“not necessarily the ideal values”
In this book we use the term “worldview” interchangeably with the words story, narrative, context or right view. Our worldview is the story we tell ourselves, the story we live by. Our decisions support our worldview and justify our beliefs. Without self-examination of our beliefs, attitudes and values we will never lift ourselves out of the story of suffering that we are creating every day.
The dominant worldview in America and around the world encourages us to seek satisfaction and security by the pursuit of material wealth, fame and power. This worldview is the basis of our inability to create a government and institutions that work for us, not against us.
Pundit Ross Douthat believes he has seen through the symptoms of policy differences to the role that the worldview of individuals and collectives plays in determining human behavior. “According to Donald Trump’s Republican defenders [2019], the impeachment spectacle unfolding in Washington D.C. is all about policy differences rather than presidential misconduct, with career foreign policy bureaucrats cooking up excuses to remove a president whose worldview they disdain.”[i]
The failure of modern civilization would not surprise most of us because it is manifested in our inability to create a world that is filled with peace, joy, harmony and freedom. That failure, like all human failure has its genesis in our worldview.
Human behavior is explained by a person’s worldview, which then determines his identity, and in turn drives his behavior. This is the “structure” of human consciousness. In Simple Reality we ruthlessly examine our beliefs, attitudes and values and truthfully look at where they are leading us.
Insight # 1 comes to us from Rollo May (1909-1994) an American psychologist and author. He developed an existential and humanistic approach to psychology where he favored the individual’s strengths, internal resources, and abilities to make better decisions.
“The belief in individual competition [seeking power] and reason [intellectual understanding] … are the ones which in actuality have guided modern Western development and are not necessarily the ideal values.”[ii]
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Additional Reading:
- Worldview, The ABC’s of Simple Reality, Vol 2
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[i] Douthat, Ross. “Trump Against the Professionals.” The New York Times Sunday Review. November 17, 2019, p. 11.
[ii] May, Rollo. Man’s Search For Himself. New York: Norton 1953, p. 45.
