“The wonderful things that we have done on this planet and the horrible things that we have done on this planet, both, have come from the human mind.
So, if you are concerned as to what we create in this world, it is extremely important that first of all we learn to create the right things in our mind.” — Sadhguru
Our Wonderful Thing
The group was sitting in a circle. Some were sitting on crates. Some on rickety folding chairs. Someone was definitely sitting on an old workout bench. The night sky was clear. The air was cool. Up on the rooftop of where everyone stayed in Haiti, the only thing we could see were the huge smiles on our friends’ faces glowing from the headlamp in the center of the circle. The only thing we could hear was everyone’s laughter. Everyone was hanging out after a long, rewarding, day helping build homes in the ridiculous Haitian heat. It was perfect. This will always be one of the best nights of our life.
Our Horrible Thing
We were sitting across the desk from our appointed counselor. She just called our dad on speaker phone, introduced herself, and asked us to explain the situation. We were numb. We can’t even remember how we came up with the words, but once we finished explaining to our dad about us potentially being kicked out of college for our repeated drinking foibles, there was nothing but silence. Finally, our dad spoke. “Your mother is sick. I can’t tell her this as she goes through treatment. You’re making me lie to my wife.” It was miserable. This will always be one of the worst moments of our life.
Living Through Our Decisions
Whether it was organizing a volunteer trip with our best friends or testing our parents’ trust, we had to live through the situations that we created. Good or bad.
Now that we’re reflecting on this, and all of the other dumb shit we’ve done, we realize taking full ownership for everything in our life requires our whole body — every cell — to take responsibility for each of our decisions.
Now, of course, there are parts of us that don’t play a huge role in our decision making process (we don’t think the cells in our left big toe helped us choose Haiti as a trip destination).
For the parts of us that do directly influence our decisions, we know there are always aspects that don’t agree with any given choice we make (we’re sure there were neurons firing in our brain begging us to drink less to avoid yet another drinking ticket).
Regardless of our cells’ level of involvement in the choices we make, they each have no choice but to align with our ultimate decision, because, good or bad, they need to keep working through the consequences of our actions. Together.
Living Through Humanity’s Decisions
Building on the idea that humanity is a larger version of a human being, you can think of everything that has ever happened in the world as the result of humanity’s thoughts and actions. Humanity created just about everything that you consider to be good or bad in this world.
That’s pretty straight forward, but if we try to reintroduce the concept that you are a cell in humanity, and therefore responsible for everything that is good and bad in the world, you might push back a bit.
Your resistance makes perfect sense. You’re humble enough to not want credit for everything good in the world and level headed enough to know you shouldn’t take the blame for everything bad.
So, how should you live through humanity’s decisions?
Similar to how the cells in our left big toe and neurons in our brain have to align to work through any decision we make, we think it makes sense for humans to try and do the same in response to humanity’s decisions.
Personally, we try to reflect on decisions we’ve made through the lense of our, always evolving, values and move forward with the intent of hopefully making better decisions in the future.
Understanding that it’s impossible for every human to agree on any decision humanity has to make — just as it’s impossible for our entire being to agree on any decision we have to make — how can humanity align its thinking towards a set of core values it can use to improve its decision making as it continues to evolve?
Do you think there’s a way for humanity to focus so all humans can maintain their individuality while aligning their minds in (relatively) the same direction?
— nOrma(n)
yournOrm + mynOrm = ournOrm.
#whatsyournOrm?
If you’re interested in joining this project to define humanity’s future, you can become a ghostwriter for nOrma(n) to inspire people to rediscover their creativity and transform how we view our reality, email hello@thenormapp.com
