selflesscentrism
If we ignore our natural selves, could we be wrong about the world and, most importantly, about each other? Your natural self thinks one way while your informed self thinks another.
Your deplorable neighbor who still loves Trump has the exact same natural propensities for genuine goodness as your other neighbor who wishes to abolish capitalism and outlaw gasoline. They each appear to be exact polar opposites and also the last people on earth to help each other in a real crisis, let alone considering the other’s point of view. But only if they disregard their true natures and cling to what they think is right. This is how wars are started and the cause of most every problem in society. Your neighbors- the Trump Guy & the Marxist- can’t both be right, can they? The basic goodness inherent in our nature is to be centrist. You were born with a perfectly balanced political opinion of zero. However, our learned preferences for social and legislative policies force us to choose and insulate our values as we fight for our assumptions with confirmation biases and vilify “the other side”. We tend to read, watch and listen to opinions, content and data that only agree with and fortify our values and assumptions. Babies, toddlers and very young children don’t have aversions to illegal immigration or affinities toward gender equality & gun control. Those preferences are learned and acquired as we age just the same as our stubbornness to adhere to them is fortified in our core beliefs as the years wear on. Can you consciously distinguish your natural characteristics (who you naturally are as a toddler) from your acquired preferences (who you think of yourself as an informed voter)? Which of these two conditions would be most consistent, reliable and valuable in terms of simply getting along with our neighbors and family? How about saving the planet, or at least prolonging contemporary society? Do we resist questioning our own acquired assumptions and also reject most anything that asks us to rethink our values? Be honest in asking this of yourself. If so, then why? Once we get over the hump of accepting that we are all very naturally the same-that we want the best for each other, our planet and ourselves- we can live better as human beings and also together to improve society. If we can’t get over this hump we will continue to fight with each other, but we are mostly fighting against our own human natures. Ignoring our nature is self-destructive. Clinging and sticking to our acquired values-like really having an unwavering conviction in what we believe about climate change, regardless of which extreme- may be the worst quality we can acquire and is perhaps the exact opposite of wisdom. In other words, a lifetime of learning, experience, information selection and knowledge acquisition that diverges from our inherent basic goodness is exactly that: divergent from inherent goodness. The contemplative practices of meditation and self-reflection are the keys to unlocking this potential in ourselves and seeing it in others.
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