Have you ever been entranced by a flock of birds flying in formation and wondered about their togetherness? Recently, I watched a documentary entitled “The Migration of Penguins.” These birds do not fly, but they know how to huddle together in defiance of the subzero cold and turbulent wintry gusts of the Antarctic. Their togetherness defines their survival. The ducks below my window are also together: they arrive and depart the local pond as one unit. I never see a lone duck there. And, of course, ducks fly in triangular formation just like migratory birds. Canadian Geese, for example, traverse my sky twice per year. The lead bird at the point of the triangle always points due north or south according to the season and the promise of warmer venues. But birds are not alone in finding security in cooperative groups. There are elk, deer, zebra, buffalo, and so on, that find security in herds, as well as social animals that feel compelled to live in tribes and communities. We humans, like all primates, are amongst the later. As I pondered this fact, I thought of the word “congregation.” It comes from two Latin words—con-, “together” and grex, “flock, herd, crowd”—that capture this symbiotic relationship. My initial association was that of a simile: we are like other animals in our need to form close structured relationships with our own kind. We may not always find it necessary to huddle together against the cold, march in formation, or line up together in subways or food courts. But we do have a basic need and compulsion to organize ourselves with rules, customs, and conventions that keep us together as a functioning society. We are like other congregations of life forms or species on our planet.

But there is more than a simile here. Did you know that the human body contains many life forms that are not human? In fact, our human genes are outnumbered 10 to 1 by the genes of other species cohabitating in our bodies. These parasitical species that live in us actually serve us, enabling many functions of our vital organs. Without them, we could not survive. (As a parenthetical note, recent studies have pointed out the threat antibiotics pose to these cohabiting life forms and, therefore, to us.) You see, the simile can be seen as a metaphor: each one of us is a congregation of life forms. A scientist, however, would not find a metaphor here, but a statement of fact: each of us is a colony of life forms. So what metaphor do I find in this fact? And how does my metaphor differ from the obvious simile with other animals?

The fact that we individuals are many is conceptual, but not experiential. I know that microbes and bacteria live in my body, but I experience myself as one person in mind, body and soul. My introspection uncovers only my lone existence. But is not this experience a microcosm of the world in which we live: one supreme consciousness, but myriad forms, both organic and inorganic. Now you might not “believe” in a world consciousness aware of itself. Physicists, however, have no better explanation for the quantum transformations at the heart of the universe. You might call this new physics metaphysics for it looks to a non-physical dimension to explain the discontinuity and non-locality of the forces underlying the visible world. It is because I can use the term “metaphysics” that I can see a metaphor in the collective existence of an individual composed of some 200 genomes, including the human genome. You see, each one of us mirrors the world: outwardly, the congregations of many life forms make up the world we inhabit; inwardly, we are a congregation composed of many life forms. Yet, upon reflection, each one of us is only aware of his/her self. Would the creative consciousness at the heart of quantum physics be aware of anything other than itself as the dynamic source of everything?

If you can accept a non-physical dimension—a quantum consciousness—at the heart of everything, then you can see the metaphor I see in the human individual as a congregation of life forms. Every human being is reflective of all that is. Perhaps the best expression of this metaphor is the ancient Sanskrit often quoted by Joseph Campbell: “Thou art that.”

The story of the tower of Babel presents a conundrum that has ever shadowed human history. In Genesis, God seemed wary of what Babylonians might accomplish since they all spoke the same language: “And the Lord said, ‘Truly, they are one people and they all have the same language. This is the beginning of what they will do. Hereafter they will not be restrained from anything which they determine to do’ (Genesis, 11:6).” And so He “confused” their speech and scattered them all over the earth. As a consequence, that tower designed to reach to the very heavens would never be completed. What was true in Genesis is still true today: little can be accomplished without communication and cooperation.

Biblical scholars would deftly point out that the story of Babel tells us that God wanted Hebrew to be the primary language reserved for the use of His people in their promised land. Gentiles would never be as united as the Jews since they spoke dissimilar languages and were broadly dispersed. But even today Hebrew is not the universal language of all Jews, not even in Israel. Moreover, however true it may be that language unites and identifies a people, it does not always result in effective communication and cooperation. Several European countries, for example, tried to make language the unifying element in the establishment of empires. But the colonial system eventually crumbled. Likewise, Russian was always the “official” language of the Soviet Confederation, but it did not hold that empire together either. Although Genesis tells us how the building of a ziggurat can be stopped, it also implies that, unrestrained, the Babylonians might have accomplished “anything they determine to do.” After all, they were “one people,” implying that they were of one mind. Even though there are those who have argued that a universal language and shared values might lead to a new world order where peace and justice would reign, I think history tells us the path to this utopia is filled with potholes and detours. Countries may conquer their neighbors and reengineer their linguistic and cultural forms, but they cannot compel cooperation. Something else, much more subtle, is required.

