Evolution is as well documented as any phenomenon in science, as strongly as the earth’s revolution around the sun. - Stephen Jay Gould, paleontologist

We have an opportunity and a responsibility to correct an innocent error that began thousands of years ago in the infancy of our intelligence. We did not then understand what is truly sacred. Instead of recognizing the sacredness in life all around us, we created and worshipped mythological gods.

We created these fictional supernatural beings to explain the mysteries of life and to provide us with the courage to face life’s challenges and tragedies. Over time, we transformed fiction into fact and forfeited our power to these deities. We then wove a web of deceit to respond to every logical challenge to our own contrived stories. With the knowledge we have today, it is long past time to let go of these ancient stories and shift our emphasis to that which is clearly sacred here and now. We have everything we require on this spaceship we call Earth to create a splendid world and fulfilling lives for ourselves. To do so means to be responsible for our health, to be kind to others, and to respect our environment. That’s the simple truth.

We are a product of this tiny orb that is our world. Over billions of years, we have evolved in concert with other species of plants and animals. As a part of this whole, we are subject to the natural laws that enable everything to exist. Every physical thing we require and enjoy is derived from our world. Everything. Every breath we breathe, every drop we drink, and every bite of food is derived from our environment. Every bit of clothing, medicine, building material, and everything else is drawn from this source. This world gave birth to us and countless other species of plants and animals. Now much of life, including our own, is threatened. We are polluting and decimating life-support systems, plundering resources, and driving species to extinction.

The rate and range of global environmental deterioration is unprecedented. It is driven by the relentless needs of a global population that have grown out of control. Parasite-like and swarming, we are destroying our environment. With astonishing speed, we are attacking our ecosystems like businesses in liquidation. We have upset an extraordinary array of life that took billions of years and endless experiments to produce.

Environmental problems cross the boundaries of nation states, academic disciplines, political and cultural ideologies, and religious theologies. They affect the affluent and the impoverished, developed and developing nations, individuals and whole societies. These problems are far more than just another on a list of major concerns. This foundational relationship with the environment is at the core of our existence. Our relationships with these ecosystems are sacred. Nowhere do we find clearer and unmistakable evidence that what we do to others, we do to ourselves than in our relationship with our biosphere (Earth and its atmosphere where life exists).

There is individuality but not independence. To think differently is to delude ourselves. We are dependent upon each other at every turn. Our integrity affects the integrity of the whole.

We are each a part of a system of relationships that embrace our family, friends, neighbors, business associates, organizations, communities, nations, and family of nations. No single object or entity exists independently.

When we think only of ourselves, we invite conflict and everyone involved suffers. What we do to others, we do to ourselves. Those of us aware of this have begun altering our lives to conform to principles and virtues that nurture and sustain relationships. As we replace our destructive habits with ones that are constructive, everyone profits.

We are wrong to complain about conditions in our world and to feel that we are unable to make a difference for better or worse. We must always question ourselves. What do we do to develop our abilities and potential? Do we educate ourselves about our health and the health of our planet? Are our habits constructive? Are we healthy in mind and body? How do we treat others? Are we kind? How do we treat ourselves? Do we have the courage to honor ourselves and become the best we can be? “The tragedy in life for most of us,” noted Erich Fromm, “is that we die before we are born.” By this he meant that we die before we are born into our unique potential.

Until we have fulfilled our responsibility to develop ourselves, we cannot critique the world without acknowledging our own destructive habits. By what we know and do, we make a difference. Each of us is a change agent. Individually, we can abuse ourselves in whatever manner we choose until finally we succumb. Conversely, we can be healthy and whole. Life cannot be violated beyond a critical point before its systems begin to fail. Each of us is the person over which we have the most control and the one easiest to change. When the errors of our ways shout at us, it is absurd for us to allow them to enjoy repetition. We must recognize and correct our errors.

Many of us are ready for a belief system that actually promotes harmony. It is apparent that we live in a world where we are destructive to ourselves, each other, and the ecological systems that enable us to exist. The belief system I describe emerges from the awareness and comprehension of the oneness in which we exist and the sacredness of the relationships by which it is sustained. The unwritten Law of One informs us that all that exists is a part of and is affected by everything else that exists.

