Tag Archives: politics of self.

January 29, 2017

492. We Are All The Wall

By Marlen

Or how to stop the wars about walls and rather focus on taking responsibility for the source of the problems that cause them to exist.

A few people have sent me information and documents as well as asked for my personal perspective on what’s my perspective as a Mexican – living in Mexico – on Trump’s executive order to ‘Build the wall’ that he promised to all of his supporters during his electoral campaign, therefore I’ll share some of my points of view here.

First of all, I’ve shared in previous blogs about my decision to not bash other people in positions of power such as presidents (Read Let’s Make Us Focus .On .Our .Lives. Again!) and I’ve lived up to that point with both my country’s president – and actually have had a few words with people that constantly bash him and make of his bashing a form of national sport – as well as with the new ‘human piñata’ for Mexicans, which is Donald Trump where now Mexicans have interestingly enough gathered around in this 4-day old renewed sense of Nationalism that started emerging in people’s phones and social media participation based on now having something/someone to fight and stand united against and that is the perception of Trump’s wall as a discredit to Mexicans, a bashing of Mexicans – which Mexicans have taken personally now reacting in this sudden ‘solidarity’ which I would have very much liked to see during the first week of this year in course where we were all more divided and against each other than ever, with all the lootings, protests against government and by the government… but now it’s as if Trump’s Wall has become a reason for Mexicans to unite, though for only all the nice-sounding reasons, but still failing to acknowledge the responsibility to look back at the collective mess we’ve created as our country, which is predictable considering that us as human beings like to focus on all the nice things but always react to and resist to look at ‘all the bad’ stuff, the ugly and very real aspect of our truth and reality – individually and collectively as the world system.

What do I mean with this?

As a disclaimer and allocating myself in what I’m about to share. Throughout this process I’ve learned to identify myself as a human being in this world, not as a ‘Mexican’ which means I have throughout my life walked a process to dissociate myself from the constructs, beliefs, main views or cultural associations of what a Mexican is supposed to be like. This is not to set myself apart, but this is exactly the same self-deconstruction that I would do living anywhere else in the world, where I’ve come to understand all notions of nationality and its ramifications like patriotism or nationalism which I equate in the same way as racism, religious ideologies or political inclinations that create a division between people. All of these ‘labels’ stand for and as separation between human beings, therefore the identification of myself as one single ‘nation’ to me would be a disservice to the principles I am standing for/as which are that of oneness and equality, who we really are as life beyond our characters, our personalities, our cultural (mental) biases and the rest of the opinions that we’ve transformed into religious-political factions that we’ve turned into ways to separate and conquer us.

I share this bit so that I leave it clear that by now it should not be expected that I will take any ‘side’ with anyone here –  otherwise I would be recreating the problems that we all precisely should be focus on stopping in this world: the continuous ‘siding with’ groups/nations/identities that invariably create friction and conflict among each other, where we lose track of how we are ALL collectively creating all the problems in the world that we are at the same time constantly fighting and complaining to resolve – yes, paradoxical in nature, but we haven’t yet realized how we are creating the very world we live in based on each word in the nature of fighting and spite that we’ve accepted as part of who we are in our lives.

So, what I see from the creation of the wall is nothing else but a way to contain a consequence that interestingly enough, most of Mexicans currently united in a sentiment of ‘renewed nationalism’ have failed to have the common sense to admit and look at, to rather question HOW we’ve come to this point where someone has to create a wall, a physical border to prevent more people from going illegally to the US and WHY it is that so many millions have decided to leave Mexico in order to have a better lifestyle than here. This has been an all-timer question that I’ve heard many people blame since the nineties to the NAFTA, but immigration has been going on way before that which is quite obvious in the sense that people would see it as a very easy thing to do to have the same kind of jobs they would have here in Mexico yet getting paid a whole lot more for it if opting for the American Dream, which is also a misnomer because there’s millions of stories of suffering and abuse as well, and I won’t go into that because there’s thousands of articles and documentaries on this situation as well. Therefore it’s not like it’s all rosy and nice in there, even more so there’s several accounts of many succumbing to or resorting to become criminals to make a living, which is also not acceptable. I’ve personally met several people lately that have come back since it wasn’t such a great deal for them anymore to be living in the US and are instead having decent jobs here, which I find cool since they went there and lived ‘their dreams’ only to realize the kind of values that opting for the ‘life of the riches’ lead you to – which in any case is a life lesson and interesting process for many of us humans that tend to only look at money as the whole drive of one’s existence.

