Thomas Legrand Transcript

Thomas Legrand interview

Summary:

Rick: Welcome to Buddha at the Gas Pump. My name is Rick Archer. Buddha at the Gas Pump is an ongoing series of conversations with spiritually awakening people. We’ve done over 700 of these now. So, if this is new to you and you’d like to check out previous ones, obviously you can do that on YouTube, but you will find that if you go to batgap.com we have some ways of organizing, categorizing the interviews, which is hard to do on YouTube. So you might want to check that out, too. We would appreciate it, if you “like” the video with the little YouTube “like” button. It tweaks the algorithm and makes more people watch it. And as I always say, this program is made possible through the support of appreciative listeners and viewers. So, if you appreciate it and would like to help support it, there are PayPal buttons on every page of the website. And there is also a new thing on YouTube itself, where you can donate through that. I think it is – well, you will see a little symbol.

My guest today is Thomas LeGrand. Thomas lives near Plum Village in France, which was the home of Thich Nhat Hanh. He will be talking about Thich Nhat Hanh and about his teaching. Thomas is a wisdom seeker, a social scientist, and sustainability practitioner. He is the author of the internationally acclaimed book, which I am going to hold up here, called The Politics of Being – Wisdom and Science for a New Development Paradigm. I just finished reading the book, or nearly finished it, and enjoyed it a lot. This book won the Grand Prize of the Nautilus Book Award in 2024. Thomas’ spiritual journey began at the age of 23 with an encounter with native spirituality in Mexico before embracing the wisdom of a wide range of traditions and practices, including meditation, energetic healing, and Tai Chi Chuan. He lives with his wife and their two young daughters near Plum Village, as I just mentioned, the monastery of Thich Nhat Hanh, which, being in the southwest of France, is the country where he grew up. He is currently the lead technical advisor for the United Nations Development Program. Is that what the DP stands for?

Thomas: Yeah.

Rick: It is a conscious food systems alliance  for which he is the lead technical advisor. So, people might be wondering, okay, Buddha at the Gas Pump, it is about spirituality, spiritually awakening people, what does it have to do with politics? And of course, the title of your book implies that politics and spirituality might actually very much have something to do with one another, the politics of being. So why don’t we start by answering that question.

Thomas: What they have to do with each other.

Rick: Yeah, yeah, there are all kinds of people who usually don’t associate politics and spirituality in the same thought. I think it was Mark Twain who said, “Politicians and diapers should be changed often and for the same reason.”

Thomas: That’s a good one. Yeah, and I don’t think it will get us through the crisis we are facing now, which, I think you know, calls for a collective awakening. And my question is, how do we organize societies for that. Often people think about individual processes of awakening. It is very important, of course. But I am a social scientist. So, I know that we are fashioned by society, we are modeled somehow by society. And actually, right now, all institutions are based on the wrong      paradigm, trying to bring it forth. They are based, let’s say, on a vision of human nature that is not very accurate and rather emphasizes all of what is wrong with human beings in terms of this economic paradigm. It claims people are selfish, competitive, and only looking to maximize their own material interest. And so, we have to understand that the ethical crisis we are now facing is a result of how we have designed our institutions or society. We can intentionally design in a different way, in order to bring about the best in humans. And for myself, as an environmentalist, I have come to the conclusion, there is little we can achieve as long as we keep viewing progress in terms of having and material prosperity, because at some point, it has become antithetical to respecting the planetary boundaries. So that is why I think we really need to reinvent and create a new vision of progress, which is more about being rather than having. I build on what the inter-religious, inter-spiritual movement has said about it, especially in the Earth Charters. It says, “When basic needs have been met, human development is primarily about being more, rather than about having more.” So, I was looking for a wisdom-based approach to politics or development, and that is how I designed, I discovered and developed this concept of politics of being.

Rick: Good. Personally, since the 1970s, I’ve always felt that spirituality and the world situation are very much intertwined, and that ultimately, spiritual development is the most influential factor that could possibly change the world’s situation. It is the most fundamental thing. And the more fundamental a level at which you operate, the more leverage you have. But you look at the world and so many situations, where industries are so powerful. And governments are so powerful. And weaponry and these huge forces, which seem so intractable, and are so entrenched. And it seems like a David and Goliath situation. And you wonder, it seems as if there needs to be a radical restructuring of everything in order for humanity to survive. And I can resort to my thinking about consciousness being fundamental and of a change in consciousness resulting in a change in the world. But I can easily sympathize with the average person who thinks that this would be magical thinking. They might despair and doubt that any fundamental change is ever really going to happen, that we are all doomed.

