This Blog (4/18/08) was reposted by permission from the publishing company.
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There is a widespread belief that when we have children, they are ours and we have a right to bring them up as we wish.
This belief has come under the microscope with the situation in Texas in which over 400 children have been taken from their mothers by the state.
Are our children really ours to raise as we see fit? Or does the wider society have an interest in our children?
It’s clear in the current crisis that the authorities in Texas and the individuals connected with the compound have radically different views when it comes to a parent’s relationship with their child.
From the point of view of the mothers, the children belong to them. From the point of view of the state, they are America’s children.
The real issue is the right of individuals to be their own person. Not what we want to make them into as clones of ourselves, and not what anybody else wants to make them into. Simply the right to be the unique individual each is, different and unrepeatable in the history of the universe.
Paradoxically, this is the central issue not only for the children in this sad situation, but also for their mothers.
Watching a group of the mothers on Larry King Live, it’s clear that they are not their own person. Everything they say, the way they dress, and the way they act is passed through a filter given them by someone else.
Their way of being in the world is “measured,” carefully tailored to fit the expectations of the compound’s leaders.
This is because they have internalized a worldview, a belief system, that tells them this is how they should be. They now see themselves through this lens and can’t imagine any other way of seeing themselves or the world around them.
We call such a mindset, belief system, and worldview a “paradigm.”
The paradigm of being your own person is poles apart from the paradigm that says you should submit to the group’s leaders. A person who is their own person questions, weighs, considers.
If a mother isn’t her own person, she certainly can’t bring up a child to be true to itself.
But then, this isn’t just true of the people of this religious community at the compound in Texas. It’s also true of many in the wider society, and in nation after nation the world over.
Not too many on our planet are really, authentically able to be true to themselves.
To be so requires us to become conscious, awakened, aware. This is what “enlightenment” is—getting our eyes opened to what’s really happening in our lives, both inside us and all around us. We see things as they actually are.
Before awakening occurs, we each live in a certain kind of paradigm. In other words, we have a particular mindset, a belief system, and a certain worldview that governs everything we think, do, and say.
When you watch the mothers from Texas talk about missing their children, it’s clear that they all participate in the same paradigm—that their view of the world is one they have internalized, but that isn’t who they truly are. Everything about them screams that they aren’t who they truly are—that they don’t know their real self.
Again, this is no different from most of the rest of the world. Take, for instance, the counselors and therapists who will be involved in this case of the children. Among them are those who see everything through the mentality of victimology. Others see life more in terms of personal choices, personal responsibility. These are drastically different paradigms.
To illustrate what this means, suppose we have seen the world and our personal lives through a green lens filter, and now we switch filters to rose-colored. Instead of the world looking green, everything now looks the way it would through rose-colored glasses. It’s a really different take on reality.
Becoming conscious, aware, awakened requires going through a paradigm shift. It’s like exchanging green lenses for rose-colored lenses. We see everything differently after such a switch.
Science is a field in which paradigm shifts are often dramatic. For instance, for countless generations we thought the world was flat and that Earth was the center of the universe. This way of seeing the world is a particular paradigm.
Then along came Copernicus and Galileo, and we realized that the world is a globe that revolves around the sun—and in due course, we saw that the universe is vast. This switch of worldview is a paradigm shift.
The point is that, just as the women at the Texas compound exist within a particular paradigm that says polygamy is preferable, wearing long dresses and uncut hair is required, and submitting to males is essential, so are many of us who think of ourselves as free people living in paradigms that, unbeknown to us, control our lives.
The thing about a paradigm is that you don’t realize you are in it. You just think that the way you look at the world is the way it is. But it isn’t. It’s just a filter—a learned filter.
A paradigm shift gets underway when a person starts to see anomalies in their mindset and worldview. The way the world has fit together until now somehow doesn’t quite work so well any longer.
The Pope is in the United States seeking to solidify the faithful in traditional Catholic beliefs. But even as he inspires many to become more devoted to their church, at the same time many exodus the church every day. They begin to see things that don’t quite fit, and before long they don’t fit in any longer.
Many of us resist a paradigm shift in our lives because we sense it’s going to shake up our world. But divine desire pushes within us for manifestation; and as it does so, it changes how we see our lives.
Before we know it, we are leaving a church or joining a different one, leaving a job, leaving a marriage—well, changing just about everything in our lives.
Once an anomaly arises within us—once we begin to feel differently or think differently about something—there is no way to stop the paradigm shift from happening. We may resist for a time, but the divine desire will ultimately stretch us until a complete mindset and worldview shift occurs.
And when this happens, we can never see the world the same way again—and never live our lives the same way either.
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