Now, I don’t blame people from following such aspiration to have more money than they would in Mexico, but it is certain that in all of those millions that have left the country, the workforce that could have instead stayed here to build a prosperous country in various forms/ways have gone to take menial jobs to ‘the other side’ as we call it here. So, what happened is that only money came back here to Mexico, but most males in little towns in this country would leave to the US, leaving huge gaps in communities across the country as a result of this, creating a ‘norm’ for many youngsters to only be waiting to be old enough to be able to go to ‘the other side’ and make a lot more money than here, which means: we failed as a society to create an economy that gives opportunity to everyone to have a dignified living.

So, it’s quite ludicrous to consider that Mexicans or Mexican Government can get offended about the creation of a wall as a way to stop a consequential outflow of decades and decades of complete negligence to create sufficient economic stability and incentives to make people stay and instead use people’s labor and dedication to rebuild communities, especially in agriculture, to create more associations that could in one way or another sort out agreements with governments in order to prevent the mass immigration to the US and also strengthening the Mexican economy that will now be probably more affected by this bilateral disagreement going on between the US and Mexico, turning it into yet another unfriendly stance that is in no way something supportive to have between neighbors, especially considering it is ‘THE’ United States of America on the north side, so, we have to own our creation: we did it to ourselves, bit by bit.

Therefore, I am not at all in disagreement nor in favor of the wall either – again, won’t take sides and refuse to do so because that is what keeps this ‘battle’ going on without solutions.

The last thing I can do here is share this perspective and suggest a few things to everyone in Mexico or outside of it that may be standing with an interesting ‘fervor’ to ‘save Mexico’ and ‘stand united with Mexico’ or ‘be offended along with Mexicans’ to rather stop the sudden nationalism and realize that we should have done this a LONG time ago in the sense of actually deciding to build this country back on its feet and become the people that can stand as individual leaders – all together – with transparency, honesty and integrity which means Everyone, as ALL citizens would have to live by and stand by these principles, as well as in self-responsibility. Because we have been masters at pointing out corruption, being OK with corruption at all levels of our societies and being the first in line to mock presidents and create jokes out of any corruption- or narco-case gone wrong – I was once there, I did that many times, but I can stand my word. I don’t indulge into that at all any longer.

Therefore I’d rather ask: how many of us are actually looking within ourselves to recognize our responsibility to the creation of all the problems faced in this country and whether we would stand also ‘In Equality’ within self-honesty and self-responsibility to own and recognize our creation, to acknowledge the fact that we’ve all built this wall by accepting and allowing our economy to be not good enough to cater for proper livelihoods in the lives of those people that were the most hardworking, noble and wise when it comes to an essential field of our economy: agriculture. We’ve shot ourselves in the foot, therefore we have to stop the tantrums and why-me/whining at a national level.

As with all things, the only solution I foresee now that this deal of the wall is done is to use it as a lesson to learn from and prevent from creating further consequences from now on. I don’t disagree that people create a sense of unity, but for god’s sake, let’s make it about ourselves, who we are as people – not about ‘Mexican beauties’ like its beaches, best weather and landscapes in the world – but about who we are as individuals, the kind of relationships that we can create in our families, with friends, at work, at our jobs. Becoming honest and integral individuals where we can again trust each other to act responsibly, to do ‘the right thing, that which is best for all’ and to not cheat and do whatever we can to bribe our way to the top.

In this it’s about applying the same as we do with our personal process: it’s about facing consequences and learning to live them the best way possible, making of the consequence a learning process where we can strengthen our strengths and weaknesses while also making sure that we go correcting our core values wherein we can once and for all be a little bit more considerate in terms of ‘following an American Dream’ and whether that was in any way sustainable as a long-time aspiration or desire for generations of humans to come. My take is: it is not. And here I clarify that it is not that I am not wanting prosperity for the people, but I am talking in the specific means in which massive amounts of people have gone to the US to get ‘rich’ or ‘lots of money’ while having to leave their families back here in Mexico, it’s not nice for them nor for the families, most of them would really want to be back here yet we all have been the ones that instead of staying in this country to make it stronger and built with an intent to revive its economy and therefore the living-quality in it, we have opted to run away from it or live off from its worst sources of income like politics or narco-business – we haven’t yet decided to create an economy that can fulfill people’s livelihoods in a best-for-all manner, hence the consequences.