Thomas: Yeah, well, yeah. And maybe it is because a lot of people fear looking at reality in that way, fearing that we need almost a miracle. Maybe this is why we are not able to point out really more clearly what is wrong and address it. I see that myself and as I said, I work in climate change, environmental conservation, et cetera. And I do feel that people are not aware of the depths of the change that needs to happen. And there is always this thing, okay, we are thinking negatively, we will have to be hopeful, et cetera. But sometimes that prevents us from looking more clearly at the real, the deep roots of our problems. And I do think it is something very profound that needs to happen, yet I do think it is possible. But yeah, I think more important than the eventual collapses that we will be facing, is the fact that we are close to make that historical breakthrough towards a spiritual civilization. And I think that is what needs to happen to bring the world into balance. It has been prophesied in many traditions, and I think a lot of us agree that this world is not so far away, which is the best, but the worst is also right here. And it is a kind of Yin-Yang thing, right? They go together. Without this doom vision, we may not have the willingness, the capacity to make that big leap in collective consciousness.

Rick: Now, let’s see, today is the ninth, election day in the U.S. was four days ago and Donald Trump won. And a lot of people I’ve spoken to have jumped to the conclusion, which I might agree with, that perhaps there needs to be a serious destruction phase or dismantling or chaotic phase before things can get better. They say it is darkest before the dawn. Well, maybe it hasn’t gotten dark enough yet and maybe he is the guy to do it. And of course, his supporters would say, “Oh, no, no. It’s going to get so much better now.” We will see how it goes. But there have been many prophecies from ancient traditions, saying that a time of great trial and tribulation will happen before there is going to be a significant about face, a significant transformation to a more enlightened age. Do you resonate with that type of prophecies?

Thomas: Yes, completely. As I said, I think evolution is a dialectical process and we see right now that, in America, for a couple years already, they have even used a very spiritual language, referring to the soul of America and so on. I would say both the light and the darkness somehow are competing together and the darkness is showing up, so that we may turn towards a greater spiritual solution. That would address this issue at the root level. Having said that, I have to recognize, I’m also a little bit perplexed about theoretical destruction. We are into that. It makes a lot of sense. What Donald Trump seems to be bringing, in terms of destruction, may not be the best destruction, as I would like to see, because he may also strengthen a capitalist system which would become increasingly more destructive. I think democracy needs to evolve, essentially, it doesn’t need to be destroyed.

Rick: As you were speaking, I was reminded of some verses in the early part of the Bhagavad Gita, where initially, Arjuna has this sort of bravado, certainty, confidence. As if, “Let me at these guys, I can beat these guys,” and so on. And then Lord Krishna says a few things to him and he begins to doubt himself. He sits down in the chariot and is feeling dejected, and he thinks, “I can’t do this.” And it is said in one commentary on the Gita that I have read, “As long as people think that they can manage, that they have within their own capacity the ability to solve their problems, then they haven’t necessarily gotten to the point where they can solve them, because there is a higher authority, the Divine, that ultimately needs to come to their assistance for the problems to genuinely be solved.” And those verses in the Gita illustrated that turning point for Arjuna. Perhaps there needs to be a similar turning point for the world, where all the attempts, all the strategies and methods that we have used to try to deal with our problems need to be shown to be demonstrably and definitively inadequate, before we can perhaps even consider that there could be a spiritual solution or a consciousness-based solution to those problems.

Thomas: Yeah, definitely. I think one way to make that a little bit more concrete would be just to say that, as long as we think we can solve our problems, we are  looking at their manifestation but not their roots, which I think we have to recognize, that is a spiritual crisis. And, of course, I have a very spiritual background, but I’m also trying to translate that for people, for decision makers and other people by using more of the language of social science. But yeah, as long as we look at superficial solutions, we are losing our time, because they won’t bring us where we need to go. So, yeah, I do think that, sometimes when you use spiritual teachings, which are usually targeted at the individual level, they are      very profound and quite radical. And I’m trying to see how these spiritual teachings relate to society. Maybe, at some point, there are some differences. I think there are a lot of solutions that have a spiritual nature and some are well known. And so, it is not so radical that there is no solution until we have this great collective awakening. But that is my way to translate it at the collective level. So, I think we must really recognize, as I show in the book, that there are lots of existing solutions, but they are not brought together into a collective vision which is spiritual, which I call the politics of being. As long as we do not recognize and acknowledge our spiritual nature along with what that means for our lives on earth, we probably won’t be able to put them together into this new vision.

