The question can be raised of whether excursions into the deeper history
of America are worthwhile. Why not simply focus on the many problems of
the present? Why are things like the genocide of Native peoples or the
esoteric links of our founding fathers relevant when we’ve got pressing
concerns like the Iraq war?
The reason I believe this exploration is now important is that we are
called to another level of consciousness as a country, an evolution of our
governing assumptions, our political structures and our national
psychology. We can envision this as an upgrade to a new operating system
-- new software for our country that builds upon the old code but adds
fundamentally new capacities, abilities, and powers.
Unlike a computer program, however, the previous operating system of our
national consciousness cannot simply be overwritten. It must be outgrown
in an integrated fashion, which means completing the unfinished parts of
the last stage of our growth, as well as understanding what is no longer
working and why. Our maturation as a country requires coming face to face
with what is no longer adaptive about our beliefs, thoughts, and habits as
well as what we’ve hidden in our shadows.
The current administration in Washington causes many who are drawn to this
new operating system great angst. In many ways, the president (and others
like him in both parties) is an exaggeration of the consciousness that
many of us feel we are outgrowing. We can fixate on what we don’t like
about him, vilify him and his allies, and build political support against
him, thinking that alone will generate the progress we need.
However, there is also a subtler process
that may be more important, which is to look at him and his administration
as a Rorschach test of where our national psyche is fixated and then to
create a vision of ourselves that is more whole. Part of this requires
embracing what is virtuous, valuable, and beautiful about the old rather
than simply pointing towards the problems and inadequacies.
Personal growth rarely happens through self-hatred or judgment. It
usually begins with the recognition that what we don’t like about
ourselves – our arrogance, weakness, meanness, or fear, for example – is
often a mask for something that is unfinished or incomplete. Undesired
qualities are signposts for something that is developmentally frozen.
Shifting the pattern first requires softening our judgment and resistance
and finding a place of love and respect for the defenses or perceived
“problems.”
Collectively, our frustration with current leadership acts as a window on
places where America’s emergent culture and the operating system it is
offering are not yet whole. If they were, there would not be the level of
reactivity and its obverse of hopelessness that we witness. They would
simply be honored in a larger, deeper, more whole context while we
simultaneously work to make sure that the outdated OS is not running the
show much longer.
In the case of President Bush, for example, we see an exaggerated version
of strong masculine qualities that many would prefer to jettison from the
new operating system. However, for the new OS to be a true upgrade, we
cannot jettison the old but must build upon it and extend it. If not, we
compromise the efficacy of the new platform. In America’s next operating
system, for example, we need the protective warrior who is willing to
fight for what is right. But that warrior impulse will need to find a more
noble, selfless, and clear expression and be integrated. We thus need to
embrace the many virtues that Bush demonstrates in his warriorship – his
singularity of focus, his commitment to see things through to the end, a
willingness to sacrifice for what he believes is right, an ability to
galvanize people to take hard steps.
Simply rejecting the warrior won’t work. It’s tantamount to deleting
essential lines of code from the next operating system. We simply need to
upgrade the functionality and integrate it better with the emerging
consciousness. It’s not the warrior qualities in Bush that are the
problem; it’s the use of those qualities in situations for which they do
not constitute skillful means. It’s also problematic when they lead to
deception and manipulation and are not fully consecrated to the greatest
good for all.
Integration is what differentiates an upgrade to a new operating system
for America from a counter-cultural rebellion. Counter-cultural values
tend to be created as polar opposites to the dominant culture. If that
remains the case, we are simply locked in a tug-of-war for dominance;
either the old operating system or its opposite. We cannot upgrade until
we integrate both polarities. At that point, the warring factions can
recognize that their most important virtues and values have been honored
and infused into a viewpoint that is wiser, deeper, and more whole. Such
a recognition will eventually lead to a natural assumption of political
power by that emerging operating system.
All of this relates back to why digging into our country’s shadow and our
current distortions with as much open-hearted curiosity and truth-telling
rigor as we can muster is a requirement to activate a new system. We need
to build the best of everything that has been previously created into what
is emerging. And we need to see where we have been unconscious or lying
to ourselves so that those dimensions of our national character can become
unfrozen and find their next higher expression.
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vision for Sacred America, at
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