reality in this new century of modern times?
Dennett shared in his book that love is not completely socially uniform for everyone. As a whole, he proposed that it is because our (world) culture has become more sophisticated. Even if some of us think of love like in some romantic novel, his contention is that we now know better than to seriously express these imagined feelings to anyone including ourselves.
He also suggests that we think that it wouldn’t be the manly or womanly thing to do. Admitting to passionate love is admitting to being weak…and as simple as a naive child who doesn’t know any better. Is this really true in this day and age? Do we think of love only as a “control devise?” And where does love of home and family as well as love of country fit in this current year’s experience of a loving life?
Obviously, love does appear to many to be a “control issue” in this New Century World. Is this kind of love, as Dennett contends it to be, a controlled conditional awareness that limits the thrilling, devastating, or energizing experiences of love that our ancestors had?
Does today’s form of love somehow cause us to feel a sense of loss, of something missing in our lives? Have many of us noticed that we are not too sure just exactly what it is that we are missing?
Nowadays, do the majority of us in or out of any type of relationship (including the three mentioned previously as spirituality based) feel somewhat incomplete and unfulfilled? Does the dominating shadow side of some of us doubt that life will ever be as fulfilling or satisfying as it once was thought to be? How can that be? What has happened?
The author contends that love, along with romance, has obviously taken a back seat. In his opinion, love has no direction and no purpose, that many of us often take love for granted if we feel it at all in present day life.
We may talk about our conscious decisions and unconscious habits, or even our conscious egos and our unconscious motivations, which some of us believe try to run and rule our lives. But are we sure we know what we mean when we say these things?
Along with many others, he emphasized that while there are those who believe in consciousness as a very special genuine thing like love or gold, he advises us that: “love is all an illusion…only gold is real.”
Dennett also stated that, “consciousness” like love and money is an old
Phenomenon that does indeed depend to a surprising extent on its associated concepts. Although, like love, it (consciousness) has an elaborate biological base; like money, some of its most significant features are borne along on the culture, not simply inherent, somehow, in the physical structure of its instances.”(24)
If Dennett is right, and we have succeeded in overthrowing some of our basic cultural concepts, will the phenomena of consciousness be threatened with extinction? If it leaves completely, as he suggested it is destined to do, will love and money also go along with it? What is a phenomenon anyway? How much power does it have over us mortals?
Perhaps it is time to ask: (1) How many of us really do think that love will go along with conscious awareness and leave us during these beginning years of this new millennium? (2) What percentage of those who agree are males? (3) And how many females agree with Dennett?
Remember his opinion is encompassing a time that will cover several years at least, certainly not an overnight whim or special inclination.
At this point, there is one last question to ask our selves. Has love already joined conscious awareness in the back seat? Or did the event of 9/11/01 change our love destiny by causing many to wake up to a new conscious awareness called deprivation?
Our human ability to conceptualize consciousness is what creates and dissipates life, as we know it now. If this concept of our own consciousness were to fall into the hands of a dispassionate scientific community only and totally out of the realm of creative, passionate fulfillment, what will happen to unconditional love and free will, as we know it to be? Finally, what will happen to our living society as human beings? Will it change radically?
Imagine if we were to reduce life to merely a matter of motion, what happens to our appreciation of love and growing pains as well as dreams and the joy of living life to the fullest? What about compassion, which requires both mind and heart (reason and emotion)? In what form will our human passions continue to exist? Some medical professionals have said that we may now have the possibility to live until we reach 100 years. A century is a long time for anyone to consider living without passion. Why bother?
What would happen if we went back to our old ways and became in the future merely animated objects because cloned parts or mechanical equipment systemically replaced all our worn out body parts? Would we be a combination of Dr. Spock or “Data” from the Star Trek Series? Or will we be merely facts and no mystery, all schemes and no dreams, all plans and no glands? How will we be able to continue to maintain such things as “beauty and honor” without the awareness of physical love in our lives?
Where is romance and destiny, our reason for growing and suffering, for continuing to live on this plane of existence? The original Greek meaning for the word, “suffer,” was “to understand through experience.” Will it come about over the years because we may become overwhelmed, overworked or overcome with boredom? Is that not suffering without cause? Are we not a civilization of over-achievers already experiencing some of the effects of that reaction right now?
What Dennett appeared to assume in his book is that because of advanced technology and knowledge, sophistication will cause us to loose any interest in the mystery of life. Our curiosity and the passion to know more will be no more. Perhaps he is suggesting that it may happen because if we eventually know it all, why bother? Or is it because we think we know-it-all already? Is that the impression the USA is currently giving to the rest of our world?
