Chapter 1    The Nature of the Whole

My wife and I drive into the parking lot.  The lot is full of potholes, so it’s a bumpy end to our trip.  I am in a bad mood – didn’t sleep well last night, and then had to spend time this morning (a Saturday morning) doing paperwork. 

Once parked, we exit the car and walk to a spot along the top of the cliff overlooking the ocean.  I sit down on the edge of the trail and gaze out at the sea. I feel the ocean wind on my face – cool, moist, constant.  The breeze feels like it has always been there – a monument to timelessness.  I zip up my jacket and feel the comforting warmth of my own body.  The sky is grey, but I can see for miles to where the ocean meets the horizon.  The sky seems to touch the water.  I place my hands on the ground and feel the coarse texture of the sand - its grittiness is crude and primal.  I scoop some up and let the wind blow it out of my hand – it disappears into nothingness.  I look around.  Nearby my wife is taking a photo of a wild iris flower – the top of the bluff is splashed with them, making patches of vibrantly alive blue.  I look further and see people walking on the trails.  They seem to be relaxed and content, talking and laughing with each other.  I begin to lose touch with my bad mood.  Maybe it is actually okay to be here?

I can be having a rough day - worried by the stressors of a professional life or my life as a father, husband or community member - but when I arrive at the beach (or a forest, or a meadow of wildflowers, or a winding trail through a rolling hillside) something changes.  Usually before long my concerns, worries, and stresses begin to become unimportant.  Instead, I find myself in a state of being, taking in what nature has to offer, and being in the presence of others.  I leave the stress and ultimate emptiness of my life behind and I am in intimate contact with the miracle of the planet.  I begin to feel Whole.

You and I are made of earth.  Literally.  The elements of the earth have combined to create a miracle:  Us.  Even though we live in modern culture and are separated from these elements – in cities, human-made dwellings, in automobiles, shopping in grocery stores for food, connecting with technology, etc. – when we remember and experience that we are made of earth, we begin to become capable of experiencing Wholeness.

How do you know when you feel Whole?  Simple:  Nothing feels like it is missing in your being.  You are not in a state of desire, avoidance, striving, ambition, or need.  You simply are. 

Something is Missing

So – if you’re connected with the earth, with other people, and you live in a constant state of calm, serenity and groundedness, then you’re whole, right?  Problem solved!  Go join a monastery or live in a commune.  Meditate for four hours a day.  Recite mantras until you’re blue in the face, and everything will be great!    

Whoa - hold up.  Let’s get Nellie back into the barn.  We all evolved in a state of wholeness when we were still in contact with the natural world and in healthy contact with each other.  Before the invention of industry, commerce, modern social norms and culture, wholeness was not only possible, it was the norm.  Your physical body (including your brain) evolved to be in contact with nature and with others.  The problem, of course, is that like all of us, you literally no longer live in contact with the natural world - there is now a mismatch between how you evolved and how you now live.  The result is that you no longer have the experience of being “Whole”.  Something is missing.  This is a great source of suffering for all of us, and we have yet to reconcile with it.  As will be discussed later, our non-conscious and delusional attempts to fill in the missing experience can be directly linked to the abuse of the planet, of each other, and to the creation of Climate Change.

Levels of Consciousness

As we explore the idea of Wholeness, it is important to understand that it is not an “all or nothing” proposition.  People live in different levels of wholeness, based on their own levels of consciousness. 

In her brilliant book World as Lover, World as Self, Joanna Macy1 describes four levels of human consciousness:  World as Battlefield, World as Trap (or Prison), World as Lover, and World as Self.  Each is described. 

If I live in World as Battlefield consciousness, I see myself as being at war.  I am aligned with the Forces of Good (or God, as the case may be), fighting against the forces of Evil.  The war must be won at any cost.   Whether I am fighting against one other person, another group, or I am part of an army fighting against a whole nation, all that matters is fighting and winning the war.  The earth itself is nothing but a battlefield and is expendable.  My very soul is at stake.  Nothing else matters.  Scorched earth.  An example:  During the Vietnam War a US Army officer was quoted in the news as saying, “It became necessary to destroy the town to save it.” while referring to the bombing of Ben Tre2.

In contrast, if I live in World as Trap or Prison consciousness, I don’t necessarily feel the need to be in conflict.  Rather, I see my life as an endless experience of pain and suffering.  There doesn’t seem to be any point to being alive.  The only reason to stay on the planet is that I have been told that if I live a life of moral goodness (my pastor, rabbi, priest, imam, etc. tells me what that means) then I get to spend an eternity in heaven afterwards.  Ok then - stick it out, be good, and then my suffering will be rewarded with eternal bliss.  I get the reward of the afterlife if I have suffered righteously and earned it.  Meanwhile, the earth and those who inhabit it are seen by me as a prison of suffering.

At Joanna Macy’s next level of consciousness, World as Lover,  I fall in love with the planet and its life forms.  I have now crossed the threshold from disregarding (or demonizing) the planet and those who live on it into appreciating and loving the experience of my life.  I still see myself  as separate and distinct, but I want to experience and taste all that I can while I am here.  Life is to be savored and enjoyed.  My purpose in life is to gain experience, wisdom, connection with others, and love.

Finally, at  World as Self consciousness, I no longer see myself as a separate being from the earth and others.  I realize that the ultimate truth is that there is no “I”.  The being that inhabits this body is, in truth, an integrated, inseparable part of a much greater whole.  I am of the earth.  The earth created me. I am of the human community. As Joanna Macy put it, “We are the world knowing itself.  We can relinquish our isolation.  We can come home again to a world that can appear to us now both as self and as lover.” 

After reading about Joanna Macy’s four levels of consciousness, it should be clear that something is missing.  How do you go from the suffering of World as Prison to the joy of World as Lover?  Do you just wake up one day having made the transition?  There needs to be something in-between – an additional level which describes directly what is happening related to Climate Change and our current experience as humans on the planet.  Let’s call it World as Possession or Resource.  Living my life at this level I have little or no regard for the earth, seeing it only as a collection of raw material for food, fuel, manufacturing, and weapons.   I am solely focused on exploiting the planet and others to satisfy my lust for wealth, satiation of my desires, and control over others.  I don’t see the earth as a living being.  I don’t feel like I am part of the earth or of humanity.  I am non-conscious of my effect on the planet, resulting in my participating in the destruction of the environment. 

World as Possession/Resource consciousness is prevalent everywhere in human culture, and is the major source of global warming, indeed the major source of our suffering as human beings.  This view of the world and of our place on it takes us away from Wholeness, as we mindlessly use the resources of the planet to delusionally (indeed, psychotically) fill the Hole left by not being Wholly connected to the earth.  More on why we behave this way later.

The Experience of Wholeness Awaits

There is nothing you or I need to do to create an experience of Wholeness.  The earth is here, literally just outside our doors.  As Joanna Macy put it, “though we may feel very far from where we want to be, there is no place to get to; for we are already there”.  What keeps us from the experience of Wholeness has little to do with lack of access or non-availability.  We simply need to remove inner barriers to accessing this experience.  Sections IV and V address how to make access to Wholeness possible in a durable way, which in turn will result in us living in harmony with the planet.