Hello Love!
In case you missed it, please go check out Part One of this post.
Now onto part two!
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Spirituality As A Mirror For The Economy Of The Time:
In this time, things were sold to us based on their utility, how long they would last, their durability and how they helped you fit INTO society. Our spirituality was the exact same. It was tradition. It had stood the test of time. It was old. Our ‘channeled’ works (Ie. the bible and all other holy books - yes, these were channelled or writings of people who were channelling God) were celebrated and trusted because they were general, applied to everyone the same, gave us a foundation to follow and we LIKED that it was OLD. It made us have a respect for institutions, which then bled into not questioning the monarchy and institutions of inherited power and wealth. Of inherited status one couldn't hope to change. Our spiritual advisors gave the same advice to all of us. No one was special. No one was different. That was what we liked about it. It helped us feel if we did what we were told, we would fit in, and in this fitting in we would be safe. We wanted the comfort of something that worked for a long time, and worked for everyone. Just like our goods. It was all what helped us survive in society. It held up the status quo.
We were sold a spirituality that fit with how we were understanding the cosmos - be good, follow the rules, fit in, and you will be rewarded. We were projecting our human made systems onto GOD then looking to GOD to tell us how to fit in so we could survive.
Again, this is all thinking that served the market. Each one doing their part for less than what they needed or just enough to survive, keeping meek and humble, believing this self sacrifice would lead to reward later, not questioning our place, respecting those with more power than us, policing ourselves and our own behavior via. moral teachings - it all served to keep the economy top down. All of the means of production and most of the wealth - and the benefits that came with that wealth like technology, medicine and provision - staying at the top, and everyone else serve to generate that wealth and sacrificing it to those in power. This was how it was all the way through the industrial revolution, through the world wars, through factory work and to the end of the 1940's. It was all service to the whole as a virtue.
Then came the rise of individualism.
Slowly and over time, we were shifting away from monarchs and systems of power that were OBVIOUS to us, to more covert systems of wealth hoarding - so that the people wouldn't be so suspicious or so ready to rebel against the elites.
People were getting sick of being held down, large groups of people weren't buying into the idea that those at the top deserved to be there anymore, and there was a call for more equal distribution of resources. To get around this, the system shifted to protect the wealthy by exploiting this desire for individually. Capitalism was created as a kind of liberation - but it was a wolf in sheeps clothing.
Rather than actually shifting how things operated on a fundamental level, there we superficial changes made to the structure that gave the illusion of freedom where freedom still didn't actually exist.
In reality, our new, ‘liberated’, capitalist - ‘every man for himself’ - system wasn’t actually different - the wealth was all still hoarded at the top by those who controlled the means of production and everyone else had to follow the rules and fit into their dictates in order to be given access to goods and services. But now this was all done under the guise of those at the top having 'earned' their right to be there, giving way to the belief that ‘if you work hard enough and if you do the right thing you won’t just be rewarded with enough - you could get MORE than you need. You could become one of the elites. You can work your way to the TOP - beyond just surviving - you can be RICH TOO.’ This was used as a tool to keep people compliant within a rigged system. It gave rise to the idea that if your life sucked, it was because you were making poor choices.
It was all up to you.
Wealth Was Still Hoarded At The Top, And All Innovation Was Assumed By The Elites
The wealth generated in the 'New World' was generated on the backs of slavery, exploitation and artificial inflation of market good prices being manufactured by people who weren't getting paid fairly for their labor. The only way that our 'New World' wealth was possible was through false means. But again the narrative was such that people didn't see this. Old World religion was still being used as a tool to keep people sacrificing themselves, and rules of morality and piety still held a lot of sway over people.
Through the decades, due to the incredible wealth being produced and through multiple people being given access to high levels of ownership - we saw more and more people coming out of poverty as they 'contributed' to the economy. It started to become obvious that having only a select few doing all the controlling was actually LESS profitable than having larger numbers of people being given more than enough to simply survive, and thus being able to innovate and generate more wealth along the way - to give back to the system. More and more people were able to climb out of poverty as there was some 'trickle down' of the wealth at the top to the average person. There was an awareness that to invest in the population - at least to a degree - created MORE wealth, not less. It was still very important that some groups be kept out, that some people stay poor, that not everyone have access - as a means of 'motivating' people to 'work hard' for less than they deserved (creating profit for those at the top), as a way of continuing to have a surplus of workers willing to work for wages that meant maximum profit for the owners of production, as a way of continuing to have groups that society allowed for the exploitation of due to being seen as irresponsible, criminal, lazy or 'other' and as a way of keeping more wealth than was fair for those at the top - but the idea of being an individual who was contributing something UNIQUE to the system become more and more a staple of expansion.
The more people we had identifying with what they created, the more we make it a virtue to be productive, innovative, sacrificing all of yourself to be a unique individual who DOES SOMETHING - the more people were willing to work ridiculous hours for next to nothing to build things that, once proven useful, would then garner a return on that time and energy investment as the people with all the wealth bought the innovations.
People got 'rich' for their inventions, their entrainment value, their skills - but it was still the INVESTORS - those who had always had the money - that were making MOST of the profit.
They were given just enough to be made examples of - 'look! You can become extravagant if you do something we all think is great! So work your butt off to prove yourself - and it's totally fair that anyone who ISN'T contributing in this way be in poverty because, hey, it's their fault.'
The system that was created still meant that ANY wealth generation served those already in positions of power - those doing the creating earned far less than what their time or product was worth - enough to be happy but it was those who had the capital to OWN the rights to the product, service or person that REALLY took home the paycheck - and those were the people who already had most of the wealth to begin with.
