What is
needed for dramatic change
is an accumulation of acts…We know that it
does not take everyone on Earth to bring justice and
peace, but only a small, determined group
who will not give up during
the first, second, or
hundredth
gale.
Clarissa Pinkola Estes
True
understanding in
a person has two attributes:
awareness and action. Together they
form a natural tai chi. Who can enjoy
enlightenment and remain
indifferent to suffering
in the world?
This is not
in keeping with the Way.
Only those who increase their service
along with their understanding
can be called men and
women of Tao.
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Utopians
are often especially
sensitive to the evils of the world
and, craving certainty, purity, and completeness,
firmly reject the evils as totally as possible, wishing to avoid
any compromises with them. Instead, utopians assert an
alternative vision of the world which they would like
to come into being. Their visionary belief may be
labeled “religious” or “political”—
it matters little for this
discussion.
They await
a “new world” which is
to come into being by an act of God,
a change in the human spirit, by autonomous
changes in economic conditions, or by a deep spontaneous
social upheaval—all beyond deliberate human control. These
believers are primarily concerned with espousing the “true”
understanding of the evil and the principles by which
people should live, gaining converts, living with the
least possible compromise until the great change
arrives. They may deliberately seek to establish
ways of living and communities which
exemplify their principles and which
may inspire others to do
likewise.93
The most
serious weakness of
this response to the problem
of this world is not the broad vision,
or the commitment of the people who believe
in it. The weakness is that these believers have
no effective way to reach the society of their dreams.
Condemnation of social evil, espousal of an alternative
order of life, a deep personal commitment, and an effort
to live according to it, are all good and necessary, but
unfortunately alone they do not transform human
society and institutions. To do that, an instrumen-
tally effective program of achievable steps for
dealing with the evils of existing society
and for creating an improved
social order is
required.94
As
my sufferings
mounted I soon realized that
there were two ways in which I could respond
to my situation—either to react with bitterness or seek
to transform the suffering into a creative force.
I decided to follow the latter course…
Human salvation lies in the
hands of the creatively
maladjusted.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
In the dark times
Will there also be singing?
Yes, there will be singing.
About the dark times.
—Bertolt Brecht
There will be prayer, too,
but to a different god,
and dread will lurk
in the songs we sing.
Doom in the timpani
no matter what the tune,
the tune a variation
on the theme of doom.
We will sing in the dark
and try to forgive
and try not to dwell
on the lives we lived.
The music we play
will be a funeral song,
the poetry we speak,
that ancient tool
we used to believe
was the vital spark,
or if not the spark,
will be the match we strike
again and again
in the darkest dark.