The difference in language and culture is not the main obstacle to a stable world order where peace and justice are secured for all. In fact, that difference is merely a feature of an underlying reality. We perceive things after our own individual fashion, even to the extent of disagreeing on the facts. We build a meaningful framework for ourselves where all the puzzle pieces can be neatly fit. That framework is based upon our personal life experiences to include not only our familial, social, and cultural context, but also our freely chosen path through life’s maze of options. In a very real sense, we create the milieu of our personal lives: it could be said that we traverse our lifespans in an ambient allusion. Truly, the Babylonians had no more difficulty in building their tower than we do today, navigating amidst all the “isms,” self-interests, and biases that intersect in our contemporary media storm. Nevertheless, progress is somehow made, but how? Take the American political system as an example. It is built around a check and balance system where compromise is required. But compromise too often leads to mediocre or half-baked solutions: when all self-interests are served, sometimes the best solution is bypassed. In our diverse society, various group moral codes can conflict over issues of life, death, and the very foundation of social organization (e.g., abortion, contraception, torture, the social safety net, the justification for preemptive force, the role of government in the lives of private citizens, and so on). And yet, over time, this dissonance in our society is often overcome or banished with the dissolution of a failed social structure, like slavery. Whether it is the fall of Rome, the end of feudalism, or democratically inspired revolutions, history provides many examples where tipping points are reached and humanity leaps forward. What inspires such change? And how can we grapple with our problems today to bring about the next leap forward?

Well, I believe we need to change the context. My myopic perspective, honed from my life’s experience, will not likely provide the answer; and nor will yours. We need a broader perspective that bridges the individual to the collective. Art, for example, lives in the creative world of imagination where inspiration is collective. Observing a work of art is the act of participating in that initial inspiration. That participation needs no common language, for it is a priori the basis of subsequent expression. The indefinable emotions that arrest our mind before nature’s power, the source of human suffering, or our mortality are transcendent of our ego psyche. These experiences are not only shared by all of us, but are expansive of the individual perspective. It is in this manner that the collective will can take a discontinuous leap forward and overcome moral boundaries that justify the suppression of women and minorities, the exercise of preemptive force over a non-threatening people, the accumulation of power and resources to the exclusion of the vast majority, and so on. Framing a new context means being open to intuition, that receptivity to the light that shines universally in each one of us. The founders of our constitutional government, for example, shared a common vision that breached individual differences. They were equally inspired to recognize a fundamental truth: any social structure must secure life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all. As a result, America is now the oldest democracy in the world. What new vision can unite a world where language barriers will no longer inhibit the spread of ideas? Could we face a future energy crisis or the specter of a polluted planet with diminished resources if we viewed our context more universally than corporate, national, or regional perspectives? Would not what inspired the Dutch to build dykes motivate every sea-level city from New York to San Francisco to Hong Kong to take similar measures? Or, because a rising sea has no impact on Dallas, Seattle, Berlin or Beijing, would we fail to act as one people? In other words, would we simply fail to see the broader context?

Of course, that broader vision alone will not in itself breach the boundaries I reference. We need compassion for each other—for all races and gender—beyond the restrictions of language, culture, religious beliefs, and physical distance. But before compassion can even be fired in our hearts, we need the light of a collective awareness. Each of us exists within and depends upon the life support systems of a tiny planet, revolving around an inconsequential star in one of many galaxies. We are, in fact, “one people,” alike in nature AND in circumstance. “This is the beginning of what they will do,” else we (“they”), scattered and confused, will accomplish nothing.

It is true that we humans are wired to make sense of our lives. But when that sense is focused on ego and personal context, humanity as a whole makes no sense at all.