This new system where the wealthy simply invested in the work of others worked to generate even more wealth for the wealthy and ever before, while tricking those who were doing the actual labor into thinking they were getting a good deal.
This promise that if you did something useful, something valuable, if you worked hard enough and made something of yourself that you would be rewarded with wealth - and thus access and an easing of existential dread - motivated large portions of the population to do so much for so little, while feeling virtuous in the process.
Finding your special talent, your special gift, not expecting anything until you've proven yourself, the normalization of working long hours and the belief that if anyone didn't have enough, didn't have wealth, had issues, it was because THEY weren't WORKING hard enough was what served the market most here. In these times we saw less and less overt focus on the powers that be as being controlling everything - and the idea that if we didn't have what we needed we were individually failing because the system was set up so that anyone who did something useful would have enough, took over. All of a sudden our suffering was our fault for not being productive enough. There was less and less pointing the finger at the power structures - less blaming those with all the wealth for hoarding all of it - and a huge shift towards 'personal responsibility' which left those in power free to do whatever they wanted.
In reality, what was happening here was that marginalized groups were being criminalized, were being kept out of parts of society that would allow them to move up - education, access to well paying jobs, access to jobs that didn't require they sacrifice their health and wellbeing, social safety-nets, mental health structures, physical health structures and neighborhoods with proper sanitation and access to resources - and in this we had groups of people always in a state of manufactured insecurity. This led to things like crime, poverty and desperation, that in turn gave the state fodder to blame these people for the instability in culture in general, to make 'others' out of them, so that they could be criminalized, blamed, scapegoated and treated like second class citizens, and we would all go along with it.
We were constantly being sold the idea of not being safe and there not being enough - and those 'othered' in our society were coming for what you had, OR those in other nations were coming for your security. The massive investments most wealthy nations make in their militaries are NOT for national security purposes. Rather these investments are made so that we have a constant stream of soldiers that can go into parts of the world that have resources in order to TAKE those resources. Our governments again manufacture these ideas of other nations being a threat to our security, as a way of making us compliant with sending troops in so that we can gain control over resources. Sometimes there is a general intention to spread democracy/avoid any nation from moving into world domination, but again this is not the main reason.
The every man for himself ideal means that we don't believe in social well fare. We don't believe in investing in people's education, health care, mental health or any other form of support that would lead to a healthy society - again because we need people to be willing to WORK. Making everything we need in life something that can only be attained through working is the best way to convince a huge society to keep over producing when we already have enough resources to take care of everyone AND the technology to take care of everyone. We are all so afraid for ourselves, that we don't question those at the top who have hoarded SO much that literally everyone could be taken care of several times over if they simply redistributed their wealth FAIRLY.
People were being gaslit into the idea that our individual choices were the single cause of our experience, and in this those at the top could continue to exploit, hoard and make choices that were terrible for all of humanity - without anyone looking at them.
We were told we were all equal within the system, and if your life sucked if was because of you. This made us less empathetic towards those who were being exploited by the system - as we saw them as choosing to be unproductive - and it made us more and more self blaming for the problems of the world and the systems. It made us blame ourselves and our own psychology when we couldn't work hard enough or in a way that served the whole. It made us not question poor working conditions and inadequate pay. It made us simply accept terrible social programs and lack of social safety-nets within societies with MORE than enough wealth and resource to take care of everyone.
We have an awareness again that our systems aren't sustainable. We are seeing the plight of other nations and people groups though access to media more than ever before. We have less and less true social connection, as everyone is trying to 'look' the part of a successful, spiritual, worthy person, so as to try to create safety for themselves - safety that can NEVER exist in the system we have.
Trends have been manufactured to make sure that we CONSTANTLY feel like we are behind. That we don't have the right things, we don't have the right look, we don't have the right spirituality, aren't doing the newest and greatest diet - everything shifts and changes, there's always a new level to reach in whatever we're doing - because our system depends on this. If any of us were to feel secure, were to feel like we were or that we had enough, if any of us said 'ok I've found my groove and I'm going to just keep doing this' - our economy would literally collapse. The only way the rich keep getting richer and the rest of us can work to make enough to live, is because we are in a CONSTANT state of consumption. And if we aren't consuming, we are producing, because we have to over produce just as much as we over consume - often just to survive. We have been trained to feel guilty, lazy and bad if we stop, rest or pause to question - because if we WERE to realize how much of what we're participating in is a total fiction that leads to nothing but destruction - again the system would collapse. We have to constantly feel not enough in order to keep participating, in order to keep consuming and producing, even in the face of SEEING that we're ok.
It never feels like enough and THAT is driving us to our anxiety and depression more any anything. Even when it's objectively enough - it can't be, because then what?
The system we have is now fully DEPENDENT upon us constantly feeling insecure, constantly feeling like there isn't enough, constantly feeling like WE aren't enough to sustain the exploitation, corruption, lack of accountability for those leading the charge and the market economy.
The existential crisis is real.
What we're being told the cause is and the solutions are are totally manufactured.
It's not you.
We're becoming increasingly aware that the world was burning around us. We've started to have access to technologies that connected us in ways we'd never been connected before. We've started to see how the systems that were running the world were destroying people groups, portions of the earth, animal lives and so on - and those in power who were profiting off of all of these totally unsustainable practices turned the light back at us again - it's your fault that you're polluting. It's your fault that you feel incapable and stressed. It's your fault that your depressed. It's your fault that you don't know who you are, what your passion is and what you want in this life. It's your fault that you're lost in the rat race.
This existential dread wasn't because of us, wasn't because we weren't working hard enough, and it most certainly wasn't because there wasn't enough to go around.
No.
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Let's take one more pause here and let this sink in.
I'll see you next week for the final part!
<3