It’s time to see beyond the sentiment of nationalism or ‘uniting against the enemy Trump’ because that breeds more of that which we need to STOP fueling and participating on in this world: hatred, anger, separation, blame, vengeance, racism. I refuse to be part of the millions that rejoice in a false sense of empowerment – instead I decide to remind ourselves of common sense: let’s own our consequences, let’s understand the source and origin of this ‘wall’ which is that of massive immigration that we haven’t been able to prevent by creating a solid economy at home.

So, if we really want to ‘be very Mexicans’ I’d first say, let’s stand in principles that change the nature of what we’ve all become as individuals, starting with stopping the hate, the fight, the spite towards presidents or nations ‘out there’ and instead focus on ourselves, focus on our own lives. There’s nothing to be offended about when we are ALL the creators of walls, because it represents nothing else but the manifestation of our separation as our inability to stand together to create a dignified livelihood for all inhabitants in this world – not only Mexico but everywhere else in this world.

Let’s keep this in mind when seeing the word ‘WALL’ = We ALL Are the WALL – now let’s start breaking down our own inner and outer wars and let’s rather focus on understanding our creation, looking at the origin of the problems and so focus on solutions to sort them out from their root, that’s what we should focus on in our lives right now.

Thanks for reading

 

 The Wall - Mexican Border - Trump - Mexicanism

 

 

Join us in our process of Self-Responsibility as LIFE

Leave a comment   |  tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | posted in american culture, Collectivism, media wars, polarity, political economy, Politics, Self Governance, self responsibility, self-honesty, self-leadership, Self-Responsibility

January 21, 2017

485. Let’s Make Us F.O.O.L. Again!

By Marlen

Or how to point the finger back at ourselves in relation to loving or hating political effigies

 

This morning as I went to buy some tortillas (staple Mexican food) the man that was selling them was listening to the news talking about – yes, you guessed – Trump’s inauguration, the ‘riots and protests’ around the world and in various US cities. As the man was weighing the tortillas he said:

– May I ask you a question?

– Sure – I Said

– Do you think that Trump is crazy?

– No, he just represents in a more uncensored manner the human nature that we all have to change within ourselves

– I don’t think he’s crazy, being different doesn’t make you crazy

– No, he may step out of the usual politics, but he is there to show us back all the points that we need to change within ourselves and focus on that by ourselves.

End of our exchange. All that I’ve seen in the buildup to the US elections is a notorious division in people’s minds about Trump, as if he was meant to be loved or hated to the core. Now, I’d like to explain how I don’t wish to make this in any way a political blog, I’m here to share a perspective that precisely goes beyond the question that I’ve been asked several times already in terms of ‘What do I think of Trump?’ And I will share my perspective here.

At the beginning of his campaign, I did go into sharing one of his statements and calling it something like idiotic or in a similar way, only to then question myself as to what am I creating when praising or bashing any other person? I have walked a similar process with my ‘hatred’ towards the catholic church and another leader that I came to hold in my mind as ‘a despicable human being’ which I had to also walk my process in self-honesty to understand my hatred and realize that I am not in fact doing it ‘toward them,’ but it’s all about what I accept and allow within myself as a relationship or experience that I impose onto others parts of our reality, which is also parts of me. Since then, I’ve been breathing every time that I see this political leader – Netanyahu – giving any orders that I could usually squirm about and instead, breathe and live my self-forgiveness: he is another me, he is part of our consequence, we are all him, he’s playing a role for us to see what we’ve accepted and allowed ourselves to be and become.

This application has worked well, also whenever I would usually walk past a church or see the popes on the media and again ‘squirm’ or recoil within myself – but I can now see, walk past many churches (lots around here) and no longer re-create my own hatred-fixation that served no purpose other than wrecking my own body by becoming hateful, ignorantly so because my hate was never going to change the nature of humanity or of such institutions, only through actually committing myself to change can I do that, and that doesn’t require a single emotion or feeling.