Rick: Yeah. As you know, and you can perhaps elaborate, there does seem to be some kind of spiritual epidemic or renaissance going on in the world, facilitated in part by our technologies. The fact that you and I are having this conversation would not have been possible even twenty years ago, because we did not have Zoom and the internet was too slow and stuff like that. So, all these spiritual teachings are spreading around the world like crazy, in addition to all the crazy stuff that is spreading around the world, all the misinformation and everything. But millions of people are tuning in and getting interested in spirituality and practicing meditation or other practices. So, there is something happening here, to quote Dylan. On the other hand, it might seem airy-fairy or pie-in-the- sky to suggest that, “Oh, a bunch of people sitting on their butts meditating and doing Tai Chi and whatnot is actually going to affect the climate change or solve the Middle East conflict,” and things like that. It just seems too abstract, too ethereal. So perhaps, let’s say someone said that to you, what would you say to them?

Thomas: Yeah, well, as I said, I think these individual transformations are happening, but what we have not yet managed, is to translate that into society. And for this, we need not only spiritual teachings. There is this discussion:      h     ow important is it, how spiritual teachers are qualified to talk about, to address world issues. I think they are part of the solutions but they don’t have all the solutions. It is really a field in itself, somehow to translate all spiritual understanding into practical solutions for the world. And there, I think we are lagging behind somehow. It is important to building communities, very important to translate the individual transformations into something that can transform our world. And yeah, I think it will still take a little bit of time.

Rick: I used to think that, if a person meditated and developed consciousness, then automatically every aspect of their life would just be transformed spontaneously. They wouldn’t have to attend consciously to their ethics or to their health or their social behavior or other things. All those things would automatically flourish. I no longer believe that. I have seen, through decades of observation, that you do have to consciously attend to that. I know people who have been meditating 50 years, who would still cheat people in business or are very difficult to get along with, full of anger, or have different problems like that. So perhaps the same thing applies to spirituality and the world situation. If spirituality is going to be a solution to the world situation, it can give us the tools to be more conscientious, to be more concerned about the environment, or animal rights, or different things like that. But it doesn’t necessarily. It is in our hands whether we are going to use those tools or not. It is not adequate to just do your spiritual practice and expect that everything is going to ripple out and change the world. I really think there need to be people on every level who use that inner development in a very intentional way to bring about changes and innovations.

Thomas: Yeah, definitely. I think, in Buddhism, people talk about wisdom and compassion. And as we said, compassion is blind without wisdom. So, often what you see is that indeed, when people go into some spiritual transformation, they tend to care more about others and the earth, but to be able to translate that into practical solutions, to have the wisdom on how to apply that to transform societies, that also takes an understanding about how each of these things work. Yeah, without even mentioning that some people may get lost. And we know that in some spiritual worlds, for example, as leaders in spirituality, we look at things in a different way, in a way that is often not acknowledged. There can be a lot of conspiracy theories, etc. I would believe that sometimes that is not so much for the good.

Rick: That is an important point. A few years ago, around the beginning of the pandemic, I interviewed these three guys who do the Conspiratuality Podcast. And that is an interesting word, “conspiratuality,” because it turned out that a lot of so-called spiritual people had gotten into conspiracy theories much more than the general population. So that tells you something, which perhaps is that discernment and discrimination are important on the spiritual path. Spiritual people, by definition, believe in things that are not so obvious, so that’s a good thing. But it perhaps inclines many of them to just believe any suggestion of things going on that are not obvious. It makes them more gullible, in a way. I mean, we have seen that with cults, how gullible people can be, how easily manipulated.

Thomas: Yeah, and all this spiritual reality, let’s say, is very complex. I feel that myself, with quite a lot of experience and insights, but I’m always cautious about what I’m really seeing, about what will really happen. So, it is very difficult, as you say. There needs to be a lot of discernment. And when we talk about reality, if you do not have an understanding of this more practical material reality and how things work in this world, it can lead you to interpret your spiritual insights, and apply that to the world in a way that is not real or realistic.

