In my field, Chinese Medicine people tend to very,very proud of lineage and put a fantastic amount of emphasis on history. This to the point many are convinced that the answers to how to practice medicine now are to be found in the past. How a culture defines Enlightenment sets the gold standard that all diagnostic information must be compared to in assessing “health” -If one is practicing an integral and spirit oriented tradition of medicine. But there is great resistance to the notion that something has changed in regards to enlightenment that has transcended the traditions. After all, Enlightenment has always been the end of becoming.
Consider this:
If I were to say Judiasm is THE way! OR, Buddhism is THE way! Or Daoism is THE way! Most people at the level of development of a holistic practitioner could not relate and some would take offense.
WHY?
Because we are all at, or moving beyond, a pluralistic stage of development where we are able to hold many perspectives simultaneously. We take this capacity for granted. “There is no one right way”.
But if I were to say, “None of the traditions are THE way, they each bring something to the table, but we have evolved to a point of synthesis that goes beyond any of them.” Then people also get upset and take offense.
I think that is worth pondering a while…………
It’s offensive to say that any one tradition could be THE way and it’s also offensive to say that now none of them are……
Isn’t this interesting? Why would this cause people to get upset?
Because we are rooted in a form of pluralistic consciousness that embraces many perspectives and, in the light of the holocaust, is weary of any absolute. Because we are conditioned to see everything as relative. And yet the realization of the absolute, the center of the circle was the sinqua non of enlightenment…….prior to pluralism. Then enlightenment became “all truth is relative, judge nothing”. Yet it seems that we have gone as far into individuation and relativism and pluralism as is possible. This to the point that the most fortunate who have ever lived are suffocating in their own heads. Why is it that the most educated, well fed, and free people to have ever lived are taking all the nutritional supplements, prozac, and psychotherapy? The answer is the same that it’s always been-alienation from the True self. In an evolutionary context that self has evolved in a way that is now must contextualized in an Evolutionarily Enlightened perspective. And that perspective is the foundation of a new medicine.