This “law” acknowledges and honors the dynamic equilibrium among all life forms. It recognizes the existence of universal principles: oneness, diversity, interrelatedness, indi­viduality, and interdependence.

Universal Principles

Oneness: All that exists is a part of and is affected by everything else that exists.

 Diversity: The whole is comprised of an infinite number of diverse parts.

 Interrelatedness: All parts are interrelated.

 Individuality: All parts are unique.

 Interdependence: All parts depend upon each other for survival.

 These principles confirm that our reality is a product of an infinite number of diverse and unique interrelated and interdependent parts. An understanding of these principles yields virtues such as reverence, universal benevolence, and sustainable industry. This understanding changes forever the way we think about and conduct our relationships with ourselves, with each other, and with our environment. It explains how we have created our problems and provides clear direction on how we can change. It’s a system that calls for individual responsibility and initiative.

Within this realm of understanding lie the treasures we are able to discover if we are wise enough to open ourselves to the possibilities of our age. These are treasures in the fullest sense. In their discovery lies the fate of humankind and many other species.

The simple truth is the way of life as it really is. It is reality, not myth or superstition. If we honor it, we prosper. If we violate it, we suffer and condemn our future to adversity. All of life is about relationships. As I have written, the foundational relationships of life are with self, with others, and with our environment. Everything else follows. We complicate life unnecessarily. We need simply to be healthy, be kind, and respect our environment.

“Be healthy, be kind, and respect our environment” is not enough for most people. They want specific instructions. Knowledgeable people have amassed a great amount of information about how to care for ourselves, relate to others, and respect our environment. This information is updated constantly. Due to the high-tech information age in which we exist, the information is widespread and available. We need only to access and incorporate it into our lives. As an introduction, let me offer the following about each of our foundational relationships.

To be continued…

Sounds simple enough, so why don’t we do it? We don’t do it because we have competing sets of survival instincts. These account for opposing worldviews and the epic struggle that goes on daily for the evolution and survival of humanity. Curiously, both these instincts are the products of evolution.

Our first set of survival instincts is perfectly normal, natural, organic, and . . . disastrous. These are our short-term survival instincts. Like all creatures, we are programmed, genetically predisposed, “hardwired,” to make it to tomorrow, i.e., to survive and reproduce. These short-term survival instincts generate behavior that is characterized by fear, greed, power, control, immediate gratification, self-centeredness, authoritarianism, denial of inequalities, and the like.

This is a set of survival instincts that can and is
destroying us.

Evolution has also given us another set of survival instincts. These occur as a result of our large and evolved brains. Unique among all species, we are able to reflect on our behavior and project to where our behavior is taking us. It’s not a pretty picture. We are like an airplane flying overhead with someone out on the wing popping rivets until the plane crashes.

We are beginning to understand that our short-term behavior for survival is destroying us. We want to survive for the long-term, not the short-term. We want to sustain humanity and advance our civilization. The word “sustainability” has come into wide usage. We understand its meaning: that we must leave this planet as we found it or improve it so those who follow us will have the same opportunities that we have had.

We are a species, perhaps the first on this planet, who has an opportunity to advance beyond short-term survival instincts.

We are beginning to understand that our behavior must be characterized not by fear, greed, power, control, immediate gratification, self-centeredness, authoritarianism, denial of inequalities, and the like. It must be characterized instead by health in all of its dimensions: physical, mental and emotional. By kindness toward each other and other nation-states. By respect for our environment, our ecological systems, and our biosphere as we inhabit a very narrow and fragile band within our solar system that enables life as we know it to exist.

These long term survival instincts and associated behavior can sustain humanity and advance our civilization.

Each of these sets of survival instincts, the older short-term ones and our emerging long-term ones, generates powerful belief systems in the areas of politics, economics, social interaction, and religion.

