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Democracy, Freedom, and Spirituality

Submitted by Ken Watts on Sat, 02/24/2007 - 16:12

One of the things that strikes me as fascinating from time to time is the way that our internal, spiritual, life mirrors the structures of society as a whole.

As I began to move toward a greater trust in democracy and freedom in society, I was also moving toward a greater trust in democracy and freedom in my inner life.

I used to be very suspect of my own motives and desires—I felt they needed to be watched very carefully, lest they lead me astray. My trust was reserved for the "me" at the top of my internal hierarchy.

This caused me all kinds of problems.

I could never be sure that this "me", who was making all the decisions, was as wise and omniscient as I would like to believe. I couldn't help noticing that when I overrode my instinctive reactions—by willpower, or by refusing to recognize their existence—that the results were not always what I anticipated.

About the same time, I began to notice that a great deal of my behavior came from some deep, instinctive place.

For example, I noticed that when I would lie in bed in the morning, enjoying the sunlight streaming through the window, a gradual, sub-conscious process would unfold until I found myself ready to get up. I had always believed that I "decided" to get up—that the ruling "me" made a decision, which the rest of me merely obeyed.

But I began to notice that this was not true, and never had been. Oh, I sometimes said to myself, "Well, I'd better get up now." or something like that. But I now realized that, by the time I said it, the decision had already been made, and made by a part of me that "I" (the "me" I believed was in charge) had no direct access to.

I began to pay attention, and to realize that this was the rule, rather than the exception, in all of our behavior. When I was having a conversation, or giving a lecture, the words that came out of my mouth came to my lips ready-made, by internal processes below the level of consciousness. I would often act without first having "decided" to act. This "I" who I had always thought was in charge of the rest of me, was not even in charge of itself.

It was, in fact, a myth: a persona that I used to make a sort of sense out of my internal processes. But if this were true, if this "me" which I had thought was in charge was itself a product of deeper processes within me, what basis did I have for ignoring or discounting my other reactions—instincts, desires, etc.—in favor of "me". Weren't these products of the same processes that generated this "self" which I was so fond of?

I began to pay more attention to all of my instincts and feelings. I began to refuse to discount them, and instead to listen to them, to stop being afraid of where they would lead. This didn't mean I always acted on them, for two reasons.

First of all, it just isn't true that we always act on every impulse. We often have contradictory impulses, for one thing.

But the other, more interesting, reason was that the impulses we are most afraid of will often go away, or transform into something else, when we actually pay attention to them.

If I found myself furious at some person or some turn in events, and I tried to resist this "negative" response, often the anger, thus stifled, would just grow. (The same, by the way, might happen if I vented it without thought.) But if I took the anger seriously, paid attention to it, opened myself up to what it had to tell me, accepting it as a valuable and good part of myself, it would transform into other feelings, and in the process it would often bestow upon me a greater understanding of myself and the circumstances I found myself in.

I use the example of anger above because that is the one we usually fear the most, but the same is true of all the emotions we disrespect in ourselves from time to time.

I began to understand my internal structure as a sort of bottom-up process, rather than a top-down power struggle, and as I became more democratic, in my internal life, I found myself becoming more democratic in my relationships to others, and in my politics as well.

I don't think this is a coincidence. The fascist regime (highly authoritarian) in Italy during WWII encouraged fathers to be the authoritarian head of their families. The hierarchy in the larger culture was to be reflected in the home. It's not uncommon for those who don't listen to their children to also not listen to, or even admit to, their own feelings.

Governments that think their citizens need to be controlled, also think it's good for parents to control their children. Parents who don't trust their children often don't trust themselves.

I found that as I trusted my own process more, I became more trusting of other people's process. When I found myself in charge of a meeting, or a classroom, I spent more time listening, and helping the group to listen to each other, and less time trying to control the outcome. And I found that this produced better results, just as it did in my internal world.

There is no clear-cut distinction between our inner, spiritual, experience and the political and economic struggles in our society. If we want democracy, freedom, and love to rule in our culture, we must learn to let them rule in our selves. Likewise, we cannot be free in ourselves unless we are willing to trust others with that same freedom.

It's all of a piece.

At least, that's what I think today.