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What it means to be an American Spiritual Integrity The idea economy is based on wisdom
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![]() The think tank for the 21st century Spiritual Integrity - success or failure
"All of the problems we have with law and order on this continent come out of a fundamental error in thinking that originated in the Greek civilisation. Rome tried to correct that problem and then got bogged-down in the challenges of the administration. Now, what is it? What I believe - it is the human spirit, the evolutionary developmental imperatives of the human spirit to advance its cause - its intuitive cause of justice. I think it is a fundamental intuitive essence, it is a non-verbal essence, it goes back to intuitive wisdom. I believe, that this intuitive sense of pursuing justice, has been frustrated by the imperfection of the logical application. We have an intuitive sense of what is right and wrong. Nature has given us this capacity. The way we have developed - we seem to have an inherent ability to intuitively sense what is right and wrong. Somehow this inherent sense has been frustrated. What do I mean? - I mean that, when Socrates talked to his elite - what were they doing back then in Greece? - In Greece they were economically quite advanced. They decided to get philosophers and teachers together and consider the viability of their civilisation and consider the means and purposes in theory. Asking: 'Where do we want to go?' -So the great thinkers said: 'Wait a minute, in order to make the right decisions, we have to base our understanding on the fundamental facts of the case.' This is what our criminal justice system and our civil justice systems have been attempting to optimise since the organisation of human society - still to this day. It is to base the case on the facts, the presentation of the facts, the consideration of the facts. When Socrates said: 'Wait a minute, I think we are not taking everything into consideration. There seems to be something missing. I think, we are not telling the truth about something.' - And there was this sense of embarassement, because what Socrates was saying was to the effect to the establishment, that perhaps the king is not wearing any clothes and he should buy himself some. He should put some on and they felt embarassed. Already in Greece saving face was a national passe-time, more important than truth. What did I tell you about these cultural differences between the Asian psyche, the Eastern psyche and the Western civilisation? Whether we like it or not, Western civilisation, also through the Christian religious effect, was on a mission to seek the truth. The scientific community is curious about the facts of scientific principles. They are curious about the facts underlying the truth of what we call reality - the natural world. They are going out there to find out, how things really work. They are not there to make themselves important with some theories that don't work. They are in a continuous process of renewal and rediscovery of how things work. What is it, that drives Western civilisation and what has driven the Western mind? - It is this uncomfortable trade-off between the necessity to know the truth and the political correctness of permitting the truth to be known. It is this imperfect balancing act between the political structures which need to maintain their stuctural integrity and the civilisation's need for the elixir of their existence which is Truth. Now, others civilisations, the Asians.... they are not so hung up on truth. For them - they have a much more pragmatic approach, a functional approach. For them, the Asians, they want to save face, the Arabs, they want to save their face. So, their modus operandi is much more concerned.... the Chinese are more interested in the smooth operation of the society. They come from 1000-s of years of authoritarian empire, the ruling family would create the dictates, so that it functions. The smooth operation of state was more important to them. .....The thing that puts tremendous pressure on the Western mind is the fundamental intent to seek and know the facts underlying the case. Q: Why is that? A: I think it is their spiritual integrity. I think that Western civilisation has a very high level of spiritual integrity. I think, they underestimate the level of spiritual integrity. I happen to believe that the spiritual integrity of their civilisation, of their peoples are very high ordered but that their mental and intellectual capabilities, the intellectual ressources, the logical ressources at their disposal, are inferior to the task of meeting their spiritual aspirations. And I believe that this failure between the practical applications of logic and their spiritual superiority is why we have these disparities and this confusion. And I believe that, because of the failed implementation of logical systems - what we call law and order - leads some people, in a cynical way, to come to the conlusion that practically it is impossible to administer modern society in alignment with their spiritual principles. That's why there is a sense of disappointment and resignation. And I believe that the period of the post-WWII was a period of drama over the failure from the WWI, WWII and earlier... the failure was in civilisation to find the working model that would assist them in implementing their true spiritual imperatives, their true spiritual ideals. That has done much more damage to the soul - the collective soul of the society - than we have officially admitted. When we consider individuals like Michel Friedman who was the representative of the German Jewish community in Europe, his life-story and his factual work, his interest in law - I mean, he is a very interesting man - but his interest in law was this drive of finding the solution of the incongruency between what spiritually he senses - intuitively he senses - is the intent of our German / European civilisation and the factual failure of it. This incongruency between the holocaust and the need or desire for just civilisation. And I feel that, whether we are aware of it or not, we are very close to the answer. If we just can stop being cynical for a moment and look at the past and learn from it. What is there to learn out of all that pain and stupidity? When one talks about it in a responsible way, one comes to the conclusion, that we were not very truthful with ourselves. All of the failures, were failures in admitting the truth. We did not admit the truth about Hitler, we did not admit the truth about Stalin, we did not admit the truth about