Rick: Yeah, which brings up the whole thing about spirituality and science. I really happen to be very fond of collaboration between spirituality and science. They are not opponents, they are actually collaborators, at least they should be and can be and need to be, but that is another whole topic. So, you can comment on that if you want or we can just keep moving on. But the scientific method is designed to enable us to discern truth from falsehood and to allow consensus to arrive at truth rather than just a person’s individual whims.

Thomas: Yeah, definitely. So, my method, I would say, has been to look at what are the main spiritual insights of many traditions, and especially how they relate to certain aspects of life, so that we can develop a way of organizing societies based upon spiritual values, as has often been prophesied. And in the book, I show very concretely, what I call these spiritual values. I show how certain ways of organizing society, certain policies are linked to these spiritual values, and by bringing them together, we can have a very concrete, tangible politics of being, with actionable agendas.

Rick: Yeah, good. We’ll get into some of those specifics as we go along. One other general theme I just wanted to throw in, is that, if you look at history, it seems to me that the changes that happen in history are not just the ripple effect of individual people changing, but there are, you could say, more cosmic forces that govern the trends of time. And things move in vast cycles of time and various ages and huge changes in society. So, I think spirituality is important, of course, but there are more than just the individual efforts being made. There is a story, it might be from the Srimad Bhagavatam, where there was this village and for some reason Indra was mad at the village, I guess, because it was Krishna’s village and Indra and Krishna were having a fight. And so, he made it rain and it was raining and raining and threatening to drown out the village. And Krishna came along and picked up a mountain and held it like an umbrella over the village and protected the people from the rain. And then the people thought, oh, it must be a very heavy mountain. He might strain his wrist. We better help. So, they picked up sticks and helped hold the mountain. And of course, they were not really doing anything. It was Krishna holding the mountain. So, I sometimes think that there are vaster forces that are governing the trends of time and causing major changes over the centuries. And such forces may be very evidently in play right now, as we appear to be in a time of very intense transformation. And perhaps this will be with some kind of cataclysmic quality as we go through the coming decade or two.

Thomas: Yeah, definitely. As for myself, I am inspired by the work of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, right? And Sri Aurobindo was a guru, let’s say, in India. He died in 1950. And he was an independence leader of India. And then he retired for the last 25 years of his life in his room, not going away, and really working on these planetary energies. This part of his work is not so well known, but it is very interesting when you get into it. He said that he was actually harnessing spiritual energies for political, social transformation, even in the Russian revolution. And especially also during World War II, seeing that, behind Hitler there were a lot of dark spiritual forces that he was fighting, along with the Mother. There is a whole spiritual history that is completely, collectively ignored, lying behind the historical facts. In France, we have a sociologist, a quite famous philosopher called Edgar Morin. He looked at what was happening during World War II, things which were like small miracles, and he does not use the language of spirituality. Maybe he doesn’t have this understanding, but, for example, when you know what people like Sri Aurobindo     were doing, you can bring the two together, right?

Rick: That is interesting. There is a person, I believe he is in Holland, named Jürgen Zewi. Do you know of Jürgen Zewi? He has been on BatGap and he has written about these deep mystical experiences he has had most of his life, where he travels into the astral and celestial realms and sees all the beings there and what’s going on. He has written a new, beautifully illustrated book, using AI technology to create what he feels are realistic depictions of what is happening in these subtle realms. Anyway, you and I have been talking back and forth and agreeing on the point that we have just been discussing, which is that there are subtler forces at work than the obvious ones, the things we see in politics and all that stuff. There are deeper forces which you were just alluding to in Sri Aurobindo’s work. And what we see, perhaps a tug of war between various forces on the surface, is just symptomatic of a tug of war between these deeper negative and positive forces.

Thomas: Yeah, definitely, and I think in spiritual work, ceremonial work, etc., we know that we tend to think that the spiritual reality is what informs the material reality, right? So, actually, from that point of view, I do believe that what happens at this level is really tough at the moment, is really strong. And this is spiritual work, in that, working on subtle energies, et cetera, can help shift the reality that we see at the political, social levels.

Rick: Yeah, which reinforces the point we have been making, because if you are just working on political or economic levels, then you are not even touching those deeper, subtler forces that need to be purified in some way. But if a person is doing deep spiritual practice, as Sri Aurobindo was, then you are actually venturing into those realms and helping to purify them, both within yourself and within the collective.

