New Year, Old Planet

The New Year is at its very beginning and this is a traditional time for resolutions.

For weeks we have been overwhelmed with countless pages and imagesmaking conjectures about whatthe future has in store for us as individuals and as a species. In a short timespan, the media have produceda riot ofprophecies about the events which are already on the march towards us on the treadmill of time and space.

At this specified time of the year, an unflinching faith in the possibility of predicting the future pushes sociologists, politicians, journalists and maitre-a-penser, omen readers and fortune tellers of all kinds, to assume the role of the 9 auspices of Rome who practiced divining by observing bird signs, and reading their flight patterns in the sky.

All ancient civilizations exalted divination and prophecy, and modern societies too, faced with the unknown, with the unexpected, have tried to calmtheirfears about the future with the false security of plans and previsions. Our rummaging in the interiors of computers,using advanced techniques for forecasting the future and estimating trends, has no substantial difference from the ancient practice of divination as utilized in archaic cultures through the inspection of the sacrificial victim’s liver. Then, as now, men try to alleviate the painful sensation of precariousness and uncertainty by transforming it into a more reassuring “planned” description of the world.

In reality, the world is not changed because mankind is not changed. Modernity has the same problems of the archaic ages, from wars topollution, from criminality to endemic poverty,becausewe still live under the same psychological conditions,and we are driven by the same superstitions, conflicted thinking and negative emotions of that remote past. The world is the perfect reflection of man’s psychology. The world is such because man is such.

Have you ever seen one science-fiction movie envisaging a bright future for our species? From Blade Runner to Matrix, and also in The Terminator there is a multi-faced, but unique catastrophic forecast of the coming world. Have you ever read a novel depicting a future of prosperity without wars and conflicts? I think that this is a litmus test of our natural inclination towards harmful thinking, and these apocalyptic scenarios are the mental projections of mankind’s fears and negative imagination. In this respect, Hollywood should change its appellation to ‘nightmare’s factory’.

One out of threeinhabitant of the planet sufferfrom eating disorders; obesity and diabetes are endemic. Suicide has become the third leading cause of death among young people. The number of people in prison has increased fourfold in the last 20 years.

You do not need to go to Delphi and listen to the oracle to know the future of a species whichtreats itself so badly, and has turned self-sabotage into a planetary syndrome through excessive use of drugs, alcohol and smoke.

The pilgrim who often travelled great distances and faced grave dangers to ask the god Apollo about his future, would find the Delphic inscription ‘Know Yourself’ engraved on the tympanum of the temple, as if to say ‘Do you want to know your future? Then know yourself!’

In this apparently mocking paradox, by sculpting this Delphic motto onto the very temple dedicated to divination, the Greeks revealed the secret relationship between the inner and the outer world, between a man’s psychology and what happens to him – the events and circumstances of his life. They entrusted this discovery to the ocean of time, like a message in a bottle, so that it would reach us. The man who knows himself, his own Being, his thoughts, ideas, and attitudes, also knows his own future – for our psychology is our destiny.

Thereis a blackhole in the heart of Man. From there, as from Pandora’s box, springall the planetaryevils. Thisis the root end primary cause of all the world’sproblems. Humanitythinks and feelsnegatively. The mostterribleillness of this world isnotcancer or AIDS- and itsrealplagues are notpollution, criminality, wars or the endemicpoverty of vastregions of the planet. They can,at the most, beconsideredeffects.

The realevilistheimmeasurableabyss of man’s negative emotions. The original sin isFear. “Iheard Your steps in the garden and I wasafraid” – Adam says on the threshold of the Paradise whichisby nowlost. Fear and all the emotionsthatspring from itshape the world asweknowit.

In order to changehisdestiny, Man needs to face a revolutionin histhinking;he shouldabandonsecond-handideas and beliefs, removethe mortal ballast of hisdistortedsentimentsfromdeep inside himself, and eradicate the tyranny of hisdegradedimagination – his reverse dreamingwhichcontinuallyspews out nightmares and dystopia.

Can we eradicate poverty, create jobs for everyone on the planet, make friends out of mortal enemies, produce a world with no pollution, create justice for everyone and cure every illness in the world – including replacing negative human emotions? Yes, this is my dream. It will not happen in 2012, however, and probably notwithin my lifetime – possibly not even within the next hundred years. But would it not be a great aim to dream of such a world 1000 years from now? For this we need timeless leaders, luminous utopians, and philosophers of actionwho are ready to commit themselves today to work with uncompromising integrity in the service of such a distant future. They are the intelligent cells of a new world, and the most strategic resource for any nation. Without them, progress of any sort is not possible.

It does not matter from which of the five continents you come. Your nationality or upbringing, your background, previous studies, the social and family circumstances which bred you, your culture, religion, or tradition are not important. Just answer these questions: do you have a dream to be a leader for the world?Do you think you have the intellectual and moral qualities for it?

Then write to me,and apply to be a part of the FLW – the world scholarship program especially designed to develop your potential as a visionary leader, and to discover for what you are uniquely born . The main objective of the FLW Program is to restore Ethics and Integrity as the central qualities of future leadership.

Not everybody can be a leader, and there is nothing wrong with that. Once you decide to be one, however, you must love your dream, and believe in it with your entire being. It will come true.