Yesterday I walked in a sunlit drizzle, wondering what the forecast would bring. Would the sky open up into a warm spring day? The temperature was about 70 degrees. Or would the clouds convene into a darkened shroud and unleash a downpour? There were already reports of flooding in my area. The northwesterly winds that normally bring our cold winter rains had ceased for the last two years, leaving most of California in drought conditions. But the clouds that hung over my landscape on this day came from the more tropical south, carried on a Jetstream that has wreaked havoc for the entire United States. Our normal winter pattern has been interrupted by this Jetstream which has carried our winter north, where the polar front bounced it southward to entrench the eastern half of the country in rain, snow and ice. Whether I was to be drenched or warmed, clearly my only choice was to walk in a sunlit drizzle. Life has its risks, including everything from a rare spring deluge to death itself.

Our species has lived on this planet for a very brief part of its history. Yet we have developed timeless world views to explain our place within it. In much of human pre-history, our forebears believed that life never ends: the cave bear returns as does the buffalo; life extended beyond death, ever to return in various forms. With the advent of agriculture, the cycle of planting, harvesting and seeding brought the system of death and rebirth into our world view. Nearly all our orthodox religions have mythologized these two perspectives into their structure and organization. We either believe in immortality of some sort and/or the need to surrender to death in order to be reborn into new life.

It has long been believed that only humans are aware of their own mortality. I’m not sure this belief is valid, since we cannot get into the mind of other animals. Elephants, for example, recognize themselves in a mirror. The ability to objectify one’s self is the first step to visualizing your future self—and therefore your death. Whales clearly become kamikaze when a whaler kills their mate. Life without this lifelong bond seems not worth living to them. Choosing death over survival presumes acceptance of death—and that acceptance seems to presume awareness. Nevertheless, it is clear that animals have not developed world views or religions to help them deal with life’s uncertainties or even with their own mortality. We have. But have we cheated death, the mysterium tremendum?

The word “religion” comes from the Latin verb religere, “to bind or link back.” Like the word “yoga”—which means “yoke” or “bind”—religion is the experience of connecting to the source of life and consciousness. What else could a sentient, self-conscious being connect to, other than to all that is? For in our minds we can conceive all that we observe and conjecture the rest. We can relate to things, because we share their substance. We can relate to living organisms, because we are the same. We can relate to the patterns we find in nature—the laws and organization of matter and energy—because we pattern our lives and societies after conventions and laws we create for ourselves. My point is that religion is not a static belief system, but a living experience. The belief systems of organized religion may differ on particulars (and you are free to believe in any one of them), but they cannot exist without the experience of connection to the world we inhabit. Intrinsic to that connection is foreknowledge and acceptance of death.

And so I continued my walk yesterday, pondering life’s many uncertainties. Like the weather, I suddenly realized I had very little control over much of my life, including my death. All that I am or will be is no more than the flicker of a candle that will eventually burn out many eons after my time. And yet I was walking in the midst of it all, alive and aware of what overshadowed my every step. But this was not the time to entertain anxieties and fears. There may be devastating floods or springtime birdsong. It is all the same. The Buddhists say one must participate with joy in the sorrows of the world. Likewise, I think it best to walk blithely in a sunlit drizzle.

Why do dogs show such little interest in TV? My dog used to sleep at my feet while I watched the screen. Her only reaction to the set was an occasional show of irritation at its noise. What did interest her was a patch of grass or bark where she seemed entranced for extended periods. My initial assessment of her was that she would rather smell than see, until one day a nature program explained the mystery about my dog’s peculiar perception apparatus. It seems that dogs process images much faster than us; and, of course, their sense of smell is several hundred times as sensitive as ours. The latter knowledge did not surprise me. But the fact that she did not share my view of TV was a revelation. She saw a slide show where I perceived moving images. Suddenly, the references to “dog years” made sense: my dog lived more in the moment than I—at least when she wasn’t snoozing. Although I have already outlived her in human years, she lived longer in the moments of her life then I have in dog years. My life term has yet to reach a conclusion whereas hers has. By this yardstick, she lived a fuller life then I have as yet.

So why should I take notice of this difference between our species? Well, it turns out that many species have more acute senses than us. And in that fact lies a lesson for human kind. Have you ever noticed how time seems to fly by, especially when you are caught up in your daily activities? You rise in the morning, go to work, and return at night day after day. We often pass our time like a metronome, repetitive, non-stop, ever advancing towards tomorrow’s yesterday. Of course, we can’t hold back time’s relentless progress. But we can slow down the metronome, take in more of the moment, and, in effect, extend our lifetime.

My dear reader, hug you child, smile at your coworker’s silly joke, hold a sunset in your gaze, inhale deeply life’s invigorating air, and live the moments of your life. I wish you all well!

