We frequently judge ideas and concepts based on looking to what was done in the past. When we look back, the past inspires us with both inspiration and cautionary tales — things we want to ‘return to’ and history we don’t want to repeat. Of course, not everyone agrees on what is worth returning to and worth repeating.
But what if conditions — at least the ones that really matter in determining our best collective future — aren’t replicable, and won’t actually come from the past? That’s a frightening thought, isn’t it – having no data for our logical analyses? What if all we have in this moment instead is what we feel and sense and imagine, not so much what we think? What if we took inspiration or caution from the past, but we have to then deliberately feel/sense/imagine/think into its resonance with an emerging future*?
This approach actually opens up the opportunity to become more personally involved in creating our reality. When we rely primarily on thinking, logic becomes a shield that we can hide behind. It’s not us, we say, it’s the data. In this new way of being and acting, we become part of the data. Our understanding would come from our personal and collective deep-rooted seeing and knowing in the world (when done skillfully… all things can be done poorly, too) — not just what we see as outside ourself.
This path is most certainly not a path of control. It’s quite scary for a psyche that’s been trained in the ways of analysis (I’m recovering from this myself). Instead, we would seek to understand — what does this moment need, letting go of my perceptions of what it “should” be, from the past? Could we have the courage to trust the present moment, to trust ourselves to guide actions into the emerging future?
*as Otto Scharmer and The Presencing Institute would call it https://www.presencing.org/