A Roadmap for Social Transformation

Change in Personal Values and Outlook

This is the starting point for social transformation. To appreciate why, it is necessary to understand the nature of social structures as well as social awakening that can bring about their change.

Social structures are inherently collective. They are a product of our joint idea of how society should function. We cannot alter them in isolation from other people any more than we can erect them on our own. This can only be accomplished with a change in group mindset.

By social awakening, I mean the realisation that existing social structures are partly ineffective at fulfilling the roles for which they were created, coupled with the realisation that better social structures can be put in their place. Social awakening affects different people at different times and at different rates. A small group of people recognise flaws in their society and look for ways to overcome them even as it enjoys widespread support. As dissatisfaction gains momentum, growing numbers of people are persuaded by their work, much more rapidly than they would have been if left to their own devices. Some people are never convinced; they continue to favour the old social structures even after they are replaced.

As would-be creators of our dream society, we essentially find ourselves in the role of historical visionaries who saw flaws in their society and sought ways to overcome them. Because we are the ones who are trying to instigate change, we cannot count on revision of social structures to make our task easier or expect the ripples from other people’s activism to carry us along. We will have to create those ripples by working against the dominant social currents.

This leaves us in a position where we have to be absolutely clear on what kind of society we wish to live in and why. We also need to be determined enough to work towards its creation in the face of staunch opposition, and poised enough to see value in our work even if we cannot reasonably expect to see it come to fruition in our lifetime. This in turn requires a decisive step away from social conditioning so that we can develop an internal guidance system for how to live.

How might this internal standard be developed? Many approaches, some millennia old, have been described by their practitioners. I will present a brief outline of the approach that I have found the most useful. It is iterative in nature and rooted in personal experience.

In order to get going, the approach needs a starting assumption of what life is about. This foundational question can be formulated as: what is it that I’m trying to accomplish with the living of my life? In other words, what is the underlying motivation or goal that sponsors all my other goals? We need to answer this question in order to proceed because we have to know what life is about before we can decide how best to accomplish it.

The next question that we face is one of responsibility. What are we going to accept responsibility for when trying to achieve our life goal? The question is deceptively intricate. It is probably obvious that we should accept responsibility for our words and actions. However, do we accept responsibility for them in all situations or only in less extreme ones, for example when we are not intoxicated or in pain? Furthermore, should we also accept responsibility for our thoughts, feelings, attitudes, beliefs and circumstances? Lastly, should we take responsibility even when we find it overwhelming?

On a parallel track, we need to decide which consequences of our conduct we are going to subject to analysis. The decision is important because our experience is far too rich to be analysed in its entirety. Once identified, we also need to decide how to evaluate those consequences to ascertain their desirability.

In an effort to make the approach less abstract, I will illustrate it with the main answers that I’ve given to the above questions. My life goal is to answer the question “Who am I?” in experiential terms. In other words, to fashion my life into a statement of who I am by stringing together a series of authentic experiences. This serves as the starting assumption from which subsequent answers are derived. Because this approach to life is completely self-centred, I cannot rely on an external authority for guidance. As a result, I take responsibility for all aspects of my conduct, to the extent that I can work with, without becoming overwhelmed. When analysing the consequences of my conduct, I focus on the emotions that it causes me to feel, the goal being to experience only positive ones.

Of course, many different answers can be given. These are used purely for illustration.

Putting the above answers into practice enables us to create an edifice of guidelines for how to live that is derived from personal experience. What is needed now is to extend this knowledge base to new situations, beyond what is available from direct experience. We need to be able to decide whether a goal is worthwhile without first having to achieve it, and to anticipate the consequences of conduct without first having to engage in it. This can be accomplished by reading literature aimed at personal growth, as well as by observing the behaviour of other people, children, animals and even plants.

Furthermore, we need to find a way to put all this knowledge to practical use. How do we determine which goals are reachable from given circumstances, or decide which circumstances to seek out in pursuit of a given goal? A number of guidelines can be offered. One that I find very useful is to provide what is lacking in a situation – be it compassion, patience, abundance or any other worthwhile quality – because the act of doing so enables me to experience myself as the source of that provision. Another guideline that effectively demystifies interaction with other people is the Golden Rule: do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

Mastering of all of these skills enables us to construct a framework for the living of our life, one that can provide us with guidance in every situation that bears resemblance to our experience. Its construction is never complete in the sense that we can be confident that the assumptions that we’ve made and the answers that we’ve given are the best ones possible. Refinement of the framework is an iterative process that never ends.

Nevertheless, by validating the contents of the framework through personal experience, we get to minimise the hold that social conditioning has over it. This allows us to paint a picture of the society that we would like to live in that isn’t just a minor adaptation of the present-day society. It also gives us the clarity of what makes such a society desirable, and the strength of conviction to bring it into being.