Transformation is not ordained as a benevolent wonder.  It can be a beneficial challenge or it may open us into the depths of despair and a ruined future. We are at such a turning point presently. We have a choice to make as to how the future opens.

At the present we are engaging in stunning conflict but hear too litttle about an analysis of the challenging nature of the conflict we face. It is particularly unfortunate that we are often reducing our view of conflict to the assumption it is all about politics. It is essential that we take a broader view. The stakes for our future are too high to reduce them for no justifiable reason.

A PERSONAL BEGINNING

My view of the larger world was opened in 1945 when my maiden aunts Agnes and Ruth took me to the victory parade for the defeat of Germany and Japan on New York’s Fifth Ave.  It was a time of wonder as the cheering New Yorkers viewed thousands of our troops marching before us and planes flying low over Manhattan skyscrapers.  It was something never to be forgotten and it  was impossible for me to ever abandon questions about what had happened in Europe and Asia and why.

SEEKING AN ORIENTATION

A few years later my family sat up late into an evening in 1952 to cheer  the election of our hero Eisenhower. Nominally he was a Republican who shortly would devote many resources to the building of the interstate highway system. That fact alone should clue us into the fact that political parties do not remain fixed. While Republicans at the time tended to oppose spending such huge sums domestically, Eisenhower was impressed with the road systems he saw in Europe during the war and brought back many to America.

With my awakening on Fifth Ave in 1945 I could never forget the essential importance of retaining a view of world events. I learned never to reduce all things to being political.  Such is a terrible mistake. We have history, we have culture, we have our nature, our personal experiences and on and on.

And now we struggle with each other about a political  focus when there is a much larger focus in which our human rights, world events  and essential changes among many other things should be our focus. The events are moment to moment but a large flexible perspective, which is essential, too often is missing.  We also need to understand that conflict may not be political but about personal aggrandizement.

COMING TOGETHER

This is a time when we may rise to the occasion and bring our political future into focus.We can make stunningly important gains or we can fall back to petty and narrow squabbling about our future.  Too often how we focus and devote ourselves has driven us into behaviors that send us into things such as tw0 world wars.

This is the nature of transformation whether it is personal, national, or worldwide. In future posts I will be addressing components of both sides of  the process of transformation.  Events in my past have time and again led me to commit to the elements that could and did lead us into highly beneficial transformations.  The type of commitments we make that lead us into devastation require careful scrutiny.

Over the latter decades of my life I have seen a repeated theme with negative consequences and that is devotion to male power.  This older white man is concerned for the movement to emphasize empowerment of men which is especially important and may pose serious problems.

We have important challenges to face. So let’s get on our way.