Written by Mathew Naismith
I should firstly point out what I mean about the inner voice
for those who don’t quite get what I am talking about here. The inner voice to
me is in relation to when the inner self speaks and speaks of inner wisdom and
knowledge; it’s the sprit or what First Nation people in America refer to as
the star in English.
East and West Mentalities:
Does it matter if one is of eastern or western thinking when trying to become
aware of this inner voice again? To a
point it does, when I talk about eastern and western thinking I’m not referring
to a race of people or the colour of one’s skin, what I am referring to is the
mentality of an ideology/philosophy.
It’s quite obvious western and eastern ideologies and philosophies are
different, not within the content itself but within the ideologies of such
content. What I am saying is it’s the
way we think about life itself that defines our mentality, for example, does
western mentality take in consideration of the tribe of the people before
themselves? How many people within a
town or city truly look at themselves as a collective, a tribe of people? This is why western mentality is more about
the self than the tribe, eastern mentality isn’t like this, the tribe comes
first and only then is the individual taken into consideration.
To me western mentality refers to individuality therefore
egotism however eastern mentality refers to the tribe (tribe mentality) therefore
the collective. It matters not if we are
born in an eastern or western thinking community as we can overcome this through
living as an individual or a collective.
Western mentality isn’t being just about the individual but also about separateness however this kind
of mentality seems to be slowly changing to a more tribe like mentality but it
has a long way to go. Sadly enough
though, easterners seem to be taking on this western mentality, losing their
own eastern mentality in the mean time for something more physically glamorous
rather than spiritually glamorous. What
is happening?
Ego Controlled Mentality:
It doesn’t matters what kind of mentality you take on or live your life by, we
all have to contend with the ego and it’s controlling ways, this is a never
ending battle that should always be fought otherwise the ego will take over
completely. Does tribal mentality have
to contend with the controlling factors of the ego? All the times but they are lucky because any
individual who becomes egotistical will know the tribe comes first, western
minded mentality lost this bond and it’s loyalty to the tribe long ago. This allowed the ego to take even more
control.
Eastern mentality has also suffered in the east, the Middle
East and China are good examples of this, they are losing their fight against
the controlling ego for the main reason I feel is because they have lost the
importance of the tribe. This has
allowed the ego to fill this void left over from losing this tribe mentality
(eastern mentality). How can we fight
the ego when all we are doing is living for ourselves and not the tribe?
Western mentality is also about positive thinking as opposed
to negative thinking but how positive is this thinking when we are about
ourselves and not the tribe? How many
positive people judge other people as being negative and ostracise them, is
this really positive? Of course not,
does this happen with a tribe like mentality?
It can’t for the main reason it’s never about the individual but the
tribe itself, the controlling ego just doesn’t play a part when the tribe
itself comes first, there is no actual individuality for the ego to be able to
gain control.
Western mentality gives us egotism which allows us to judge
that I am positive, this takes judgement to come to this conclusion, I judge
you negative therefore I must be positive.
The reason this doesn’t happen in a true tribal situation is there are
no negatives and positives to judge each other by, it’s more neutral.
Middle Eastern
Tribes: If we looked over at the Middle East at present, we will find
tribes fighting it out, these people are putting their tribe first, in this
case the tribes are reprehensive of different religions and factions of
religious sects, what is so good about tribal mentality when it obviously creates
conflicts?
At first glance these conflicts seem to be due to tribal mentality,
to a point that is correct however why are these tribes truly warring with each
other? Its’ to do with having different ideological principals to another
tribe, what is anyone expressing when they become destructive over principles? Egotistical, the more we conflict the more the
ego takes control and of course the more destructive we become. Eastern tribes have been warring for thousands
of years, what again is so good about tribal mentality when it obviously creates
conflicts?
Tribal Mentality:
It’s not the tribe itself that I’m trying to portray as something more constructive
but the constructiveness of tribal mentality itself, it’s the mentality of
being a tribe that is constructive. What
man has done is allowed the ego to take control of these tribes not the tribal
members taking control of the ego. A tribe is formed by many different and varied
people coming together as one, no one is exactly the same but the tribal mentality
has brought them together. What we don’t
do as a species is look at the whole of mankind as a tribe with different and
varied people coming together as one, we are still separate tribes like separate
people within a single tribe warring because of our differences which are
egoistically controlled. In a tribe not
controlled by ego and judgement, we don’t get this kind of conflict, yes there
are conflicts but they are soon dealt with by other tribal members.
To me having different ideological principles is no
different to people being different to each other, we are indeed one tribe, a
race of humans warring it out mainly because we are controlled by the controlling
factors of the ego. Could you imagine for one moment what it would be like not
living in an existence controlled by the ego but living differently to each
other under one tribe!! Yes religion has
tried to bring us under one tribe either passively or aggressively giving us
this constructive tribal mentality, this hasn’t worked for the main reason each
religion (a tribe) has allowed itself to be controlled by the ego. I should say here that not all religions
(tribes) have done this either. If we
truly lived collectively as one tribe, the tribal members wouldn’t become controlled
by the ego, any conflicts would be kept rather small.
Once we see ourselves as one tribe, we will judged each
other a lot less and in turn lessen our conflicts, also by seeing ourselves as
one tribe we will become a lot less ignorant of each other as we become a lot
more accepting of each other. As I have
said in past posts of mine, the controlling factors of the ego can only exist because of our ignorance, once we become more aware, our ignorance becomes a
lot less lessening the controlling grip that the ego has on us as a tribe not
tribes. Once we see ourselves as one
tribe, the inner voice will return, by seeing ourselves as one tribe is using
this inner voice.