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What Do I Do If I Earnestly Desire to Save the World?
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The following are excerpts from Ishmael and My Ishmael by Daniel Quinn. This is Part 1 of a 3-Part introductory series that explains the impetus for The Regenisis. You must change people’s minds... As long as the people of your culture are convinced that the world belongs to them and that their divinely–appointed destiny is to conquer and rule it, then they are of course going to go on acting the way they’ve been acting for the past ten thousand years. They’re going to go on treating the world as if it were a piece of human property and they’re going to go on conquering it as if it were an adversary. Nothing less than a world of changed minds is going to save you — and changing minds is something every single one of you can do, no matter who you are or how you're situated... There’s nothing fundamentally wrong with people. Given a story to enact that puts them in accord with the world, they will live in accord with the world. Every story is based on a premise, is the working out of a premise. First definition: story. A story is a scenario interrelating man, the world, and the gods. Second definition: to enact. To enact a story is to live so as to make the story a reality. In other words, to enact a story is to strive to make it come true... Third definition: culture. A culture is a people enacting a story. But given a story to enact that puts them at odds with the world, as yours does, they will live at odds with the world. Given a story to enact in which they are the lords of the world, they will act like lords of the world. And, given a story to enact in which the world is a foe to be conquered, they will conquer it like a foe, and one day, inevitably, their foe will lie bleeding to death at their feet, as the world is now. People can’t just give up a story...you can’t just stop being in a story, you have to have another story to be in. Of course it’s not enough. But if you begin anywhere else, there’s no hope at all. You can’t say, ‘We’re going to change the way people behave toward the world, but we’re not going to change the way they think about the world or the way they think about divine intentions in the world or the way they think about the destiny of man. As long as the people of your culture are convinced that the world belongs to them and that their divinely–appointed destiny is to conquer and rule it, then they are of course going to go on acting the way they’ve been acting for the past ten thousand years. They’re going to go on treating the world as if it were a piece of human property and they’re going to go on conquering it as if it were an adversary. You can’t change these things with laws. You must change people’s minds. And you can’t just root out a harmful complex of ideas and leave a void behind; you have to give people something that is as meaningful as what they’ve lost—something that makes better sense than the old horror of Man Supreme, wiping out everything on this planet that doesn’t serve his needs directly or indirectly.’ “What do I do if I earnestly desire to save the world?” You want a program?...Then here is a program: The story of Genesis must be reversed... Nothing less than a world of changed minds is going to save you — and changing minds is something every single one of you can do, no matter who you are or how you're situated...Of course there's nothing wrong with reaching a hundred, but if you can't reach a hundred, then reach ten. And if you can't reach ten, then reach one — because that one may reach a million. Excerpts from Ishmael and My Ishmael by Daniel Quinn. Part 2...A Redeclaration of Peace, Re+versing the "First Commandment" of Genesis Part 3...Notes On The Law of Attraction From The Master Key System |
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