Seven Keys to Overcoming the Crisis and Not Dying in the Attempt - 01

Disappointed Expectations: Human and Values Crisis

In the collective unconscious, there is uncertainty about an imminent social collapse, aggravated by mistrust and powerlessness in the face of the ruling classes and the lack of authentic leaders. On the other hand, our positivist and materialistic education generated expectations of an advanced social order and continuous and progressive prosperity. However, we see that these expectations were not based on reality, but rather that there are economic, social, and ecological cycles whose laws we do not know, and which suddenly appear, dismantling the social and economic system in a matter of days and causing a humanitarian and values crisis with profound and long-lasting repercussions, especially for “Western” psychology, which is now universal.

The West has not only lost the direction of its leaders, but has also called into question its own identity (often at the hands of those same pseudo-political leaders). It has sown the seeds of discord and erosion in the very foundations of its educational systems and, through the mass media, in public opinion itself. All social and cultural values have been called into question with the acquiescence of the powerful and politicians of all kinds.

And if there are no authentic leaders, there are no followers either, but rather an amorphous mass that does not know what to expect. We do not know whether African drum music is better than Mozart, or whether monogamous marriage, an expression of a long coexistence between Western religions, the result of millennia of jurisprudence and social experience, etc., is better, or whether we should let other cultures impose their polygamous customs in the name of supposed tolerance, even if this leads to the loss of women's rights. We no longer know whether religious freedom means allowing someone to cook a crucifix on a television program or to caricature of prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). We do not know whether Michelangelo's Pietà should be valued at the same level as the €124,000 cost of each can of fresh feces by the artist Piero Manzoni. We no longer know whether life is sacred or not, while the secret cloning of human beings continues at the same time as the belief that artificial intelligence will give way to the humanity (?) of the future is promoted by all means.

The confusion is total. This is the cause of the crisis of values, relativism, not knowing which way to turn, since everything has been called into question.

To this systematic destruction of the fundamental pillars has been added, consciously or unconsciously, a scientific-materialistic projection of the future: that of a brave new world, organized solely by science, which will be able to respond to all our material needs. What does it matter to know what is good or bad, moral or immoral, if you will have everything at your fingertips anyway, live protected, and all your appetites will be satisfied? However, the opposite has happened: not only is there moral insecurity, but also economic insecurity; what was promised has not been fulfilled.

Suspicion begins to spread, and epidemic diseases of almost biblical proportions announce that something is not right. No one trusts what society and its leaders can offer them anymore. The collective unconscious reflects this vision through literary and cinematic creations that present us with a world in a catastrophic state where survival is the only law.

Many utopias have been attempted over the last two centuries. Many kinds of utopian “isms,” prefabricated in offices by intellectuals with no real experience, have been born with the pretension of bringing solutions, yet they have only generated centuries of conflict and more bloodshed than ever in the 20th and 21st centuries.

Social revolution has not worked, among other things because there were no authentic human leaders, at most crude revolutionary chiefs, or leaders without conscience, sometimes murderers, who took power, and other times interest groups that managed to apply their own formulas.

From which dark office will they devise the new savior model? Who will carry it out? People imbued with wisdom and heroism, or rather people eager to be part of “the caste”?

All we have left is the human revolution, that is, the internal revolution that focuses on the very basis of the problem, on the human beings who make up the social fabric. We need a New Man, with a different outlook, capable of seeing within himself and capable of realizing universal humanistic ideals.

That Human Revolution can only have as its principles Fraternity, Knowledge, and the Development of Human Potentials, based on a deep respect for all people, of all races, regardless of country or gender; it is enough to be human.

We propose Seven Keys to Overcoming the Crisis, which we will develop in successive articles.

Key 1: Change Your Perspective

Key 2: What Depends on You?

Key 3: Capacity for Resurrection

Key 4: Don't Waste Time or Energy

Key 5: Seek Perfection

Key 6: Seek Immortal Values

Key 7: Seek Your Place in Time

“Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country” (John F. Kennedy)

To this I add “and for yourself, for your deepest Self”