The Denial of Reality Inherent In Primitive Ego Thinking: The Challenges That Are Coming - Part 2© Dick Rauscher - Issue #33 March 25, 2009

A Brief Summary from Part 1 of This Three Part Article
In Part 1 of this three-part article published in the previous Newsletter, I wrote about three growing challenges that we will soon be facing… global warming, our Western culture's unlimited appetite for "stuff", and the myth called unlimited economic expansion. I stated the growing and urgent need for each of us to increase our psychological intelligence through the intentional and conscious evolution of our primitive ego; the early childhood ego of our inner child. I reaffirmed my belief that maturing our individual and collective primitive ego is essential if we are to successfully prepare for the rapidly approaching, life altering, changes we see gathering on the horizon.

I pointed out how our primitive ego tends to ignore warnings, threats of danger, and impending change until they actually begin to impact us directly and personally; or, at a minimum, threaten to impact us in the "very" near future. As one writer commented recently, "it's amazing how shocked we can be when the totally expected actually arrives." We know we are running out of time to innovate and then implement the pro-active choices and life-style changes that will be needed to creatively cope with the impacts and changes that are we know are coming. I have no doubt that many of us will be "shocked" when they actually arrive.

However, if we choose to remain unconsciously trapped in primitive ego thinking, unable to creatively prepare for the real world and the life-style transformations that are certainly coming, it foreshadows a future for us that could become very uncomfortable; even traumatic; a future in which we could find ourselves powerless, reaching for ineffective, last minute, knee-jerk responses to cope with the challenges we will be facing.

I reaffirmed to readers that I do not believe we are facing the end of the world or a dooms day scenario. But I am convinced that many of the inevitable challenges that are headed our way will almost certainly have the potential to bring about significant environmental and social change. Some could easily threaten the very survival of our species. But regardless of the level of threat, I believe it is absolutely clear that virtually all of the challenges bearing down on us will have the potential to significantly impact the way we currently live our lives.

On the positive side, I am equally convinced that if we are willing to do the work of intentionally maturing our primitive ego consciousness, and intentionally increasing our psychological intelligence, we will have the vision and wisdom needed to consciously and creatively face these impending challenges and threats that we have created for ourselves. As Einstein reminds us, we cannot solve the problems that face us if we insist on using the same thinking process that created the problem in the first place. Fortunately, we do not have to. The willingness to grow in self-awareness and evolve our consciousness is always a choice available to us.

Understanding Primitive Ego Psychology and using the simple tools contained in the Primitive Ego Theory of Human Development we explore in each issue of this Newsletter could easily put us, individually and collectively, on a path toward the conscious evolution of our species. Making the challenges looming on the horizon subjectively "real" for us will help us avoid an emotional "shock" when the disruptive social, economic, and inevitable life-style changes actually arrive.

However it is important to remind ourselves that denying the realities that are coming and doing nothing is also an available choice….not a good one, but a choice.

End Of Brief Summary Of Part 1 Of This Three Part Article

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The Denial Of Reality In Primitive Ego Thinking: The Challenges That Are Coming–Part 2 - Denials #4 & #5: Uncontrolled Population Growth and Global Poverty

The global runaway population explosion that we are experiencing not only increases the problem of global warming, our Western culture's already voracious appetite for "stuff", and the myth of unlimited economic expansion we discussed in Part 1 of this three part article, it also:

• is increasing the already critically high levels of land, water, and air pollution,

• puts enormous pressure on the availability of land for both housing and farming,

• puts additional pressure on the consumption of our planet's already dwindling natural resources,

• is creating global food shortages,

• adds to the growing global unemployment crises,

• directly contributes to the growing economic strain on our global education and health care systems, and most importantly,

• is a primary cause of our rapidly growing global poverty.

When the lack of status and social power created by poverty is combined with armed conflict and environmental overload, those living in poverty, including women and children, are effectively denied access to the financial and educational resources needed to obtain land and farm tools. Current estimates agree that roughly one billion people currently live on "less" than one dollar a day. It should come as no surprise that they are struggling daily with ethical and moral issues of poverty and lack of adequate nutrition.

Despite the high level of poverty and food shortages present inside many third world countries, racial and cultural discrimination, ethnic dislocation caused by political unrest over land ownership, and on-going political power struggles all combine to create conditions in which the governments of these countries routinely withhold critically needed food and medical supplies from their people. The poverty and genocide in Darfur is a good example of what happens to those caught in the middle of political conflict.

We are unarguably in the middle of an unparalleled human population explosion.

