Optimum Integral Wellness
Outline

 

Our country/civilization/society/culture currently has significant problems; we are perpetually at war or in conflict with other nations and live in fear that others want to destroy or hurt us or see us fail; our social services such as schools and health care are not stellar; and although we are the most scientifically and technologically advanced society and culture on the planet and lead relatively extremely comfortable existences, these advancements have failed to raise the overall satisfaction or happiness of most individuals.

In fact, many individuals in our culture - even people who are regarded as extremely "successful" in the public arena - feel alienated, disconnected, depressed, unwhole, unwell, unfulfilled, unloved, unlovable - as if they are "failing" or unsuccessful in one or more ways, either socially, personally, financially, sexually, psychologically, professionally, or in terms of their family lives or their general health and wellness.

There exist hidden - essentially unquestioned - assumptions upon which our highly competitive capitalistic consumer society is based. For example,

1. 1. it is not only possible but desirable to "own" a portion of the planet, i.e. "land" or "property;" in addition, it is also possible for companies to "own" frequencies of airwaves over certain area and also have the rights to certain parts of the water masses.
2. Darwinism, including the proposal that competition insures "survival of the fittest," is the "best" way to conduct business, i.e. the "best," most productive and most industrious workers and producers will be rewarded, be "successful," that we live in a meritocracy. If people cannot or do not compete or wish to be "productive" in some fashion they are often viewed as suspect or even sometimes deemed to be mentally ill or criminal.
3. it is not only possible but desirable to quite easily judge phenomena and behaviors and divide them into categories such as good and bad, positive and negative, helpful and harmful, civilized and uncivilized, etc. Thus, certain behaviors and even thoughts are considered to be "normal" and acceptable while others are considered to be deviant, abnormal, and unacceptable. The lines are seem fairly black and white although there is apparently some room for hypocrisy; in America murder is deemed as "wrong" but murder sanctioned by the state in wars, assassinations, or capital punishment is acceptable.
4. "Science," based on empirically based "proof" can and does provide and accurate understanding of the human body, the eco-system, societies, the planet earth, and the universe. It also can and does provide proof supporting the "best" ways to do and produce things within our culture, such as raise children, grow three pound strawberries, harvest cow flesh and milk, convert corn into cheap fuel, send men to the moon, etc.

These same hidden assumptions influence how babies are individuated (raised, taught to have a sense of "self" or a personal individual identity) in our culture, how they are taught to be independent, competitive, and gain approval of others, i.e. how to "succeed" or be successful members of our society.

However, because of diverse and inconsistent pressures, stresses, influences, supposed unquestioned "desires" (e.g. success, fame, fortune,) and other stimuli both popular and personal, many people in our culture experience crises at some time in their lives. When the symptoms of these crises manifest themselves in some form of acting-out such as alcoholism, divorce, career suicide, or in other self-destructive ways, there are "scientific" treatments to allay, cover, or mask these symptoms.

Western science is quite talented at pigeon-holing and treating symptoms but it usually does not treat the human body, psyche, mind and spirit as one integral being. Also, there is a primacy placed on assigning blame or being able to assign blame for undesirable conditions - e.g. "genetics;" certain lifestyles such as consuming particular amounts of protein, fat, carbohydrates, and sugars are considered optimum while other lifestyles are considered to be less than ideal.

When anthropologists look back on our culture from the year 3000 they will be able to see things that we are currently unable to see, the way that we look back on leeching and ideas such as the world is flat as remedial, unsophisticated, ignorant or even somewhat barbaric. Perhaps it is actually the cut-throat competitiveness of our breed of capitalism that eventually causes alienation and depression because people have a difficult time trusting others? Perhaps our ways of raising children to be competitive actually precludes them later from being empathic and compassionate towards others such as those who live in third world countries and are currently dying from curable diseases? Perhaps the way babies are separated from their care-givers and taught to be independent causes a profound fear of abandonment that later manifests itself as a fear of intimacy that destroys over 50% of marriages in the United States? Perhaps people deeply resent being loved, appreciated, respected and admired for their achievements and "successes" instead of being loved unconditionally, just for being alive? And perhaps these resentments cause people to behave or "act-out" in certain destructive and self-destructive ways that intend to draw attention to this resentment but instead do the opposite and push people away? Perhaps our form of morality, of dicing up phenomena neatly into categories such as good and bad, positive and negative, causes fears and prejudices that are ultimately inefficacious and/or destructive?

I believe that when anthropologists in the year 3000 look back at us they will find us at a pivotal turning point wherein our culture had a choice: we could have continued to try to beat other cultures and societies and the earth and each other into submission and prove that our way - our type of capitalism and our brand of television-driven democracy - of doing things was "right" and "superior;" or we could have learned to optimize integral wellness and do the greatest good for our society, for all societies and cultures, for all human beings, for all species of sentient beings, and for the planet earth.

However, I am not optimistic. I rarely see politicians ask their supposed political adversaries "How can we work together to make this a win-win situation?" And I rarely see couples or business partners able to compromise to make their relationship continuously mutually beneficial. We do not feel like winners unless there are visible losers. The lack of compassion that we exhibit as a society may be merely the reflection and manifestation of the lack of compassion that we exhibit as individuals towards each other and vice versa.

There has been an emphasis placed on entrepreneurial competition and "going it alone" in our culture that has produced many great businesses, artworks, scientific discoveries and creations, and technical and medical achievements; but could this same emphasis on independence actually be hindering our collective and individual optimum integral wellness? And if so, how can we learn new tools for leading meaningful lives before we end up destroying each other and ourselves?

In this book, I shall attempt to provide hypotheses that demonstrate how the causes of many of our collective and individual failures and problems are the same as the causes that once made us great. What is needed now is a paradigm shift, a new way of doing and seeing things so that we learn how to live safely and lovingly together instead of as putative winners and losers. For if one person - just one - one "loser" - is suffering somewhere from something that is easily remedied than we have not reached optimum integral wellness and thus cannot evolve or be content. We need to learn how to take care of ourselves by taking care of each other; we need to learn how to do well so that we can do good; we need to learn how to replace resentment with gratitude; and we need to replace the win-lose paradigm with a win-win paradigm.

 

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