During Trump’s campaign I saw and read how many people loathed him, hated his guts, ‘could not stand him’ but I decided to not participate in the praise or bash, but simply remain observant this time, not jumping into the bandwagon of people that either loved him to death or hated him to his death, literally. I then saw how the purpose of this media and political frenzy was to continue dividing and conquering people. As if it hasn’t been obvious enough – because I’ve been very vocal about it many, many times – this whole political set-up is once again getting people to hope for another person in a role we have created to precisely abdicate our personal responsibility, to change our lives, to be the difference, to be ‘the rebel’ in this case that goes ‘against the establishment’, and I’m definitely keeping an eye on how things develop because to me this Trump presidency can act as a catalyst to finally open full eyes to people that still have ideas of ‘a president being the real change’ and instead of praising or hating one single person to save the world or destroy it, rather for once and for all: Focus On Our Lives.

That spells out the word F.O.O.L. but that’s exactly what we become, fools when we follow the media waves, the political waves that are nothing else but following the same formula applied for thousands of years: create the illusion of choice, divide and conquer, create the idea of a savior and everyone will follow.

Why is this so? Because of our inherent human nature that we’ve created, accepted and allowed, to exist as a follower by default- not a genuine leader. Because we prefer to always abdicate responsibility and blame, instead of taking self-responsibility and assuming the consequences of our actions, regardless of the outcome. Because we like to fight for our limitations, instead of strengthening our strengths, strengthening our weaknesses and helping each other to become better humans every day.

The list can go on. This is why I said to the man this morning that Trump represents very well the human nature that we ALL have to change. Not sure if my words were heard, but that doesn’t matter, because I am aware of our tendency to ‘skip’ the realization that we are all Trump, we are all Netanyahu’s, we are all Hillary, we are all ‘the worst criminals in the history of humanity.’ Now we simply have to accept it, digest what it means and start acknowledging our responsibility to it all.

What I see very relevant to do is to remind ourselves is to grow out of the old, to let go of focusing so much on ‘mainstream politics’ and focus on the politics of the self, of the nature of who we are and have become to acknowledge the very same patterns ‘out there’ in the shape of our politicians and recognize that very same nature of ‘them’ existing within ourselves.

Here, I also look beyond borders. I discuss Trump even if I am a ‘Mexican’ and even if I am ‘supposed to be offended’ or supposed to be ‘hating Trump’ based on how Trump has discussed Mexicans and Mexico in his agenda. I stand clear, I am beyond a label and instead stand as a human being that can discern in common sense what is best for all and what is not. Therefore I can only take the person for the words they say and the actions they live to see how congruent they are, how much of what it is promised or spoken of becomes a reality and how much is simply part of the usual show, and from there see what are the creations and consequences of such actions. Therefore if someone would like to believe I should condemn his words or actions, I remain clear in my stance and will test out where it gets me: I cannot ‘bash’ or judge, I can only propose and create solutions that I can start living within myself and in my sphere of influence. That’s then stepping out of the ‘battle’ loop and into self-creation.

Whichever the outcomes are, I cannot judge him or anyone for that matter, no one ‘president’ will ever change anything, we all have to do that change within and by ourselves, each one of us and stand beyond the need for these fictional constructions as dinosaurs of the past, of a master-slave relationship that definitely has to crumble for the fallacy it always has been. So my perspective is that Trump’s presidency along with various ‘radical’ movements around the world can create a catalyst to for once and for all dismantle the deception that the notion of government as ‘authority’ represents. We will be giving a possibly very tumultuous and chaotic step beyond our limitations – as they say: growing pains and we as humanity definitely have to break down all illusions, shatter everything that does not stand within the principles of equality and what’s best for all – and so focus on the reality that we CAN create one by one, in living principles, without the need of a ‘master’ to guide us or save us. We have to stand in self-leadership.

I had refrained myself from talking about these topics – yet again – to me it felt like repeating myself for the 1000th time, but I’ll say it until these words are etched in our being: we are all equal and one, we all are living beings with the potential to be the best that we can in each of our contexts and positioning, we are the ones that can decide for ourselves whether we are part of the creation of the new or remain stuck in the divide and conquer left-right, blue-red, white-black paradigms of separation, of human descent of the past.

I wrote to someone in an email yesterday: let’s make the world great again, starting with ourselves! Because that’s the ultimate reality: the mirrors (me-errors) of political institutions, of ‘leaders’ and these structures of ‘power’ need to be dissolved within our minds first of all, no matter if they still remain ‘in place’ in our societies for another 100 years: we decide what we give power to in our minds, we decide whether we want to be part of the problem (old politics paradigm, black vs. white, red vs. blue, left vs. right, rich vs. poor) or do we decide to give one step beyond what is presented as ‘the ways of the world’ and stop focusing on all of that, to instead focus on ourselves, creating the lives and living the principles that are best for all.

