Continuing from yesterday’s post:
What does this discourse in primary years of education say about our civilization and technological advancement? As society continues to change and grow, the individual must change and grow at the same rate. Some people change along with it. Some stay the same. We all want to continue to learn innovative ideas, but we are continuing to use old methods. We cannot get stuck in the past and forget our dreams, and our creative process based on our history. We must learn to accept our failures and get unstuck. If we continue to believe we cannot change, we will not change. We will stop learning new things. We will stay in jobs that are mentally unproductive. We will stop enjoying our lives. We will stop learning something new. We will begin to believe that this mundaneness is all there is to life.

If we continue to let only one percent of the world’s population make all our personal decisions, we will lose our courage to uproot negative feelings about ourselves and others. We will not believe in ourselves. We will refuse to believe that a single individual can make a change. If we can get beyond what our adolescent years taught us about learning new things, and dealing with new people, we can finally complete the growth process and become an adult and functioning human being. We won’t be as angry with ourselves – this anger which usually translates to anger at others and the world. We can finally learn to stop and take it one day, even one hour, at a time.

During the 1960s, we as a nation began discovering the individual and the individual in relation to the world that surrounded us. Some of us didn’t like what we saw and dropped out. We went to communes in hopes of achieving happiness. Some of us decided to become part of the political action scene. These were the ones who thought that working to elect new blood would change society. Some of us became activists, disliking the system and wanting to completely give up on society as it had become. To me, this is usually translated as blowing up s*#t, thus harming innocents in the process. Some of us still believed in the system enough to try and make changes by working for the government. Others simply rode the storm out. The influence of the Vietnam War permeated the sixties’ and early seventies movement. We blamed everyone except ourselves, including those young soldiers that came home from the war. Many of those young people came home to a disenchanted world and their psyches never recovered. They weren’t heroes to the very loud protestors. They were baby killers. That still makes me so sad to think we had abandoned them in a time when they needed us the most.

During the late 1960s, author Edward Abbey authored a book called Desert Solitaire. He was a great outdoors person and had strong beliefs in keeping the great open spaces pristine and undeveloped. Throughout my final high school year, I wanted more out of my personal reading. In making a discovery of his works, (and once again in the 1990s) I began to transform my thoughts about the world and how I wanted to fit in. His words made a meaningful change in my thinking during that time. I realized that I was only a tiny part of the vastness of his world. I was an insignificant speck. I would later discover how self-absorbed the society was becoming. In this same book, Abbey stated that he wasn’t “…opposed to humankind but only to man-centeredness, anthropocentricity, the opinion that the world exists solely for the sake of man…. He also stated that he was not opposed “…to science…but to science misapplied, to the worship of technique and technology….”  Finally, he stated that he was not opposed “…to civilization, but to culture….” (p. 305-306).

It was our culture that swept us into Vietnam. It wasn’t for mutual aid and our defense of our civilization. Rather, it was a judgment made by the men in power regarding the threat of the illusive communistic takeover. It was like any other war – a fight for monetary benefit. So, I personally couldn’t condemn the young people who were drafted into a non-war. I did condemn many of the political decisions made (such as the draft) to force those young men into a war zone. And I condemned those who spat on these same soldiers when they returned. A lot of my generation was too young to participate in the war or protests to the war. We could only observe what was going on through the mass media, so our reactions were detached from those who were already engaged in these actions. I would rediscover Abbey’s works in 1999 and would begin another attempt to live the life that I desired – a life that he had inspired me with his works.

In my college years, I began to realize that I wanted more. I wanted to make an impact. I wanted to make positive change in the world that I lived in. I didn’t want to be one of those who dropped out. As I began to realize that I did, indeed, have a place in the Universe, I wanted to save all the beautiful places and live there, whether it was in the mountains, or in the desert, or both. I thought that if I had enough knowledge, I could fight the system – the establishment. I knew that illegal actions were not the answer. I repeat: You can’t just blow s*#t up to solve the problem. It never does. I made a choice to fight within the system. But, as I began to learn, knowledge was not enough. Application was just as important.

Law enforcement was the career choice for me to create change, but there are so many other governmental entities that need an enlightened graduate. When it comes time for graduation, I hope the new generation will make a choice to work within the government walls, as hopeless as it seems right now to make changes from within. We must move forward and create a system of enlightened and integrated workforce that work ten times better than they were in the past.

Keep up the good work and thank you.

Remember today is the last day for the Colorado Gives Day campaign. I just gave donations to 5 different causes so please give what you can! Hugs to everyone and be at peace during this holiday season!

Note: Parts of this post were originally written for a graduate level class in the late 1990s. Some teaching methods have improved over the last two decades. I would love to hear teachers respond to this blog, how they help students learn, and what the new methods are to teach in an integrative learning environment. Thanks to all teachers who are dedicated to the craft in these trying times!