Often in this blog, you have borne with me as I assumed that individual differences were beneficial to human progress. America, in particular, is the grand “melting pot” where peoples from other lands and cultures intermingle, creating new energy, innovation, a broadening social awareness, and an expanding workforce. But I have also written about the failure of legislators to find common ground, about the absence of dialogue in debates at all levels in our society, and the illusions we create to preserve our self-image as a people and as individuals. What is the basis for this disparity in my view? Well, I think I can best explain myself by recounting what I expect is a relatable experience: watching a football game with a relative.

My father spent the better part of his adult life in the Los Angeles area, whereas mine, was in the San Francisco Bay area. Our sports’ loyalties seem to have been formed by this divergence. After my mother passed, Dad moved to northern California to be closer to his family. It was a blessing to spend time with him on a regular basis, including the ritual of watching Sunday football games together. The problem, of course, is that we viewed the game from different perspectives, especially when our team loyalties conflicted. Arguments constantly arose over which team was more brutal, what penalty was justified, or what foul was missed by the referee. The psychological term for these disagreements is cognitive bias. We were not alone in seeing the world as defined by all our previous perceptions and experiences. The human brain fills in the blanks in our limited view of the world from its reservoir of past experiences, some of which were freely chosen and some, merely conditioned by society and circumstances. What happened between my father and me on those Sunday game days is reminiscent of what we see around us every day. Politicians, for example, only see scandal in the opposing party. In the business world, corporate “culture” can determine a person’s work appraisal and promotion eligibility. When an outlier in these circumstances proposes that our diversity is our strength, that we are one nation united by a common bond, or that an individual’s contribution to an organization can’t be measured solely by some generic yardstick, those proposals can fall on deaf ears. To some extent each of us is deaf and mute, for we naturally tend to hear and speak past each other. This is the curse of our unique perspective on the reality that surrounds us.

Those football arguments with my father were a source of embarrassment for me. I loved my father and couldn’t understand how I allowed myself to be pulled into those trivial disagreements. Of course, our meetings always ended with hugs; our affection for each other could not be altered by personal team alliances. But love alone did not prevent these mini-brouhahas on game days. Eventually, I did find the remedy: I pretended to root for my Dad’s team. In other words, I tried to see things through his eyes. Suddenly, my team seemed to deserve more penalties; and my Dad’s team sometimes seemed more sportsmanlike than mine. Watching a game with my Dad became much more enjoyable without the embarrassment and stress that I had previously brought to our shared time together. A side benefit was the fact that I became more appreciative of both sides in the football game. Even a bad call by the referee did not unnerve me, for I realized he was just as limited as I was in my perception.

We are not born with intact egos, but grow into them. Once we discover ourselves as “subjects” in a world of “objects,” we become the epicenter of all our experiences with the world around us. The problem, of course, is that this personal prism through which we see everything can be our prison. The world is in fact multifaceted. Its many refracted surfaces should offer us clues to the mysteries we leave undiscovered. To embark on that journey of discovery, we actually have to move beyond our limited perspectives and engage with the “other.” But how does one move beyond personal ego? Well, in order to see and live the game of life from another perspective, one must first admit our own propensities and exclusiveness. Then one must “tune in” to other viewpoints—truly listen, not just to others, but to the reality that stands outside us. Transcending an egocentric perception can become a mind-boggling experience, where, like a gymnast, you can leap from one position to another. The world becomes a diamond of such brilliance that it dazzles differently with every turn of the mind. The ego is diminished by its luster, while life becomes a learning experience—an adventure into its unfolding mysteries. We learn to value only what we can personally conceive, rather than what we have assumed from past conditioning. Our individual perception becomes self-transcendent; and our values evolve as our own rather than as the unexamined prescriptions of our past experience.

Most often we tend to interpret our differences in terms of values. For example, Fox and MSNBC news subscribe to opposing political positions. Christians and Muslims seem unable to reconcile the difference between social justice and Sharia law. Jews and Arabs disagree on the one true God and His chosen people. But, if you look beneath the surface, we find these differing values represent justifications for limited views of reality. News outlets report the same event from totally different perspectives. Christians and Muslims can live together in harmony whenever they rid themselves of the conditioned viewpoint that defines each other as enemy combatants. And the fight between Jews and Arabs is really over land rather than principle, so their struggle has more to do with occupancy than religion. So at all levels of society, our disagreements are more about facts than values. The latter serve as faux justifications for myopic perspectives.