Thomas: Yeah, well, I think it can be powerful to make the link, even when you are working at the spiritual level. I have been doing some healing ceremonial work. If you are able to talk to the people where you are and open their hearts at a more material level by talking to them, you connect the material and the spiritual and that makes things much more effective, right?

Rick: Yeah, that is very important, meeting people where they are. There is a proverb in India that when the mangoes are ripe, the branches bend down so that people can just pick them at their level, rather than having to climb the tree. Okay, so you provided very useful points at the end of your book, ten main points that summarize what is discussed in the book, and I’m going to start going through these points, in most cases actually just reading them and then having you comment on them and having us discuss them. So, point number one is, and we’ve kind of touched on some of this but it doesn’t matter. “We need a collective shift of consciousness, a cultural evolution of a spiritual nature to address our current challenges. It is already ongoing and we are currently facing an evolutive crisis which requires individuals and societies to look inward and transform.” Okay, so that summarizes a lot of what we have been saying, but do you want to comment on that further?

Thomas: Yeah, that is what you said, the      thing that is more systemic, that is common to all the crises we see in the world is the same kind of consciousness. If we bring it a little bit down, to something more concrete, we could speak even of mindset, of culture, which mainly is the result of modernity and based on specific values, materialism, individualism, reductionism, anthropocentrism, etc. And we need to understand that what we see, or the way our world functions, the way our institutions are designed, our laws, our policies, they reflect this kind of worldview or mindset. And that is what we need to change, to be able to live in harmony.

Rick: Yeah, and there is a quote which is attributed to Einstein which is that you can’t solve problems from the same level of consciousness at which the problems were created.

Thomas: Yeah, and in the book, I say it is funny, because I often see these quotes in some reports, etc., and often the same report, to me, doesn’t go deep enough into the chain. They often still work in the same paradigm that I qualify as this modern worldview and paradigm of economic growth and having. And yeah, often it feels a bit as if this sentence from a movie which says everything needs to change so that nothing changes, right? So, often they are changing to still preserve what I qualify as the main paradigm. And I think we need to go deeper into that kind of spiritual transformation.

Rick: They are rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

Thomas: Yeah.

Rick: Okay, here is point number two. “As a wisdom-based, science-informed approach, a politics of being can support this evolution,” the evolution that we have just been discussing. “Its main goal is to support the fulfillment of all beings. That is to say, the realization of our truest and highest being. ‘Being’ is a wiser and more adequate development objective than having. It applies to the whole earth community.” And of course, that gets us into the wealth gap, the wealth disparity, where you have, what, ten or 15 people in the world have more wealth than the 90% of the population, or you know the statistics, I’m sure, but there are huge disparities between the rich and the poor.

Thomas: Yeah, and this wealth really does not matter so much from a point of view of being, to help them become who they are and the best version of themselves, nobody needs that amount of wealth. So, you know, this concentration is just a manifestation of this paradigm of having we are in. If we would instead think in terms of being, then, one doesn’t need to have extreme wealth to be. And it will lead us to address inequalities, because that “having” makes us competitive. If I have more, probably you have less. Being works for everyone. If I can be more, because we inter-are, if you are more, then I can be more. Also, you are helping me to be more.

Rick: Yeah, there is an interesting section in your book about universal basic income, which would mean that, either in a country or even in the world, everybody gets a certain amount of financial support, so that all their basic needs are met. And as I understand it, the means are there to provide such a thing. And I will let you elaborate, but there are even sections about where people wouldn’t be obligated to work, they would just have a basic income. But when this has been tried experimentally, it is found that people do work, or they engage in something constructive or creative. It is interesting to consider the possibility of the whole world functioning that way. Do you want to elaborate?

Thomas: Yeah. Well, that change of paradigm really has to do with all views of human nature. Either we think we are just selfish, materialist, and we do not want to support other people. So, if you think that way, we give you money, then you work less. But if you think that people are naturally drawn to find meaning in their lives and to contribute to society, then, and that is what we see more in these studies, is that this extra money just helps them build the condition to express themselves in this healthy manner and in trying to contribute positively. So, it is an evolutionary process and often our institutions are what maintain that kind of vision of human nature: we assume that vision, a negative vision of human nature. But we can also construct our societies or even our organizations in a way based upon completely different assumptions. And the funny thing is that it is called also theory X, theory Y. You know, there are these two different ways of functioning and then the question is which one is real? And the answer is: both, people react according to how you frame the situation. If you frame it in a way that you are not trusting people, then everybody is trying to cheat. If instead, you are trusting people, then people respond with responsibility to this assumption.

