Shift Your Thinking & Shape Your World

by Shirley Ryan

 

While traveling in Central America, the subject of bandito's reared its head to send shivers down everyone's spine.  This is a subject that is near and dear to those who travel internationally. Whenever we discuss these things, as people do, the conversation gets stuck in the fact that this is something that happens in third world countries. Third world countries have banditos.  Third world countries devalue their women.  Third world countries keep women bare foot and pregnant.  The interesting part is that some people in our country think we are the enlightened and progressive ones. Some even think that women have equal rights.  This isn't exactly the case; it's like prejudice, in that it's more subtle then before, but still around. 

Within this realm, there are some not so new political controversies kicking up the dust around our values. Unfortunately, the liberal left and conservative right continue to portray themselves as dueling parents that never quite challenge the thinking that keep us stuck, because, of course we are so progressive and enlightened.  We still want to make values about religion and that right and wrong do not really matter in the larger, progressive scheme of things. So, what do values, equal rights and banditos have to do with one another? Stay with me, I do have a point.

As luck and the gods will have it, the message is clear that change is on the horizon.  And the truth is that we have "bandito's" in our country too, for the same reasons. Cultural permissiveness towards offenders, dependency, and lack of family structure (systems and learning); create systems that become dependent and stagnant.  When families get stuck, communities get stuck and when communities get stuck, then whole societies get stuck.  Growth doesn't happen, because there is no transition from parental relationships within the family units to adult relationships between males and females.  Adult relationships create new worlds, because adults set boundaries.  So, how do we get unstuck? Women need to be educated differently.

Women as mothers need to teach boys how to treat women when they grow up. Women as mothers need to teach girls how to expect to be treated by their men when they grow up. They need to teach girls that it is OK to be direct and assertive when talking to other girls, too.  They show how this is done with their everyday behavior. When women accept less then they deserve, they send a strong message to both of their children, boys and girls. "We as women don't deserve to be treated with respect and dignity.  Our thinking is not valuable.  We as a partner have nothing to contribute."  Therefore, it is solely up to women to challenge and change the system as they know it. The system starts with their own family and their own children, and then ripples out to their community, church, and school systems.

What does this have to do with bandito's?  Everything!  Women also encourage and insist that men work at trades, and learn new things and not take the easy way out--like being a bandito. Some people have always preferred getting things the easy way, like stealing rather than work, but morals are also up to the joint family leadership to value certain ideals. This also means that women put their foot down and not accept the booty from ill gotten gains. They need to tell their sons and daughters that something is wrong, when it is wrong.  Women need to help to steer the family ship towards those practices that will shape their family toward new ways of being in this world.

Here is another inconsistency. I know it may seem odd, but some men and women who actually seem traditional, may be at opposite ends of the thinking pole.  Because male and female perspectives are different on many subjects, it is important to have the balance that those differences make. So women have to speak up.  While this can create tension, and it should, it also can help us to grow as families and as a community.

We can create collaborative family systems that teach both boys and girls to be responsible to the family system, and community, not just for our daily bread, but for internal family leadership and change.  I am referring to seeing women as "participating," and collaborative family leaders. I am not referring to women's roles as bankers, lawyers and corporate leaders. (I am not speaking for or against woman's rights in the workforce; this is beyond the scope of this article.)

What some people might not realize is that as responsible people we become parents to all of the children of the world. Hillary Clinton made this point clearly; "It Takes a Village" and we as communities need to remember this, regardless of our political or cultural affiliations. This may be one of the traditional values that have become lost in the shuffle of our enlightened culture, especially in urban communities. These are the mores that create interdependent communities that care for one another and an interdependent world that coexists for the betterment of all.

But there are some traditions that are cleaner, and handed down from family to family and community to community. This can be ways of doing things; those little short cuts that help us get things done easily. This reminds me of a simple story about a woman giving a friend a recipe to cook a rump roast. Part of the recipe goes like this. After the roast has marinated for 3 hours, cut about 3 inches off the end of the roast, and put it in a 12x12 inch roasting pan. The second woman asks why this is so? The first woman says that she doesn't know why. She got the recipe from her mother, and she would ask her. The next day the first woman goes to the second woman, somewhat red faced. Her mother had smiled at her and said that she told her that because the first time the roast was too big for the pan…I have one about a guy getting directions from his father on how to wax his car, too, but I think the message is clear enough.

Whether it is in families or countries, cultural change seems like overwhelming work. But it isn't, because this kind of change uses systems, processes, and principles to alter the future. In order to do it though, we must start from the political leadership residing at the top, and be marketed through the creation of new visions for the future. Reinvention, when addressing a whole cultural face lift, entails sifting through a myriad of history to celebrate the past, while always questioning where it came from, and what makes it so today.

This is tradition at its best. Cultural change and reinvention is always geared at asking questions about the practices and principles that were learned, and embraced as a system.  These are translated and integrated into new future practices. The job is not really about learning, but to unlearn things that no longer work for us, both individually and through our communities. Does this mean giving up our traditions? Not at all!  Where would we be if we didn't have some of our wonderful traditions to honor, like Christmas, Passover, May Day, Thanksgiving, Cinco de Mayo, Dias de los Muertos,  Easter, Memorial-like picnic's and the like? Traditions make life rich and meaningful, but mindless adherence to things that keep us stuck does not.

Will it happen over night? No, not really. Unlearning what took years to learn takes time. We will need to find a balance within systems where the middle road isn't between black and white, and the outcome is vibrantly thriving, rather than muted shades of gray. While shades of gray are relevant in some instances, it's not when it replaces values, character, honesty and integrity.

What kind of world do you want to live in? How can we as adults instill personal and family boundaries that promote traditions that help us thrive? This only takes a shift in our thinking to ripple subtly through our systems, like pebbles in a lake. We then begin the journey as a society to shape a world that leads to interfamily and intercommunity health and wellness, providing strategies that foster living peaceful, abundant lives.