To conclude, self-awareness is not only the beginning of wisdom, but the necessary steppingstone to a collective awareness. Without this step forward in our individual lives, it will never be possible to extend the moral boundaries of our value systems to include every human being on this planet. Whether human perception is a curse or a blessing depends upon the ability of individuals to break the bonds of ego and to live in the collective as a true participant in our common progress.

Since Americans believe in the pursuit of happiness, the expression “Happy New Year” should seem especially appropriate. We are the “can do” people of our time. But to the “old world” colonial powers, we often appear naïve. To the rest of the world, we appear willing to solve international problems that are intransigent, even to the extent of engaging our economic and military power. When faced with failure, we abandon the field to others and reengage elsewhere. In this iterative process, we don’t lose colonies we never established or imperial prestige and power we never sought. We simply regroup, sometimes after a period of withdrawal from the world stage, and reengage elsewhere. When one travels to the imperial cities of Europe—London, Paris, Vienna, or Rome, for example—the sense of awe can be equally tinged with nostalgia for what has been lost. For, in those cities, there must be an undercurrent of sadness below the surface of pride in place and origin. We Americans have for the most part been immune to such feelings of great loss. In general, we anticipate better days ahead, without remorse for past failures. Civil war, economic traumas, civil unrest, disastrous foreign interventions seem unable to unhinge what others might term our naïve faith in our future happiness. The French, perhaps understandably, may feel ennui; and the Germans may show some regret for past excesses in nationalist fervor. But we Americans are just simply optimistic about our future.

Many magazines publish specialty issues at this time of the year around the same topic, a forecast of the New Year. The year 2014 is predicted to promise another NASA mission to Mars and several resupply missions to the international space station, including the first manned flights in rockets not made and operated by NASA, but by private companies. In fact, the future of private enterprise is touted in many financial publications: 2014 promises an expansive and profitable global economy led by the American market. There will be new breakthroughs in genetic research, possible cures for specific cancers, growing energy independence, continued reductions in Federal deficit spending, and the promise of new labor saving inventions that will further ease the mundane burdens of everyday life. Of course, there are those negative forecasters who remind us that the hourglass continues to run down on issues such as global warming, the impending time bomb of economic disparity, desalination of our oceans, and the loss of ecological diversity, arable land and drinking water sources. These latter issues seem not of immediate concern and can’t compete with the prospects for better economic news on the horizon and with projected American achievements in space, in the global market, or even in the upcoming Olympic Games. Our myopic view of the future reminds me of the words of a very astute senator of a bygone era. Although satirized by Juvenal, I believe it was Cicero who first decried the Roman Senate’s policy of assuaging the masses with panem et circenses (bread and circuses) while busying the legislative agenda with short-term, often self-serving policies, in lieu of the republic’s future interests and actual betterment. In our time, the Roman Senate’s influence is reprised not only by our government, but by our free press. Moreover, that influence often abets a basic aspect of our national character: we Americans tend to be optimistic. We believe we can solve any and all problems, even those that seem endemic to our way of life: stress can be relieved by medication; (mainly) urban violence, by incarceration; marital problems, by divorce; social alienation or personal limitations, by money, title and/or power over others. But these bromides are not the solutions that touch our daily lives and cannot be a basis for personal optimism.

It is not my intent to demean anticipated American achievements in space, economic dominance or the Olympic Games. These endeavors are promising and truly laudatory if realized. But they are not sufficient justification for a naïve and stilted vision of future prospects for Americans. In fact, they have little or no bearing on our individual success or failure in the game of life. They are merely contexts, along with everything else not directly connected with the daily choices we make in our lives. Is context important? Of course it is. But there are happy and fulfilled people living in our slums and in the war torn countries we’ve vacated (I’ve met more than a few personally). Their optimism is not based upon things outside of their control, but upon themselves. Certainly, like all of us, they hope for a better future. But they rely on their individual abilities to learn how to adapt to their circumstances, to create value and meaning in their everyday activities, to connect with and love the people in their lives, and to discover the uplifting virtue of gratitude for the experience of being alive. In the end, optimism is not something given to us by government or circumstances. It is a right we have to claim for ourselves. Otherwise, that right will be usurped by a sham.

Our lives are short, but the process of human evolution continues. Each of us is a seed—part of the new crop and the next harvest. So I remain optimistic and wish for you all a very happy new year.