The Deep Roots of Sustainability

The Western world, since the Scientific/Industrial Revolution has valued highly the capacity of our logical and analytical minds as well as the economic success which has been credited to this thinking. This has resulted in what appears to be a discrediting of the deeper consciousness of the human mind, that is, our intuition or inner Wisdom or spirituality (in its broadest sense), as this wisdom cannot be measured in scientific terms. Many scholars now believe that this situation (accepting only the measurable knowledge which comes from the logical mind), has created much of our human disconnect with our natural world and our human linkage with the Earth, resulting in the ecological breakdown we are now experiencing.

The following paper focuses on the deep roots of our dilemma. This involves in many cases the discovery or “rediscovery” of some deeply rooted values located in our deeply seated unconscious mind (inner self or consciousness), and our rethinking about the nature of humanity and how we are interconnected with Nature. This process is opening up new ways of thinking about the deep capacities humans possess, and the importance of drawing from both the conscious logical mind as well as the deeply rooted unconscious areas of the mind (our inner self).  As a result we are gradually rediscovering some of these deeply held “universal” values, where both areas of the mind (logical and consciousness) are needed to fully comprehend them and transform them into practice. These emerging values appear to be gradually providing a new basis for policies and actions to deal with our present environmental, social and economic crisis.

Are we on the threshold of finding some commonly held deep universal values that could result in new positive approaches to our common challenges in Sustainability for our planet?