all the other types of political organisations, the party systems, the opportunism, the political necessities to get the job done... all these different things, certain social problems, that we don't discuss openly. It is this inability to openly admit the underlying issues in a social context, that leads always to a kind of pragmatic victimisation-system. It is not surprising to me that Michel Friedman was doing his television-interviews (with) major politicians challenging them to speak the truth about something, to speak out, to consider the congruency or incongruency of their thought - processes. I think that, what he was doing was very responsible and very respectful of - what we call - the democratic process and social necessity. He was acting out of an inner conviction, that he didn't want it to happen ever again - the stupidity of the past. And by not openly communicating the truth about whatever, we were feeding into a cycle of violence. Whether we want to admit it to ourselves or not. When we run away from the truth, we are setting ourselves up for another embarassing failure. The truth is not as painful as we think at first. It sets us free. When one can fundamentally just tell the truth and maintain one's dignity as a politician, as a human being, as a functional political member of the society, it heals the society. It creates a sense of unity and responsibility. If we do not openly talk about the truth, we create a situation of us and them. And we don't know who us and who them are, but there is always this sense of this us and them. Transparency, open communication, rational logic move people to a point of responsibility. They have to take responsibility for their thought processes, they cannot just sit there thinking wrong things. You see what happened in East Germany! Why did East Germany fail as an economic, social, political paradigm? I believe, that the problem in East Germany was not communism. It was not socialism, it was not the Soviet system. I believe that what happened in East Germany was more severe than anywhere else in the Soviet Union. East Germany had the disadvantage of being an authoritarian Germanic system, caught up in a socialist nightmare and they couldn't tell the truth. The political structure could not openly talk with its people. They would still be effectively dealing with the problems today and their society would function economically, if they could have developed a paradigm of communication amongst their people. So that they could adapt, so that they could do the necessary work of governance. I feel, that the same mistakes that the East Germans made during the Stasi regime have been inherited with the current German regime. The same mechanisms of denial, the same mechanisms of supression, the same mechanisms of avoidance of talking about the important issues is leading them into the same kind of stagnation and irreversible problems that the other regime had. It is an amazing thing. If somebody would have told me that, ten years ago, that that is going to happen, I would have said - no way - there was too much democratisation through the support of the Americans. No, what I get is, that they cannot. It is something inside the German psyche which finds it painful to openly communicate. I think, that this is the fundamental flaw. I don't even think, that they are evil. I think, that the evil that results out of their systems is just - because it is somehow painful to them to communicate- it is not even intended to be evil. Evil is the side-effect of their embarassement in their inability to communicate. It seems absurd, but it is as simple as speaking simple words and not being caught up in recrimination. There are people who believe things and they are justified in believing those things. But the things that they believe are not fully accurate. ...what happened in Austria 1934 was a cumulative problem of talking it through. It was senseless to start shooting around and pretending to revolt. What were they hoping to accomplish? It was an infantile reaction of saying, they want to be heard. They felt, that they were not being heard. They had no voice. They felt, that they had no other choice. Why do people have to reach for such extreme measures, when they can pick up the phone and call their political representative and tell him what they think?! Or they have a town hall meeting....I think that this is the crisis on the continent, particularily in the Germanic society It is a crisis in communication. When people have difficulty communicating, it is important to identify what kind of 'Nachhilfe' (support) they need in communication. 99% of the communication's failure comes from people's past experiences which lead to these expectations, that it was unpleasureable, unfullfilling. So one can either throw up one's hands and say, everybody is nuts, is insane, and say, it is no point anyway. Or one can say, okay there are problems, but let's identify the opportunities and go after the opportunities. The opportunities in communication are much greater than situations that are problematic. This is statistically true of humankind. We got ourselves into a bit of a bind as human beings - as a society - because we are violating effective principles of communication to the point where people don't believe in communication any more as a viable thing. So we have to re-invent or re-discover effective communication skills. That's all it is. That is actually the only problem here. This is the same challenge that America is going through, this is the challenge that every Western civilisation - Great Britain - is going through. They are trying to rediscover their greatness. It is a problem of all of the countries to find out what is that essential magical formula - the silver bullet. It is communication. It is effective, accurate, consistent communication. This communication is then the basis of effective administration of law and order. And that is then the missing part of the spiritual imperative, I have talked about, which has high ideals. Western civilisation has very high spiritual ideals, very high. The failure to develop the sophisticated logical infrastructure to attain those ideals is where this emotional energy - what we call frustration - this emotional energy results from, where people don't know what to do....When you pick up the phone and you call a store: You say - do you have something... and they say. Yes...How much is it? They say the price. And you say: Are you open late...and say yes and you- I am coming...You go there and you buy it..... The satisfaction of asking the question, getting the answer, asking for the product, getting