Mind Your Mind

The pivotal chapter in Life After Doom is the 2nd chapter, “Welcome to Reality”, in which McLaren sketches four possible scenarios for the future:

Scenario 1 is Collapse Avoidance. Humankind will be able to avoid final collapse by waking up, joining together to do what is necessary to change course, and learning to live without destroying the earth we have. The needed changes will not come without great struggle and turbulence, and they will not come quickly.

Scenario 2 is Collapse/Rebirth. We will not come together and do what is necessary to live within our limits. Slow and gradual decline will continue, occurring over a longer period of time, and ending in collapse. Some percentage of humans will survive and regroup. They will rebuild their communities. Their societies will – necessarily – look different than ours because if they don’t irreversible, total collapse will certainly come.

Scenario 3 is Collapse/Survival. Humans will not work together to rebuild after collapse. They will live in a world of violence and oppression as they seek to survive. Brute survival will be the norm. Cultural and environmental conditions will be difficult.

Scenario 4 is Collapse/Extinction. This is mutually assured self-destruction. The collapse will destroy our systems, people, and the environment. War will break out that, given the technologies available, will be catastrophic for human survival. Most animal and plant life will suffer the same fate.

Chapter 3 is called “Mind Your Mind”. McLaren recognizes that the reality we are facing is not an easy one. He calls these scenarios “heartbreaking, mind-blowing – a body slam” and congratulates us for getting this far without throwing the book in the trash can.

Does McLaren know which of these scenarios is most likely to happen? No. He knows we are in for a bumpy, downhill ride, but he doesn’t know and will not predict which scenario will play out in the end.

In the meantime, we need to “mind our mind”. By that he means that we pay attention to the objective evidence around us (reality) as well as how we as individuals (and the group) are dealing with the data we receive.

There are three aspects of our self that determine how we react to our environment:

Our basic instinct is our survival instinct. This is what we need to keep us alive. It is often referred to as the seven F’s of survival: “our instincts or reflexes to feed, fight, flee, freeze, fawn, flock or….mate.” (39)

Then there is the belonging aspect. “It motivates me to not only care about my own survival, but also the survival of my family and herd. It motivates me to protect and be protected, to feel attachment and show affection, to be sociable and stay connected.” (40)

Finally, there is the drive for meaning. This drive “organizes my experience in stories with beginnings, middles and ends. It helps me think critically, creatively and independently.” (40)

These three facets of our being interact with each other and determine our thoughts, feelings and decision-making, especially in times of crisis. They can feel to us like confusion, as we react to different stimuli and try to make the best decisions for us and those we care about.

“Minding our mind” means that we become aware of what is going on around us and inside of us, looking for ways to welcome reality, process it and move forward in healthy ways.

McLaren suggests two ways we can “mind our mind”.

The first is that we “learn to speak our mind in circles of trust.” (43) We build bridges of trust with others so that we can share what is going on around and inside of us in a safe, non-anxious environment, in which we can seek clarity and decide how to proceed using wisdom from the group.

The second way to “mind our mind” is through “contemplation”. By this McLaren means that we disengage. We “allow the habitual patterns (of responding) to be interrupted, suspended. (We) put them all in the awareness mode rather than the negotiation mode, without allowing any single one of them to call the shots and dominate the others.” (44)

McLaren quotes Richard Rohr: “Contemplation is meeting all the reality you can bear.” (44)

There are a myriad of techniques and ways to contemplate. Contemplation, however one does it, allows us to “let go, let be, let come and set free.” (47) Thomas Merton describes this as discovering the true self. McLaren suggests we “think of it as becoming the integrated, unitive, or connected self…as opposed to the fragmented, divided or separated self.” (47)