SHAPING THE FUTURE
Shaping the Future chapter from GROW, The Modern Women’s Handbook by Lynne Franks, published 2004.
As women, we are traditionally the caretakers of our culture. Our responsibility is to understand and somehow make sure that the changes that are happening in our world preserve the basic humanity in us all. By connecting with the principles of the sacred feminine, such as those found in ancient matriarchal civilisations, a more nurturing society can evolve – one that abhors violence; advocates such values as justice, compassion and love; and raises its children to reach their full potential as human beings.
When people talk with such idealism they are often accused of being naïve. How can we change a world that’s solidly entrenched in the way of competition, domination and violence? My answer is that without creating the vision, nothing can be achieved. And without having the change in our hearts, we will find ourselves living in a world that perpetuates everything that goes against our feminine sensibilities.
Brahma Kumari leader Sister Jayanti addressed this point at a conference on conflict resolution in Sweden in 2001. She said, “It would only take a relatively small group of committed individuals to initiate the transformation of human consciousness to a more positive caring society. The beliefs of the minority reaching the point of critical mass will shift the majority and creative a culture of peace.”
If we’re talking about getting rid of the old, outdated patriarchal ways of running the world, it’s essential to present a pragmatic vision of what we want to replace it with. We need an overall blueprint of what a what new world, based on principles of the sacred feminine, would look like and how it would work. The primary foundation for such a world is co-operation. First and foremost, it’s co-operation between male and female As women, we know that the best most efficient way to get things done is to work together, and that means living and working men in harmonious coexistence, valuing the perspectives and strengths of both sexes and creating a higher quality of life for all. It must also be a world of co-operation between business and community, human beings and the planet, national governments and nongovernmental organisations, young and old, spirituality and science, and our inner and outer selves.
The opportunity to create this world does exist now. It is possible to create a society where we can bring people together and heal our families, our communities and our world. To do so would take a new breed of leaders, ones who aren’t tied to the old way of doing things. Rather than money or power, these leaders must have spiritual values to guide them. And since spiritual values are at our core, it is vitally important for women to step up and take the lead in this transformation of society.
A cooperative society is an organic, evolutionary step away from the world we presently live in. When the power of national governments diminishes, that power will naturally transfer into specific small and large networks which transcend national boundaries and link with one another. Consequently, a new economic order could be created that truly rewards effort, including the caring of others. Distribution of land and natural resources would be fairly shared among the people who live on it, and the need to conquer and repress others in the name of power would not be a consideration.
Cooperative ways of working together, whether in agriculture or small enterprise networks that encourage individual creativity instead of exploiting workers, would develop gradually as this new feminine paradigm took hold. And in a cooperative society based on a feminine perspective, training in technology skills would be open for all, and education in understanding and respecting the differences between cultures and beliefs of others would become an intrinsic element of society. Traditional and holistic medicine would integrate, creating a new science that treats and cures disease based in part on sensible nutrition, exercise and meditation. Our senior citizens would be revered and respected, keeping our history, both personal and societal, alive. Men and women would create new kinds of relationships – sexual and platonic – based on mutual respect and love, rather than selfish needs and society’s expectations. We would have freedom of choice in how we wished to live every aspect of our lives.
Yes, it is a somewhat Utopian vision – but we must believe that it is also possible to achieve it. Our personal responsibility in making all this come about is to first bring ourselves into the same sort of harmonious balance we wish to see the world in. By finding a state of peace within us where we stay calm and balanced, we can project a sense of love and creativity to those we engage with. Through our feminine principles, we can achieve a natural state of being that is connected with others. It is then up to us to live within our own cooperative world. Only when we achieve this personally can we begin to create a true, feminine future.
