Making Change

Building relationships through compassion and moral reasoning has a distinctive effect on the future of a country and its ability to reconcile with its past. There are specific ways to train the mind and incorporate this training into a new approach to education. We need more compassion, moral reasoning training, focus on the future, and focus on habit formation and mind training to flourish as a society and truly heal the conflicts that are holding us back from a sustainable future. 

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There will be 1.5 billion senior citizens across the planet by 2050, and there is an immense opportunity for them to participate the productivity and meaningfulness of the human endeavor. Come listen to how I propose this happens. 

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Good information, bad information and how to know the difference, this episode offer the skills of the mind to discern current events in a more informed way that makes positive change in the world and in ourselves. Have a listen to what happened to the ship and the bridge, reactions to that event in the media, and what we can learn! 

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In this week’s episode, Dr. Marc Gopin explores the concept of Deepening Democracy and how it is essential in our polarized United States. Deepening democracy and the celebration of democracy are critical to the way we need to think on a day-to-day basis. We need to celebrate the ideas of democracy. We need holidays not about presidents, not about heroes, and not about extraordinary figures. Instead, we need to celebrate freedom or the Bill of Rights. We need to celebrate the idea of people having to work together for compromise and sharing of power. There is a way for us to be kinder, smarter, and more cooperative in the United States. But it takes education, it takes making our best democratic ideas into a focal point of 1) our intellectual, cognitive, and emotional development, and 2) our social lives together as a nation of shared rituals, habits and celebrations.

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"We need our minds working together on a philosophy of life, looking at the world around us in a way that is filled with love." - Dr. Marc Gopin

In this week’s episode, Dr. Gopin explores how “The Love of this World” is an essential ingredient for the survival of the Earth’s biosphere. By focusing on how we can positively change our minds to change the world, this episode probes the way in which getting past humanity’s threat to the future of life on Earth depends upon our collectively finding ways to express an intense love of this world. We can develop a philosophy and a spirituality that embraces not only the Earth but all of humanity, even when we fight and oppose one another.

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In this episode, Dr. Marc Gopin interviews Dr. Heidi Ravven, Professor of Religious Studies at Hamilton University, on the urgency of embracing election celebrations for the future of democracy. As they have stated in print (https://thehill.com/opinion/campaign/559308-celebrate-voting-a-different-approach-to-securing-a-democratic-american ), we Americans urgently need to safeguard the future of democracy through a creative and ritual embrace of the right to vote for every single American citizen, a celebratory approach to voting that will bind us together as one country.

One of the interesting things about America is its civil religion. We need to think about how we engage emotions in American civil religion much more carefully. How, Marc Gopin and Heidi Ravven ask, can we engage emotions in a way that brings us together as Americans, rather than the current way in which politics and social media tear us apart? American civil religion means everything that we do that makes us feel American with a kind of sacred devotion. The Fourth of July is a prime example because it brings together Americans in ceremony. Such celebrations are important in terms of freedom and equality, and they can be used to define us as Americans. Our basic moral belief in elections as a human right can be celebrated through ceremonies and rituals that acknowledge our identity as Americans. Political polarization tends to distort the brain of most citizens, driving us to obsess about how we are completely different from each other.

In Making Change's latest episode, Dr. Heidi Ravven makes the case for how much we actually have in common in terms of shared values of pluralism, respect, and equality. This is the first step, emotionally and psychologically, towards building a better relationship to the democratic process and towards elections. Elections can become a focus of many rituals, customs and ceremonies that will bring us together as a nation of common ethical values rather than a nation headed toward fragmentation.

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"We need to learn from what helps dementia patients to cope and to feel loved. We need to look at ourselves in society as patients in need of care, as patients who often cannot remember moment to moment why we should be together as a country, why we should take care of each other, or why we should be good to each other, regardless of political or religious stance."- Dr. Marc Gopin

Here are some of the things that work with dementia patients and also could work with our whole society when we forget to love and care for each other: 1. Greetings of care, 2. Focusing on positive emotions, 3. Deep breathing, 4. Smiles, 5. Making safe environments, and 6 Repeating ourselves again and again to reassure and guide. These ways of being with dementia patients are also lessons that we need to learn about ourselves when we are at our most vulnerable and confused, as we are today as a society. We must focus on the present, the here and now, the moment-to-moment gestures of compassion and care. We must be infinitely patient to build local and national politics together. Politicians' jobs are to fight for control, but our job as citizens is to band together and build a society that is safe, prosperous, and equal for everyone.

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We are living through a time of American history when a system of political enemies pitted against each other is the worst in memory. This is occurring significantly even within families, but especially between different geographic areas of town, suburbs, and countryside. We have separate places to get our news, separate places to socialize, and separate places of worship. We are living apart increasingly along political divides that never occurred before, as if we are two tribes dividing up and preparing for warfare.

History and science suggest that this is the beginning of stigmatization, hatred, and violence. But we do have a choice. We can choose to humanize each other across enemy divides, and we can especially seek out those who are angry, unhappy, and miserable. Empathy with those in misery may be a way out of serious American conflict. We will explore how in this podcast. 

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"What is true security? Some people argue it is loving everyone who comes into your country. Other people think it is about being very careful, about not letting anyone in and about carefully examining each case of an immigrant. Together, we can discover bipartisan efforts of dealing with immigration properly and ethically. We can truly make our country one of homeland security."Using the show Star Trek’s motto of “Go where no man has gone before”, Dr. Marc Gopin illustrates how since the dawn of time, humans have always traveled from one area to the next with a spirit of exploration. As he analyzes the United States’ expansion of democracy and the start of many wars in the pursuit of power, Dr. Gopin argues that true homeland security can be found not in the building of walls but instead in our common moral values of love, compassion, and respect for one another. Follow us on Facebook: fb.me/MakingChangePodcastFor questions and comments, please reach out at [email protected]

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