it at the right price...This is effective human, social, economic policy being implemented when things are working. So when systems, organisations, people are implementing systems where one cannot get through to them: These are intentional constructs to break down the fabric of Western civilisation for some short term benefit. Q: Why wouldn't a minister answer an e-mail? A: The typical answer is this: There are too many emails and I cannot answer them all. And then one says: We are paying enough tax-money to run 10 times the government we have.... but this featherbedding of pumping people's pensions and pumping people's benefits - so that they don't have to work. That means we are putting so much money into people‚s featherbedding - their future economic enjoyment, that the money they are getting paid today to do the services - ...there no services. What I am saying to you is that the modern corporation, the modern government has learned that the citizen will accept in practical terms a zero effectivity rate in the service. That means, you will not get the service you are paying for. So what normally happens in a healthy market system, is that the customer no longer frequents the store and it goes bankrupt. Somebody else goes into that mission and provides the services and this time provides the service for the money. Because these things are artificially constructed, everything you see - the ORF, TV - radio all are artificially funded, they are not competing, so you have featherbedding and you have mafia style agreements. You have a non viable economy - nobody asks questions. The journalists don't ask questions, because they are being paid not to ask questions. That's why people are frustrated because they know, that they are living in a corrupt, highly criminal structure which is feeding on itself to a degree that makes it impossible. You have kind of a stagnation. Nobody can pick up the phone, nobody can write an email, nobody can expect an answer because it is politically incorrect to do something! The inability to communicate, because of this psychotic belief in this false god, the golden calf - political correctness - which isn't even real - it is just a false belief! The people who are making decisions, are making them in a knowledge vacuum, because they cannot get communication to them. People in a smoke filled room sitting there, thinking their stupid thoughts - completely out of alignment whith what is happening in the world. You can't manage a 'Kuhstall' like that and you can't manage a country like that. So this is the reason why the European paradigm is a failed paradigm. ....there is no transparency, there is no communication, there is no viability! ......That's why people aren't doing business, because nobody in the right mind is going to do business with people who don't know what they are doing. The problem is that the psychological mindset of this society is inappropriate to the challenges of modern economic systems. That's as simple as that. It might have worked in the feudal system They are still running around trying to do the feudal lords. That's why they are missing it. And most probably the economic fruits of the opportunities will be going to those post-communist countries who took it up the ass really hard. They will implement the structures, because they are courageous enough to grab the opportunities with both hands. That is how evolution works even during globalisation. One has to have the courage to be able to say the truth. That's all. Pick up the phone and do business. That's all. The capacity to do what one says and says what one does. Because 90% of the opportunity is in the doing it, just doing it. That's what is missing. The enterpreneural spirit cannot function here because the political system doesn't like enterpreneural spirit , because enterpreneural spirit is relatively non-political. What's happening in Europe? To be really honest with you: People have become too fat and lazy to work. It doesn't matter what work it is. Answering a phone, answering a fax, an email, fulfilling an order. The fundamental thing is, that the people who are living in a society feel, they are too good to work. They are too important to work. Europe is a leisure society, everybody is in early retirement, they are in the state of early semi-retirement. Nobody does any real work. There are some people who are trying to make their ends meet, make payments.... there are certain people running around at the lower runs of society - meaninglessly running in circles, not doing any real work, because at the lower runs no work is possibile without a cohesive organisation. So nothing of meaning can take place here. Our society is no longer doing effective work of any kind. What we are doing is - we are coasting and everything is held together with tape, it is the pretending that work is being done. Even Germany - they say, that they are 'world-Export-Meister.' ...in reality all they are doing is repackaging the goods and services of other nations and they are sending it out with a stamp called 'Made in Germany'. It is just a marketing ploy. They are exporting it to people who are still paying a premium for the belief that it went through the German ports...So what we have - we have a lie. That goes back to my original theme: Socrates is uncomfortable, because the lie is more profitable than the truth for the people who are running the political systems. That's the same as happened back then. They said: 'It is not profitable to tell the truth. We are making more profit as a Greek establishment by lying, by violating the law, by cheating our people.' So they grouped together, they ganged together - the mafia - and they decided to poison Socrates, to keep him from being an irritant and saying the Truth. And as they did that, they destroyed their future. What is Greece? They have no dignity as a society. They gave it up then. They chose the lie and the poison and the stupidity. The myth, of what they could have been, is not enough as a crutch to hold them up and sustain them to face what they really are today. Everything has its price, they chose the lie and they became an embarassement. What are we doing in Europe? We want to do the same thing they did: We want to choose the lie about the European Union, about the book keeping and psychotically believe that nobody is going to notice. This is a major opportunity - because when a huge economic system like Europe chooses to destroy itself through a lie, then there is a niche opening up for a society which can face the truth. Transcript: May, 28th 2004 Mail This Story |
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