Our planet reached one billion people for the first time about 1800. We hit the two billion mark in 1930. Three billion in 1960. Four billion in 1974. Five billion in 1987. Six billion in 1998, and seven billion in 2009. It is estimated that global population figures will slow down in the coming decades, but current forecasts indicate we will be well over 11 billion within roughly three generations.

All the people who have ever lived on Earth is estimated to be roughly 106 billion. That means we are headed for a scenario where roughly 10 % of all people who have ever born on our planet will be alive and consuming space and vital resources within a few generations.

It is estimated that population growth and the impact of global warming on food production alone will create severe food shortages and malnutrition for an estimated two to three billion people by the end of this century. Given the forecasts that we will soon be facing severe fresh water shortages and the fact that 87% of all fresh water is used for agriculture some are predicting that severe food shortages will be a global problem well before the end of the century.

The collective primitive ego consciousness of the Western civilization narcissistically assumes we're doing fine so far. Most of us in the Western world are still eating pretty well, we have pretty good educational and health care systems, and most of our children are not suffering from malnutrition, so it is easy to assume we can safely leave the problems created by overpopulation for someone else to solve.

But before we get too complacent we might want to consider the following statistics.

• Only about one billion people currently enjoy our Western culture's standard of living and the earth is already running out of many critically needed natural resources.

• Current projections have us growing by roughly a billion people every 11 years for the next couple of generations, and in recent years 80% of this growth has come from the developing nations.

• In 2005 it was estimated that almost a billion people on the planet were suffering from chronic malnutrition. This is a sobering reality when you consider that 27% of the world's population is below 15 years of age.

• The sobering reality is we live on a planet where 80% of the people alive today are living at sub-human standards struggling simply to survive…..and they are beginning to want more. They are waking to the reality that day-to-day survival is not enough. They want their share of the "good life" that we enjoy in the Western cultures.

• 80% of the world's population is increasingly aware that Western culture represents only about 6% of the world's population but we are currently consuming roughly 1/3 of all our planets resources.

• The bottom line….virtually every one of the seven billion people alive today are struggling to increase their standard of living to approach that of the Western world.

These statistics reflect some important realities for the future of "life as we know it" because soaring global population growth combined with rapidly growing levels of poverty are rapidly becoming an excellent formula for global unrest.

We are a nation building fences because we are worried about "illegal" Hispanics south of the border who want to share in the "good life" that we enjoy. Given the growing level of poverty in the world, it is becoming obvious that immigration problems are going to be the least of our worries in the coming decades.

To get some perspective on this issue, we need only to ask ourselves a couple simple questions…..

What would "we" do if we woke each day to watch our children struggling with malnutrition and a lack of clean drinking water, or dying due to lack of adequate medical care capable of treating even simple illnesses. How would we feel if our children were growing up uneducated while people in another part of the world were concerned with providing college educations for their children?

At what point would we aggressively begin to insist on change?

What would we be capable of doing as an individual or as a nation of people when we awoke to the realization that we had little or nothing to lose and everything to gain? How much force or violence would we be willing to use, or justify, to get our piece of the "good life"?

The reality that most clearly reflects the level of denial inherent in primitive ego thinking is the amazing insight that the majority of primitive egos living in our Western culture are honestly shocked and puzzled as to why the rest of the world is getting so angry with us.

Our primitive ego's ability to ignore the obvious is amazing.

We are unaware that runaway global population growth and over population is one of humanities most important growing crises. Incredibly, most of our conservative Christian churches---including the religiously conservative Bush administration that controlled Washington for the last eight years---continue to deny people access to birth control on ideological grounds; even to control the spread of AIDS.

Despite the fact that many people living in Western cultures are virtually unaware of population growth and the crises it represents, it is already impacting us even here in the United States. Anyone living on either coast of the United States, or in any major world city, already knows first hand the limited availability and rapidly rising cost of land and housing.

Our current housing crisis and economic problems are bringing prices down, but the pressure of more and more people wanting land to live and build on are driving prices to levels that only the very wealthy will be able to afford. The West Coast states of California, Oregon, Washington, and Arizona for example already reflect land and housing prices that are significantly more than most middle class workers can afford and it is doubtful that banks will ever again be allowed to create mortgages that a prospective buyer is not realistically able to repay.

When we consider the 60 -70 million baby boomers getting ready to begin down sizing and moving out of their high end homes and properties, one has to wonder where all the buyers are going to come from to purchase those expensive homes.

When the gap between a culture's wealthiest people and it's poorest people is too wide, it has the potential to create massive upheaval in the fabric of that culture. When the gap is global in nature, the potential for conflict and social crises is severe. I believe we have very little time left for our wealthy Western culture to voluntarily demonstrate our compassion and belief in equality and justice. For the poor to have more, it means we are going to have to be willing to live with less, but it is clear that reducing the enormous gap between the wealthy and the poor of the world is absolutely essential if we are to successfully create a peaceful global culture.

To Briefly Summarize
We all depend on the Earth and its resources for our survival. The earth is humanity's only life support system and it simply can no longer continue to support unlimited human expansion and consumption. For those who have the courage to look at the growing evidence, our planet's fragile life support system is already showing significant signs of malfunction.

If sustainability is the concept that must become part of every economic and environmental decision we make in our human cultures, then our current uncontrolled population growth, encouraged by primitive ego denial, is clearly not sustainable.

Despite the fact that our planet "cannot sustainably support" even one billion people at our current Western standard of living, India and China are both about to attempt increasing that number to four or five billion! The reality is simple. Our planet simply cannot support that kind of growth. But the most important question is whether we are going to redistribute our immense wealth voluntarily and peacefully or wait until 8 billion people living in poverty take it from us violently.

I am convinced that until we find ways to begin reducing the number of people living on our planet and begin to voluntarily redistribute the wealth that we enjoy in the Western world, we are going to continue our headlong rush toward severe global upheaval. At some point, it is inevitable that those living in extreme poverty, roughly 80% of the world's population, are going to run out of patience. They are not going to ask for their right to share in the benefits of a 21st century civilization, they are going to demand it as their moral right.

Because our narcissistic "me" oriented primitive ego is rarely willing to share with "others" what we subjectively feel is "ours", I am also convinced that simply waiting for our human culture to voluntarily mature and evolve our primitive ego consciousness into that of a more compassionate and spiritually mature observing ego consciousness is also unrealistic.

The primitive ego's of the wealthy are not going to voluntarily agree to higher taxes as a way of beginning to redistribute their enormous wealth to those living in poverty, and the primitive ego's of middle class Americans and Europeans are not going to voluntarily reduce their standard of living to globally sustainable levels so we can more realistically and safely digest the rapid increase in the living standard of several billion people in China and India coming within the next couple of generations.

As I said in Part 1, I am convinced that Primitive Ego Psychology and specifically the Primitive Ego Theory of Human Social and Spiritual Development are mental health tools that could effectively lead our species toward the level of psychological intelligence that we so badly need to achieve. I believe that if the insights and wisdom of Primitive Ego Psychology were taught to grammar school and high school students in our public school system, we would experience a significant increase in human consciousness within one generation.

Using the primitive ego thinking process of our unconscious inner-child simply does not make sense when we take the time to understand its limitations and dangers. Once a person develops the insight and self-awareness to begin paying attention to the many embarrassing ways we manifest primitive ego thinking in our day-to-day interactions with those around us, like a snake shedding it skin, growth in consciousness would become almost effortless.

Coming In The Final Part 3 of This Series
It is better to be prepared than "shocked" when the expected arrives. In Part 3 I will wrap up this series with a) a detailed summary list of the various challenges I see looming on the horizon, b) a general summary list of the important aspects and behaviors manifested by primitive ego thinking, and finally c) a detailed list of ideas and suggestions I believe each of us could incorporate in our lives to begin preparing for the challenges and changes that are coming; to better insure that the challenges that are coming do not create unnecessary crises in our lives.

The Stonyhill Primitive Ego Theory of Human Social and Spiritual Development© (PET) was developed to offer not only a simple coherent theory for the development and evolution of human consciousness, but to also provide the psychological tools and insights needed so-as-to enable the infusion of "intentionality" in the future growth of our species consciousness.
PET is a developmental theory of the human ego that could be offered in our public school systems to teach the skills and insights required for growth in psychological intelligence (PQ©) and the intentional maturation of our species consciousness, or to those interested in the authentic spiritual growth that comes through growth in one's self-awareness.
Readers can go to www.stonyhill.com for in-depth articles and past Newsletter discussions on the subjects of our inner-child's primitive ego, awakening, happiness, compassion, authentic spiritual growth, and The Primitive Ego Theory of Human Social and Spiritual Development©.)

PERSONAL THOUGHTS

Why I Publish The Stonyhill Newsletter
As we have been discussing in this three article series, I am convinced that life as we know it will soon undergo some life altering changes. These challenges are going to force us as a self-conscious species to move beyond the current adolescent narcissism of our species, intentionally manifest a more mature adult consciousness, and bring an end to our reliance on the religious, political, and economic ideologies that created the unparalleled levels of conflict, violence, suffering, and death for so many people in the 20th century.

I am convinced that most of the problems we are facing globally today, problems that are currently being blamed on the obvious greed of our various Corporate, Wall Street, and Banking executives, and the collapse of the housing bubble are the direct result of a) our runaway global population explosion, b) our blind belief in the myth that our planet can successfully support an unlimited economic growth for 8 to 10 billion people, and c) our lack of psychological intelligence that leaves us blind to the dangers of denial inherent in our inner child's primitive ego thinking process.

Our planet simply does not have the resources to "sustainably" provide a Western standard of living for the one billion people currently living in the Western culture. To assume that we can somehow provide that same standard of living for an additional nine to eleven billion people is a level of denial and ignorance we can not afford.

The myth of unlimited economic expansion is unraveling. We are facing our current economic crisis partly because of uncontrolled primitive ego corporate greed, but primarily because we are trying to meet the unlimited "wants" of too many people and ignoring the "needs" of countless billions of others.

In a nut shell, this is why I write about the dangers and narcissism of primitive ego thinking and why I feel it is so important for us to understand and intentionally evolve and mature our primitive ego consciousness into that of a more observing and humble contemplative ego. We may not be fully ready for the challenges that we have unknowingly created for ourselves, but ready or not, they will soon be upon us.

Primitive Ego Psychology and the Primitive Ego Theory of Human Social and Spiritual Development could be effective tools to ensure a more enlightened conscious evolution of our human consciousness, but to be effective, they must first become basic psychological insights and tools taught in our public educational system.

Blessings for a holiday season filled with love and compassion. See you in the New Year.
Namaste
Dick Rauscher

SPIRITUAL PRACTICE

We could make a significant contribution to reducing global warming if we simply cut our meat consumption by 20 %. This simple spiritual practice would protect the earth mother that birthed us and increase our enlightenment…our evolutionary spirituality….our ability to work "with" the laws of Nature and the Initial Evolutionary Impulse that created our universe rather than "against" it. As reflectively conscious beings, we are an integral force involved in shaping and creating the future of our world. Enlightenment is more than a personal goal, it is the goal of our species. Enlightenment is more than a psychological goal. It is how we act and behave; what we manifest. It is who we are.

For those of you who are looking for a spiritual practice that will make a significant difference for the world, consider the following:

• It has been shown that eating too much meat is unhealthy; a primary cause of heart problems and clogged arteries.

• It is expensive.

• Cattle production is a major contributor of green house gases and global warming.

• Cow manure releases nitrous oxide, a greenhouse gas that has roughly 300 times the warming effect of CO2. They pass about 200 liters of methane gas. Methane gas has 23 times the warming impact of CO2. When you consider the fact that there are 100 million beef cattle in the United States alone, these statistics begin to point to a significant cause of global warming.

• It is estimated that livestock production is responsible for 18% of global greenhouse gas emissions.

• Cattle are raised on large amounts of grain which is very energy-intensive to produce.

• It takes roughly ten times the grain required to produce the same number of calories from meat than it does from grain alone. In other words, it takes 10 units of grain to produce the same number of calories in meat that you would get from one unit of grain alone. Most of the world's grain production is fed to cattle, not people.

• The methane gas that comes from cow manure stays in the atmosphere far longer than CO2.

• Roughly 30% of the world's land surface area is devoted to livestock production and the damage to soil and surrounding water resources is very high.

• Compared to rice and vegetables, beef uses 16 times as much energy and produces 25 times as much CO2.

• In Latin America roughly 70% of former forest cover is now being used for grazing.
  The average person in the industrialized world eats about 180 pounds of meat a year. People in the developing nations consume about 68 pounds a year. Between population growth and the fact that as the world economy grows for countries like China and India, one of the first things they will do is increase their meat consumption.

The majority of these statistics came from Rajendra Pachauri, head of the U.N.'S Nobel Prize winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.(Http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,1839995,00.html)

QUOTES

You'd think if some tiger were lunging at your neck, your attention would be riveted on the tiger. But that's apparently not how it works in the age of global A.D.D. As a tiger sinks its teeth into the world's neck, we focus on the dust bunnies under the bed and the floorboards that need replacing on the deck. We live in the world of Perverse Cosmic Myopia, an inability to focus attention on the most perilous matter at hand.
David Brooks, Op-Ed Columnist for the The New York Times, March 20, 2009

It is not the strongest of the species that survive,
nor the most intelligent,
but the one most responsive to change.
Charles Darwin

If we sanction violence in our hearts, we are going to cooperate with whomever is waging war. We are participants because psychologically we sanction violence. If we really want to put an end to warfare, we need to explore deep into the human psyche where the roots of violence have a stronghold. Unless we find the roots of violence, ambition, and jealousy, we will not find our way out of chaos. Failure to eliminate their roots will doom us to endless miserable repetitions of the failures of the past.
Unknown Author (Included because it speaks so clearly of the dangers of primitive ego thinking.}