Rick: Now, I can hear people objecting that, well, there are always going to be jobs that no one wants to do. No one wants to lay asphalt on a highway in the summertime, or work in a pig slaughterhouse, or do a lot of horrible things that people seem to think need to be done. So, I sometimes think, okay, well, there are a lot of jobs which probably should not exist in a more enlightened world. Do we really need tobacco and whiskey and gambling and all kinds of things that just ruin people’s lives? Maybe in a more enlightened society, those industries would not even exist. But we still need to lay asphalt on the highway and do some stuff that is not necessarily that pleasant, but I don’t know, maybe with AI we will have robots that can do that. And we don’t have to get people out there to do it. I mean, if everyone just sort of did what they found most creative and fulfilling, I wonder if major sections of the workforce would go empty.

Thomas: Yeah, and I think we will try collectively to minimize that kind of work, because we are assuming, there are some people we don’t care about, who will be doing it and we will just exploit them. So, I think we would organize in a way, by sharing these tasks so that people don’t spend their whole life doing the bad things, and also trying to find ways to either have robots or otherwise trying to minimize the kind of things that require work that is not very fulfilling, right?

Rick: Yeah. Another interesting section of your book was about the prison system and how the United States has the highest per capita percentage of people in prisons. And you were contrasting the conditions of U.S. prisons with places like Norway, or maybe it was Denmark, one of the Scandinavian countries, where prisons are almost like these little country clubs, which are not so bad. Hey, sign me up. But they produce tremendous results.

Thomas: Yeah, exactly. It’s a view, if you think people have committed a crime because they are bad people and you need to be tough on them in order to create that kind of incentives, because that is how people work, so they don’t want to be in prison. That is      one view. People in Norway, they would rather think, there have been some causes and conditions. People do not want to commit crimes naturally. It is because of their conditionings. And we should create prisons to look like any house and community, so that people then can reintegrate when they end their stays in prison. So, it is really based upon this way you think people are and how you think things work, right?

Rick: Yeah. And getting back to our earlier point about collective consciousness, maybe we could call it the stress in collective consciousness. You know how in clouds the static electricity builds up. And eventually, you have lightning striking because the cloud cannot hold that much static electricity before it has to be neutralized or balanced or released. So, you could think of collective consciousness as being like a cloud and qualities build up in the collective consciousness, such as tension and stress, and then eventually you have a war, or you have a crime wave or something. And if you think about it, at least in the U.S., the prisons are like little stress factories where people are living, a couple million people are living under very miserable, difficult conditions, becoming more stressed. The stress that caused them to commit crimes in the first place is being amplified in many cases. So obviously, some people undergo transformations and come out and live a better life, but there is a high rate of recidivism and many people come out as hardened criminals, who weren’t actually that hardened when they went in. So, that is one major thing. It is as if we have this network of little transmitters of negativity throughout the country.

Thomas: Yeah, and we have to understand, that there are very strong social determinants of crime. There is this video, you may have seen it, where you have all the people in the prison in a circle and then someone asks, okay who had been abused as a child make one step. You have some people, you see that there have been a lot of traumas, a lot of violence that led them to be in prison. So, it is not because they are bad people, it is just because of social conditionings, right? And then, the other thing is that it is also a business, no? So instead of addressing the causes of crimes, now the prison has even become a business. And it fuels that kind of dynamic of economic growth without creating any prosperity or well-being, but rather, it fuels an economy also.

Rick: You probably know that in the United States, many of the prisons are actually run by private corporations. And just since the other day, when Trump got elected, the stock in these corporations has gone up 30 or 40 percent. And they are all really excited, as if, “Well, this is such a great business opportunity. We’re going to lock up 20 million people and throw them out of the country.” Okay, I’m going to proceed to point three before I start ranting and raving too much. “Cultivating our fundamental interbeing, or relational nature, is instrumental to allow us to live in harmony with one another and the Earth community. Our spiritual nature makes us interconnected with everything that is at the level of being. Only by recognizing their interconnectedness and sustaining the whole can each part thrive.” So that is a beautiful point. And just towards the end of your book, I was just listening to this section about unity and diversity, which that point relates to. So, let’s talk about that for a few minutes.

