This article is being passed around in my little circle here at micro.blog. Absolutely worth reading. All of the vigor, these days, seems to be outside the mainstream (i.e., universities, legacy media, Democrats). Rachel and I were watching some videos of Dr Zach Bush this morning. He (and other “alternative health” folks) are clearly out of the mainstream. Yet his vision is so compelling.

I don’t know what to make of his claims (or those of Thomas Cowan) that fall outside the mainstream. Maybe they’re wrong in important ways. But, as I said to Rachel, I’ll take being wrong in details but right directionally. What does mainstream medicine offer us? Depressed and lonely? Take this pill. Sick? Take this other pill. The two pills causing new problems? Here are more pills to handle that.

I’m too dispositionally cautious to go very far into the deep end. But the Recognized Authorities are less compelling every day.

One of the most clarifying things Charles Eisenstein says is (paraphrasing):

If you were placed within the totality of another’s circumstances, you would behave in the same way they do.

That is, if you had the right mix of childhood trauma, economic deprivation, lack of exposure to a wider world, etc., you’d be a racist too. Given the right mix of circumstances, you’d also abuse children. To deny this is to live within the illusion of moral superiority.

This doesn’t mean bad behavior is excused. It does mean, however, that the right response to the temptation of moral superiority is to reply “there but for the grace of God go I.”

There seems to be an epidemic of anger, and it’s been this way for a while now.

I made a traffic mistake today, took my turn too early at a four way stop. My mistake, no big deal, no near miss. But the guy immediately laid on his horn and flipped me off, and not briefly.

One of my neighbors plowed the snow off the alley and the next time I saw him I thanked him. He told me another neighbor came out while he was doing it and started griping at him because as the snow was being moved, it blocked a part of his driveway. The first guy offered to fix it but second guy snapped “I don’t need your help.”

We’ve had some unpleasantness on micro.blog this week. I stumbled across it and was shocked at the heatedness of the accusations. Everything cranked to eleven. Accusations of bigotry and fascism. It was a lot to take in, given the normally placid nature of the micro.blog timeline. In my dismay at the fury, I called someone’s response “unhinged.” That was not a helpful word to use. Nevertheless, all this anger is deeply disturbing.

For years now, our politics have operated in the register of anger, and now more than ever. Anger is one of the primary languages of social media (the other being sarcasm). Based on the behavior I’ve seen over the past few years, it would seem that people walk around just at the boiling point. How else would they explode so quickly when something goes wrong?

What is it like to live with such rage all the time? No wonder there is so much addiction!

When the guy disproportionately reacted to my traffic mistake today, I waved back at him through the back window–with all five fingers. I tried to pack a spirit of contrition into the gesture. He must have caught it, because he backed off.

When I saw angry neighbor shoveling snow shortly after he griped at helpful neighbor, I asked him if I could help. I’d been making an effort to be friendly with him since last summer. He’s a prickly old guy, but I found out he’s had back surgeries. My dad had back surgeries; I know how that kind of pain and discomfort can affect a person. Angry neighbor appreciated the offer and we talked a bit about how heavy this snowfall was.

Heaven knows I’m not holding myself out as an example for anyone. I’ve waved back at other drivers with a single finger, plenty of times. In fact, all of my worst outbursts of anger happen behind the wheel; I don’t know what that tells us about driving, but surely it means something.

What I’m saying is that there is an epidemic of anger and we must take care not to catch it. That will require some practical steps to avoid anger triggers. It will require some self-examination and–dare I use such an abused term?–shadow work. What causes anger to rise most quickly in you? Could it be a violent reaction against something you have repressed in yourself? Are you acting out of some unacknowledged trauma? The source of the red hot, fast rising rage I’m talking about is never really its object.

The epidemic of anger will burn the world down around us. It will start wars, foreign and domestic. In 1954, some students asked Jung if nuclear war could be avoided. He replied:

I think it depends on how many people can stand the tension of the opposites in themselves.

That is, it will depend on our recognition of the messy strangeness within each of us, patiently sitting with the tension that runs straight through our souls. Or, alternately, we can join the anger party and impose our pain on everyone else. Your choice.

For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? (Matthew 16:26)

There is nothing more urgent than the preservation of your own soul—not from the fires of hell but from destructive forces here and now. There are powers at large today seeking to rip love from your heart and replace it with fear and hate. In the name of all that is beautiful and holy, you must not allow it.

The powers of destruction are using your politics to get to you. They don’t care about your opinions; your opinions are tools the powers will use to corrupt you. Do you feel that will to dominate, defeat, demean that other, with whom you disagree? The degree to which you feel that is the degree to which the agents of destruction have gained power over your soul. You should be alarmed.

How you play is what you win. (Ursula Le Guin)

If you win through violence, what you have won is violence. What is won by violence must be kept through violence. However noble your intentions, the territory you win through violence will be ruined, dead, sown with salt.

This is a plea for you to resist, not politicians (the poor fools), but the demons running freely through a population, jerking people around like marionettes.

What if the way we respond to the crisis is part of the crisis? (Bayo Akomolafe)

You’re playing a game rigged by the powers of destruction; you can’t win. They have captured your mind and they’re dosing it with fear and anger. The angrier you get, the more you play the domination game, the more you buy into the myth of separation—the more lost you are.

Listen to that still, small voice that you can only detect when you’ve quieted yourself. That voice will call you to nobler, humbler action. That is the voice the powers of destruction need you to ignore. You will feel the echoes of that voice when you look into that formerly hated other’s eyes with compassion. How they react when you attempt that connection is not your business. The only soul you can save is your own.