Our old short-term instincts generate adversarial, hostile and belligerent politics focused on the destruction of one’s perceived opposition whether that is an individual, organization or a nation-state. It is politics that favors unilateralism and pre-emptive war. Our long-term instincts and emerging worldview are about politics that are non-adversarial and seek to find the common ground. It is a worldview that recognizes that we don’t have the time, resources, or energy to squander fighting with each other, that we have severe and complicated problems on our planet (energy, environment, water shortages, disease, etc.) that must be addressed urgently in a constructive multilateral manner, and that all of our challenges are compounded by the addition of in excess of 1,500,000 people to our global population every week.

In the area of economics (business, commerce), our old way of thinking is about short-term gain. We maximize profits in the short-term and exploit people and our environment. Our emerging worldview is about long-term gain and sustainability. It’s about a “triple bottom line”: people, planet and profits. Simply put, it’s socially responsible business. It’s the understanding that life is a far more complex phenomenon than a race to see who can accumulate the most money and material possessions in the least amount of time.

In social interaction, the old worldview is about “we versus them,” exclusivity, and segregation. The emerging worldview recognizes that social interaction must, above all, be inclusive and integrated as to mirror the interconnected phenomenon and structure of life itself.

Old religious thinking positions one’s truth and tribe against others’ truths and tribes. The result is never ending conflict and chaos, the antithesis of peace. Emerging spiritual thinking focuses on kindness and universal benevolence in all relationships, and an intelligent understanding of the origins of ancient belief systems and of the phenomenon of religion.

In summary, our old worldview is characterized by separation, exclusivity, segregation, and unilateralism. Our emerging worldview is about togetherness, unity, inclusiveness, integration, and multilateralism.

Many of us are predisposed as a consequence of our genetics (”hardwired”) and/or our life experiences to think and act in our old, destructive, and unsustainable ways. This requires unlearning and evolution of thought and behavior, all of which are daunting tasks. The new way of thinking, the paradigm that seeks to, and must, emerge in our world, is one that requires learning. What is it that we must learn?

We must learn that we exist as a tiny fragment of an immensely larger interlocking whole in which all of the parts are interconnected and dependent upon each other for survival. Simply put, everything is connected to everything else. We exist not separately but in communion with all living things. Life is an interrelated interdependent phenomenon. Everything is in relationship. Everything is linked. That is the nature of life - the web of life. That is the nature of the reality in which we exist.

This reality has behavioral implications. These can be summarized in seven words, which together form three simple rules for living: Be healthy. Be kind. Respect the environment. These seven words have the power to change life as we know it: the way that we govern and the laws that we enact; the way we do business, the products that we create, the services that we offer, how we treat our employees and the manner in which we interact with our environment.

Be healthy. Be kind. Respect the environment. Leaders must model this behavior. Teachers must teach it. We must exhibit it. That is, if we wish to sustain our species and advance our civilization.

To do so requires entering into a completely new way of thinking about the reality in which we exist and its behavioral demands. Our window of opportunity to accomplish the necessary and monumental transition in thinking is small compared to the large obstacles within our current belief systems that must be dissolved. Yet, we ,must do this if we and all the life forms that share this jewel of a planet are to survive.

Be healthy. Be kind. Respect the environment. Why are these seven words so critical and powerful? Because we exist as a tiny fragment of an immensely larger interlocking whole (the operative words) in which all of the parts are interconnected and dependent upon each other for survival. We exist not separately but in communion with all living things.

This interlocking whole is the inescapable foundation that supports both the architecture of life and our civilization. If we continue to destroy the relationships (with ourselves - our health, each other, and our environment) that form the foundation of this interlocking whole, our house, our structure, and our civilization will collapse.

Conversely, if we honor these relationships, we will succeed and prosper in every way. The choice is ours. Our future lies in our own hands. As it always has. The difference today is that we understand a great deal more about what sustains and optimizes life. It is time to apply our knowledge, to honor what we know. Only then will we reverse our destructive and unsustainable momentum, end our needless suffering, prosper together, find peace, sustain humanity, and advance our civilization.