“Mindfulness is a state of mind in which we realize that we are not our state of mind.”
Dechen Yeshe Wangmo

Thanks to a mention in Suzanne Taylor’s The Conversation dialogues, I came across a superb site put together by Jungian analyst and authorAnne Baring. Among other commentary well worth reading, she has this to say about our present global idealogical situation:

“Having survived the four totalitarian psychoses (when killing on a vast scale is legitimized by a belief system, whether religious or secular) of the last century in Germany, Russia, China and Japan (a fifth if Cambodia is included), it seems unbelievable that we are now seeing the rise of another. There seems to be no end to the endurance of the desire for absolute power and the ideologies which serve it, nor to the tragic credulity of vast numbers of people who look upon this desire as legitimate and even favoured by God. Religions which carry such rich treasures in their inheritance have also apparently taught people that the supremacy of their belief-system is what matters to God, not the way they treat other human beings. So power rather than compassion and relationship continue to rule the world and continue to cause unimaginable suffering.”

It’s back to this idea of being caught up in a particular spin (see the essayHoled in One, which has just been expanded and developed further, for a fuller explanation) that gives the illusion of the “rightness” of any one position, and the momentum fueling the desire to swallow up the entirety of existence within the same system of thought. The faster the spin, the greater its depth and intensity and its impact on the collective, and the greater the collateral damage when two well-spun systems collide.

It’s fascinating in this context that Sufi mystics have used whirling around on the spot as a means of meditation for centuries. Whirling forms part of their practices which work towards letting go of dualistic thinking (and therefore of the individual “self”), and realising the underlying unity of existence. Homeopathy (treating like with like) in action?