Thomas: Yeah, I just want to say that there is a reframing of the social crisis, the ecological crisis we are seeing, as a relational crisis. We have a new understanding that we know that mystics from all different traditions all have the same kind of experience. They use different names, different concepts, but it is about the fact that we are one or we “inter-are” with everything. And if we have this understanding. Obviously, we want to take care of others and nature, because we do not feel separate from that, right? And this is a very deep spiritual insight that maybe not all of us will experience. But I think the importance is the direction. And even science tells us the stronger the connection to self, to others and to nature, the more we are closer to being healthy. And we see that someone who is more connected to his own needs is healthier, and will take care of others and nature better. And these three connections also fuel well-being, they fuel happiness. And that is why this inner human development is also good for societies, for nature. Right? And so, I tried to connect that language, spiritual language, and the science language. In science, we talk about our relational nature and it is a fact, we know from psychology that our own identity is based upon relationship first, especially with our mother and our parents. And when you look at the scientific studies about the most important drivers of happiness, relationship comes first, right? So that is a way to show how this spiritual understanding is reflected in more scientific, more concrete evidence that we have.

Rick: Yeah, there is a verse in the Gita which talks about enlightened people seeing all beings in the self and the self in all beings. And then Jesus said, “Whatsoever you do unto the least of these, you do unto me.” So, I think he was describing his experience, actually. And, also in the Gita, referring back to Jesus’ quote, the Gita talks about seeing the same self, not only in our self, but in the dog, in the elephant, in the cow, and so on. So, Jesus is describing his experience, if you mistreat a dog, you’re mistreating me, because my innermost being is the same innermost being that the dog has. So obviously, if we could all see the world that way, we would be living the golden rule, do unto others as you would have others do unto you, because actually you are them, they are you.

Thomas: Yeah, and I think it is true that you can. So, with Thich Nhat Hanh’s teachings, we have a different view, but to look at that maybe a little bit more concretely, he is saying that a lot of our suffering is collective in nature. A lot of it comes just through our ancestors. We have their genes, and this is being transmitted to us. I meditated quite a lot on that, and at some point, I really asked myself, does all that is happening in the world really affect my own well-being? And yeah, I think, maybe sometimes, there is some influence. I see some catastrophes in TV, etc. and it does not necessarily change my day, right? But just at a deeper level, I think the way I inhabit the world is very much influenced by how things are here, about all the suffering, right?

Rick: Yeah, we are all in the same big swimming pool. And if some people are peeing in the pool, pooping in the pool, it influences us. Now, that is kind of a weird way of putting it. But I actually, I don’t experience this, but I have spoken to people who, when some terrible thing happens someplace, they feel it, as if they are right in the middle of it. And, I have even heard people describe how they had not even heard the news that something had happened someplace, but they were having this horrible feeling. Something is really shaking them up. It reminds me of Star Wars where Obi-Wan Kenobi stopped all of a sudden, just as Darth Vader had blown up the planet Alderaan with the Death Star, and he had not gotten the news of that, but he just stopped and he said, “I just felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of beings were crying out in alarm.” I think that is the way he phrased it. So yeah, I think that is a real thing.

Thomas: Yeah, I think I have felt a great disturbance in the Force these last few days, we could say. And you know, I have experience of that. I remember once I had a nightmare about how some people wanted to kill me or something and my wife had the same. And then, later on during the day, I checked, and I noticed that it was one year after some important terrorist attacks in France. So basically, I think my own consciousness was just sensing what was happening at the more subtle level in the collective consciousness of the country.

Rick: And Charlie Hebdo or that…

Thomas: Yeah, that was Charlie Hebdo in January. So that really can tell us that what is happening to your consciousness is not separated from the collective consciousness.

Rick: I had this friend, who now has passed away, but he used to teach transcendental meditation in Louisiana where he grew up, and that is the Bible Belt. And one morning he was just sitting in meditation and all these negative images started coming at him, as if he was under attack or something. He thought, “What is going on?” And then later on he discovered that a newspaper article had been written about him, saying that he is a devil worshiper, he is serving Satan and all this kind of stuff. So, he had all these people thinking that kind of thoughts about him, and it was getting to him.

Thomas: Yeah, yeah.

Rick: It was leaking.

