More On Change: Breaking an Addiction to Playing it Small
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More on the subject of change. I think today…I’ll explain how it’s possible for us to save the world, if only we all agree to join a 12 Step Program for Addiction to Lack of Cosmic Integrity and get right with our Higher Selves. No biggee.
I’ve been a compulsive eater my whole life. And I’ve been trying to change that my whole life. Nothing has ever worked because some part of me believed I needed those behaviors to survive. I didn’t have any coping mechanisms to replace them. Finally, maybe, after 40 years I’ve hit rock bottom and can’t continue the way I always have. Finally, maybe, I’ve started to acquire some tools and insights that will help me break lifelong patterns. I’m only in the beginning stages, haven’t found my own sobriety yet, so it’s hubris to start talking about global solutions. But I’m going to do it anyway because I think much of the world is in a similar situation and frankly, we’re running out of time.
Many of us privileged first worlders have known we were doing bad things to the environment and to other people for a long time. But we’ve been addicted to those behaviors, unable to change because we can’t even guess at alternate ways of doing things. And it’s even harder because the culture around us is also addicted to these behaviors. Alternative behaviors were inconceivable...until the pandemic hit. What we have seen, at the very least, is that different behaviors and patterns are possible. Obviously staying in our houses all the time is not a reasonable answer but we now know that we are capable of huge, drastic action. On a global scale. If we could do that, we can do something else. So lets do it. Let’s break our addictions to comfort and familiarity and unhealthy coping mechanisms and decide to try for something else, something healthier, something bigger.
Not an addict you say? Prove it.
At this stage in my recovery I don’t yet know what that healthier existence will look like, all I can do is trust that it exists and rely on others to help me get there. That’s what we have to do for each other, as global citizens for change. Believe that we are capable of something else, something more balanced, and keep supporting each other in our effort to get there.
We don’t all need to be doctors and tech geniuses--though those folx can be major assets. We do all need to claim our discomforts, our fears, AND our hopes and dreams. Do your dreams really require the oppression of the environment and other people? What makes you not take action? What makes you afraid? You don’t have to become someone else, you just have to totally inhabit who you are without shame, with full acceptance and compassion. That’s the Higher Selves part of things. Total self-acceptance is a tall order, but Higher Selves can handle it. When you stop resisting your humanness, you can let go of whatever crutch or addiction is holding you up. Then you will have more energy for making the changes that the world is demanding of us. And you won’t have to think of these changes as an imposition but rather a truth that your soul has been crying out for for a long time.
We might not save the world. In fact, we won’t save the world. At least, not the world as we know it. This fight is not for the comfort and shortsightedness we’ve been living with for too long. This fight is for our souls and spirits and the wisdom of a planet and the rightness of a universe that claims us all. If we can get with that, victory is ours.
I think. Maybe. I’m not sure. This is stressful and my nervous system is new to stepping up instead of hiding. There will still be days of eating in front of the TV as a solution to everything. But maybe if you do this with me? If we take this leap of bravery and strive to be our highest selves together, it won’t be so daunting?