So, what’s my stance? I choose to not judge Trump or any other political leader that a lot of people seem to get a kick out of mocking. Mocking is mocking, hatred is hatred no matter how we may want to justify it or believe such experience within us towards others is ‘well deserved.’ No, it’s not, because it’s not about ‘them’ but always about ourselves in what we accept and allow as words and experiences Within ourselves.

My personal process thus far has been of being an observer this time, not taking sides in pro or anti but simply taking the man as another me, another human being and as I practice applying on everything: investigating all things and keeping what’s best – which is a far more supportive approach than the bashing that seems to go to the left and right of the spectrum at least in the country I live in, and based on what’s going on in social media, the divide and conquer is running ‘as expected’ because WE all have participated in generating such polarity, while forgetting that’s the way we get trumped, we get conquered.

Consider seeing Trump as our reflection, as our greatest teacher as any other human being can be no matter ‘who’ they are or ‘what their position is’, he only gets the attention based on his hierarchical position, but you can surely do the same reflection with every single person in your life and around you, to see how we are judging them or generating any contempt towards them to instead ask: what are ‘they’ revealing about ourselves and how can I make sure I no longer create this inner-conflict and separation ‘towards that person’ by deciding to align my relationship to those aspects/parts of that person that I have reacted to, and instead see directly where am I living out the exact same patterns that I criticize in others. That’s one simple step into self-honesty.

Will many be willing to do this? After all of these years, I bet few will dare to because we still prefer to keep ourselves in a good light as a ‘good person’ and not question our own problems, our conflicts and admit that such contempt, hatred or antagonism toward anything in this world is in fact revealing something about ourselves that we are in conflict about and have not understood as who we have become yet.

I challenge everyone that holds dear the ‘right to protest’ to question what ‘protesting is’ and if it is in fact an honorable way to develop oneself as a self-responsible human being, one that is willing to acknowledge manifested consequences and stand as a living example of correcting those same problems within ourselves first, rather than looking outside to seek culprits and blame, which is by far and based on my personal research, a very ingrained pattern that is overlooked as an actual self-dishonesty based on the righteousness it is held by, which is nothing else but an ego experience.

That’s why I’ve been so keen to write about the actual nature of ourselves as human beings as a key point to admit to ourselves if we are to Ever in fact stand our ground to acknowledge and live our potential. We cannot grow the best and the new unless we realize the crookedness that exists in all of us – no one’s saved from this – and to learn to understand and work with the flaws, the conflicts, the problems, the destructive nature we’ve become in order to no longer judge it or judge others for it – hint, stopping using some supposed ‘authority figures’ as human piñatas – and instead, take that judgment back to ourselves to see who are we really in fueling those emotional experiences within us.

I saw videos of protests and in stability I simply acknowledge that it will still take time for humanity to outgrow the reactive, tantrum-nature that we haven’t matured from just yet… some of us are slowly but surely standing up from it, so it’s up to us to ensure that the new generations can stand in a much more independent and self-responsible individuality that is at the same time contained within the consideration of the whole as one and equal. Living principles are the key, considering what’s best for ALL in fact (not just those that we see as ‘our country’ or ‘our race’ or whichever other delusional frontier/limitation we create in our minds) is a living principle to practice in a plethora of ways.

These are all steps to go unraveling the illusion of separation, which at the same time reveals to us the potential of ourselves as creators. So, time to focus on self-creation through self-investigation, self-honesty, developing Humbleness to embrace even those we’ve labeled as ‘the worst of the worst’ as parts of ourselves as well that reveal ‘where we are’ as humanity, so we cannot just go and develop ourselves to be these wonderful beings and ‘forget about the world.’ It’s about communal ‘awakening’ for a lack of better word, but it’s not about seeking justice or hope for some other ‘king of fools’ to do the job, it’s about self-responsible living creation that we are all capable of directing in our lives.

Let’s do it and stop participating in the divide and conquer, thank you.

 

Check out this (still) very relevant video

Know Your Candidate: Trump and Hillary Revealed

 

 Point the finger back to self

 

Learn how to stand as your own authority:

3 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , | posted in Politics, self awareness, self creation, Self Governance, self judgment, self reflection, self-honesty, self-leadership, Self-Responsibility

%d bloggers like this: