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A new approach to human life

By Tenzin Nyinjey | Tibet Sun

Tenzin Nyinjey Photographer unknown

I am convinced that there indeed is a global warming threatening the whole world. However, it appears the world is not seriously taking this crisis into consideration, especially the highly advanced countries in the West, along with India and China—who are mainly responsible for emitting green house gases, the primary cause of a warming globe.

If we are truly serious about overcoming this crisis, we have to ask ourselves some serious questions—some soul-searching needs to be done. This global warming can be overcome only when we take some difficult decisions. Indeed, if we take these difficult yet wise decisions, it can help us overcome not just global warming, but also many other associated crisis plaguing our global human family—poverty, disease, hunger, violence and war!

Such a decision entails a wholly new approach and way of thinking—a new model of life. The present dominant thought in the world is that of realism influenced heavily by thinkers like Machiavelli and Hobbes. We firmly believe that we live in a world of intense competition where only strong can survive and weaklings have no place. We tend to believe in Darwin’s philosophy of the survival of the fastest and the fittest. As such, our society is deeply driven by greed. Competition rather than cooperation is the norm. We are habitually constructed to inflate our egos. We believe, by nature human beings are selfish, nasty, brutish and egoistic. Ideas of independence and individuality are deeply entrenched in our minds and glorified intensely.

This school of thought may have brought many marvels on this earth—the great scientific revolutions, economic prosperity and democracy. However, it has also caused two World Wars, genocides, destruction of native cultures, and now the global warming which is threatening to destroy the whole planet. Imagine the billions of Indians and Chinese owning cars, as virtually every American household does in the United States. Imagine the kind of air pollution it would create, imagine the kind of intense emotional violence it will engender in the form of loss of mental peace among those who aspire to get rich and own a car and a big house near a sea beach. Imagine the kind of corruption it will endanger or jealousy and fear among those who are left behind in this mad rush for economic prosperity, the number of people that needs to be repressed and massacred to achieve this goal.

This dominant school of thought—of putting so-called national or personal interests above everything else, of considering money and material comfort as the new God—needs to be transformed. It has not been very sustainable. It is responsible for this global warming, literally and metaphorically. Just observe the world. Poverty, hunger, violence and wars in so-called underdeveloped countries in Asia and Africa, no respect for human rights and dignity in fast emerging economies like China and even in the advanced and prosperous West, a kind of deep human crisis is brewing, as we can see from the increasing undermining of basic human values and trust among people, even among family members and friends.

Just observe the people commuting on the New York City subways—their faces all tensed and cold, no one talking to each other, so paranoid of themselves and others. It’s their work and mortgage dues eating them up from within. Now these crises are true global warming to me. In other words, anger, hatred, jealousy, fear, insecurity plaguing our world are the true manifestations of global warming. If we could some how overcome these crises, I think we can overcome all the problems our human world is facing, including climate change and possibly a future nuclear holocaust.

And such a solution is only possible when we look at life from a new approach, when we have a new understanding and belief of innate human nature: that man by nature are not selfish, egoistic, nasty and brutish, but compassionate, loving, cooperative, that true happiness and freedom is possible only through human love, understanding and kindness for others.

Such a new approach of life and human nature, which is slowly emerging, as we can see from the new school of thoughts such as post-modernism and post-structuralism, will give our planet not just the resilience and adaptation needed to overcome global climate crisis, but also a new world—free, happy and prosperous. The responsibility to create such a new and visionary world primarily falls on the citizens, the ordinary folks—whose initiatives will have ripple effects, eventually prompting government leaders and politicians to change their course.

Indeed, change must come from the individual. Each and every individual should take his or her own initiative to realize this new world. We need to be aware that human greed has no limits, and if it is not moderated by restraint, it is the source of oppression and slavery to both self and others. A decent, free and happy life is possible only when we cut down on our massive consumption driven by our greed and reorganize our life in way that is more peaceful, reflective and caring for others’ welfare.

In short, we need a new system that transcends the conventional capitalism, a humane and compassionate socio-capitalism, the path of which is shown by the likes of Dalai Lama, Bill Gates and Warren Buffet!

Copyright © 2010 Tenzin Nyinjey

Published in Tibet Sun