My Vision of a Better World

May 16, 2005 at 12:01 am | In the Commons, meaning in life, humanize, personal work |

The World We Want asks:

  • What is your vision of a better world?
  • What are the conditions needed to realize it?
  • What are the obstacles?
  • Based on your experience, what parts of the vision are realistic and what ideas, strategies and plans can make it so?

These are all questions about what it means to humanize the earth (the way I interpret “better world” in my life). A better world is one where the human being is the central value, more important than money, more important than power, more important than violence and more important than religion or any other institution.

This is a world where each human being has an identical opportunity to pursue a true meaning in life, a world where people are able to overcome their fear and actually connect with the best in themselves and thus are able to see and celebrate the best in each other.

The most important obstacles for me are the internal ones, my fear of failure, my fear of appearing foolish, my inability to articulate the deep meaning that I touch on every once in a while, my inability to touch on that deep meaning more than for a fleeting moment, my lack of connection with myself, etc. Of course there are also external obstacles as well, such as the American Dream, that tells people that if they’re unhappy it’s their own fault for not working harder, even when they’re working harder. This prevents people from working together as much as they might otherwise. There are lots of other external resistances as well, but the internal ones are the ones I can do something about.

Realistic? Well, none of it is actually realistic, but that doesn’t make it any less necessary, or in fact mandatory, for me to keep working in this direction. It’s my meaning in life, after all. How to go about it? Well, it’s about this blog, it’s about connecting with the people I live with and the people I meet, it’s about continuing to invite people to my weekly meeting on Thursdays at my house and a periodic conference call for those not able to meet in person, it’s about intentionality.

I invite you to intentionalize your own vision of a better world, especially what you can do today. And tomorrow.

Other responses: Scratchings | bmoPHAT | Gerry | Tom Matrullo | Tracy Gary | Martin Kearns | The Happy Tutor | Juke Moran

8 Comments

  1. Ted, I concluded my entry with the same thought about what part of my vision is realistic: none of it. I suspect Phil chose that word with great care and anticipated our responses.

    Comment by Harry — May 16, 2005 #

  2. He’s a shrewd character, that Phil. :-)

    (For reference, I’m linking to Harry’s response as an edit in the main post.)

    Comment by ted — May 16, 2005 #

  3. Beautifully expressed and very moving. I’ll link to it. Thanks. What would happen if we thought bigger? Let’s say that you had a small budget, what would you do with it to get a disproportionate cascade of positive effects?

    Comment by Tutor — May 16, 2005 #

  4. My first reaction is that money won’t help, but let me think on this some more and see what I can come up with.

    By the way, did I mention that my plan for personal and social transformation has been taken up by over 1.3 million people around the world? It’s not just me, so one might say the cascading uplift is already happening.

    Comment by ted — May 17, 2005 #

  5. […] Here are my original answers. My intention is to answer again. In the meantime, what are your answers? […]

    Pingback by Humanize the Earth! » The World We Want — September 2, 2005 #

  6. Wow so much that is important to think about because people put up so many walls that keep
    them from really looking outward. All we can really take with us from this earth is our connection to one another. A better world would be people that are open and allow others to be who they really are. I have two kids and my husband and I have tried so hard to let them be exactly who they are and not put demands on them to be what they think we want…to love them for all of their uniqueness. My daughter could not be any more opposite of me. But she has brought a whole new prospective to my life.
    Every person is a gift and we desperately need each other if we are to survive at all.

    Comment by heatherpoet — October 27, 2005 #

  7. Heatherpoet, thanks for sharing your poetry here. You’re definitely a gift to your family and to this site as well. Thanks much!

    Comment by ted — October 27, 2005 #

  8. […] Last year, I answered some questions about the World We Want with My Vision of a Better World The conversation has continued and I recommend that you read Open Letter to H. Peter Karoff part of which says: A little money goes a very long way when people are hungry for democracy. Just open a crack, give them an excuse, and don’t make it too fancy, or formal or stilted. The recommendation is for a series of 75 local community meetings held in Open Space around the theme “The World We Want” tied to the release of Karoff’s book.  Good stuff. […]

    Pingback by Humanize the Earth! » Blog Archive » The World We Want — May 28, 2006 #

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.

Powered by WordPress with Pool theme design by Borja Fernandez.
Entries and comments feeds. Valid XHTML and CSS. ^Top^