Personally, there is some difficulty accepting any so-called sophistication concepts. Surely knowledge is something most of us seek in the world around us, for often it is a way to improve our lives. There is always room for improvement.
The answers to the mystery of life are exactly what advanced technologists and spiritual experts are seeking today. Hopefully they want to be the first to share it with the world in order that we all become aware of its benefits and continue to improve our intelligence agenda.
Our country was founded by seekers and searchers – looking for new ways to make life better for us all. We still are in the Seek, Search, and Discovery Game of Life. We humans will never unravel the total mystery of it all. The more we come to know, the more we will want to know, and the more we will realize we are co-creators with our God and begin to accept that Spirituality is the foundation of our lives. Perhaps we will finally be able to recognize we will never ever know it all. It was not meant for us to lock ourselves up inside and never grow emotionally. The more we feel, the more we will reveal about this adventure called, “Life Among The Living.”
Can it not be more reasonable to think that all that is happening in society today may be because (as many re-incarnationalists have suggested) it is time to graduate to a new consciousness level in order to make this great Planet Earth fit for all life, including humans. This world is currently thought of as the University of the Universe. Are we not here learning how to allow our souls to make it a world that benefits all of its inhabitants?
Will humanity relegate true love and romance to the past because we still cling to love as a possession? Is it possible that, as a whole, the majority of mankind no longer knows what it is to truly love one another unconditionally? Is this the lesson of this new century in these new times — that each and every one of us must learn that Love is Unconditional?
Perhaps in the crowded standby Earth Entry waiting rooms there is another important lesson that we require and desire to work with and complete. Can it possible be: How to examine our past history and customs to understand the values that are either non-existent or still controlling today’s current lifestyle?
Is this one of the reasons why exploring Ancient Societies is becoming very popular? These studies allow us to relive a romantic past again in our private lives. We cannot ignore the everyday reality that there is no romance to be found that is not sexually bound in our lives.
Sex has become a common commodity that everyone is sharing freely as a way out of bondage. There are no longer any Knights in Shining Armor with Damsels in Distress requiring rescue services. The mystical magic of love has been swept under the bed and replaced by the mechanics of sex as common as an impersonal hug or business handshake. This type of social sophistication is surely affecting everyone’s life.
What is being discussed here, in this statement of the problem affecting civilization today, is “demystification” — a favorite subject of many writers. In our left-brain habit of assigning labels to famous facts and fables, simple things have become lost in our shuffle dance of life. Cultures have been given permission by society to conspire together to convince social/tribal consciousness to move beyond simplicity into complexity.
Can it be true that the more advanced we become in our thinking, the more we are controlled by society and science, the less able we are to appreciate the basic premise of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? Otherwise known as the Declaration of Independence, which surely provided us all with the Freedom to Love Unconditionally. For it is this type of freedom that is the foundation on which all other freedoms rest.
Our foundational system, as we deal each day with current events, appears to be crumbling right under us. Can it be rebuilt stronger to accommodate this New World Century and the technological information explosion happening all around us?
Perhaps there is a specific solution to this problem? Surely our civilization must have at least advanced far enough in the last two thousand years to acknowledge how simple free-will and self-awareness of male and female energies still operating assures that life continues to exist for the purpose of providing a place to co-exist as free souls together.
Our basic continuing search for fulfillment is not necessarily the only reactive response. Our known world is on a course that is following the Universe’s expanding nature. Since the first big bang, resulting in the manifestation of solid energy forms that brought forth Universes of Worlds to inhabit, we have been on this ride that is like no other as far as we know. It is the way it is for humans. The mystery of what it is and why it is lies just beyond the reach of humanity and always will — because that it is the way it was created.
The sophistication ideal may be caused by the general overall lack of personal spiritual interest and awareness. This does not mean everyone has to limit themselves to undertaking studies into the examination of orthodox or unorthodox religious belief systems and cultures in order to understand them.
Mostly, it refers to a personal spiritual satisfaction path that assists humanity in understanding why and how male/female spiritual energies operate, and how a bio-electro-magnetic entity is able to function on an invisible as well as a very visible energetic level of conscious awareness. For humans are dual nature beings. Humans have a physical nature and a spiritual nature. Both are truly meant to work together harmoniously. How much more time will it take for all of us to accept and truly realize this important fact?
