All of us evolved from a primitive lifestyle. Some cultures evolved from it earlier than others. Do we deep down have a desire to return to it? Where we happier when life was more simple? Have we lost meaning and quality in our more advanced society? Have we lost touch with ourselves? Or do we have a deeper need to move forward in our evolution?

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this sort of thing always amuses me. People talk about the "Good old days", what good old days? what was good about them except through the rose colored glasses of hindsight?
ah yes the good ole days of...polio...whites only waterfountains...child labor...horse dung in the street

you get my point.

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In Integral Panendeism, there are two currents of spirituality, one that descends from "heaven to earth" and another that ascends from "earth to heaven". The former is often associated with the feminine (Mother Earth) and the later with the masculine (Heavenly Father). All too often, people pick one of these two currents and so there is much conflict about what is truly "spiritual".

Plotinus taught that neither is more spiritual than the other, they are different aspects of the same thing. So we honor what we have come up from (the Earth) by ascending to what we do not remember (Heavens). But once we fully remember, it is then our duty to re-embrace the whole, both ascending and descending currents. That is true spirituality.

So, to use Spiral Dynamic terms, once we emerge out of BLUE thinking into ORANGE thinking, we may become very excited about our prospects with our new knowledge and attempt to dominate the earth, unaware or ambivilent to what damage we may cause. But we do eventually become aware, especially as GREEN emerges out of ORANGE. At first there are admonishments, but eventually we have to use the knowledge we gathered in ORANGE to re-embrace the Earth and help heal it for our own survival.

Travis

I agree 100%. I've received emails in the past that outlined the "problems of today", and how much simpler it was back in the day. There have always been problems. There will always be problems. We will always have struggles. It's life.

I don't think that's what we should focus on to define ourselves. I think no matter what the situation, you just need to keep a positive outlook and do the best you can. Your life is what you make of it.

How many sobs stories have we heard from people who are perfectly healthy and have a lot going for them, yet they are just miserable?

Then you hear stories from people who have suffered massive disasters. Maybe amputation, disease, blindness, yet still have this incredible positive outlook and are true inspirations.

Nobody has it easy. We all have our struggles. But life is what we make of it. We have the power to survive!

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Jesus is the reason for the season. Merry Christmas!

I think that a lot of people do indeed wish that they could slow it down and return to a simpler life. But I don't think that most of them fully think about what they would be giving up, nor how much work it actually is. That said, I suppose that a few of them do. Every summer, that is basically what I do when I go camping. I also try to purposely live my life so that there is as little "rush-rush" as possible.