Thomas: Yeah.

Rick: Okay, so we will go on to point four. And keep in mind, those of you listening to the live stream, if you want to send in questions, please do, and I will be asking them in half an hour or so, maybe. Okay, point four. “Societies progress as they increasingly honor the highest values, qualities and ideals, such as freedom, goodness, beauty, truth, understanding, life, happiness, love, peace, etc. These are spiritual qualities in the sense that they reflect an awakened human being or divine perfection. Science and practical initiatives shaped around these universal values can help us design a politics of being. Cultural development relates fundamentally to an evolution of our values, which shape our worldviews and institutions.” All right, so how do science and practical initiatives shape themselves around these values? How can we get those who are holding the reins of science and government to shape their initiatives around values such as freedom, goodness, beauty, truth? It often seems as if many of the people have a different agenda. And so, we vote, but that doesn’t always seem to work out in the interest of those qualities.

Thomas: Yeah, well. So, you have mentioned freedom, goodness, truth, and beauty. So, goodness, truth, and beauty are called the platonic transcendentals, and they have been recognized in western philosophy as a template for the good society. About freedom, Hegel, the philosopher, used to say that history was about a manifestation of the nature of the mind, which is freedom. In this book, I have one chapter on all the others that you have mentioned. Just acknowledging a new reality, we now have a happiness science developing, we have a compassion empathy science developing, we have a peace science developing, etc. And all these sciences tell us how to cultivate these qualities at the individual level sometimes, but also, at the collective level. And actually, I would say a lot of cutting-edge social change initiatives are built explicitly around all of these values. You have social change initiatives that are making and finding new models to transform society, based upon these values to transform society. I refer to systemic and complex thinking and a spiritual understanding of how we should think. I think I also mentioned life: in the regeneration movement, for example, this idea that we should harmonize ourselves with how nature works, we could say, all indigenous wisdom has been about that. And so, the idea is that now we have very concrete ways, practical ways that have some scientific backing, to tell us how to transform society in that way. Obviously, it is not yet an agenda that is recognized, that we now have this possibility of being more intentional about how we transform our cultures, but I think it is there now and that is what I propose.

Rick: Yeah, actually, one time I attended one of the Bioneers conferences. I didn’t go in person, but they had it video streamed locally here. And it was really interesting. At the end, they had this long, long list of organizations that took quite a few minutes to have them scroll down the screen, who were doing all these amazing things, all this really cool stuff. And if you rely on the 6 o’clock news for your information on what is going on and what is happening in the world, you don’t get to see that stuff. They do not cover those things. So, in your book you mention a lot of things like that. There are some really cool, interesting, inspiring, hopeful initiatives taking place around the world. You know there is that saying in the newspaper industry, “If it bleeds, it leads.” So, we see the bloody stuff, but we don’t see some of the good stuff. It just does not really make news. So, to realize how many good initiatives are underway could be perhaps uplifting, can counteract the depression one might feel.

Thomas: Yeah, and definitely it is the same thing. As you say, the media rather are feeding the bad seeds in us, the seed of fear and this whole vision of humans not being trustable. And I would say, in the media, the solution in the politics of being would be to have this kind of more positive media. And I know Thich Nhat Hanh at some point was a guest editor of some Indian magazine, and that is what he emphasized, that we need to feed different stories, we need to feed different seeds in our consciousness that can then develop new collective possibilities.

Rick: Yeah, I’m on an email list called the Good News Network, and I get an email every day with four little stories of something really good that is happening. I read the other stuff too, as you can tell from the things I’m quoting here, but I try to keep it balanced. There is some good stuff going on. So, point five, “The focus on being, the highest values, wisdom and science, which can integrate all relevant claims and initiatives. As such, it can help unify this vision and strengthen this movement.” So, there was a spiritual teacher, one of whose favorite slogans was “Highest First.” And he also liked to say, “That to which you give your attention grows stronger in your life.” And “Highest First” would mean there are so many options, so many things you could do, so many things you could try. Figure out which one is the highest, which would have the most impact and beneficial influence and do that one. Maybe you will get to the other ones later, maybe you won’t, but you start with the highest one that you can perceive.

Thomas: Yeah, I would agree, go for the highest, because these values are universal. It is also the highest that can bring us together as one humanity. So, yeah.

Rick: Yeah. When you see what is going on in the world, the situation with Israel and Palestine, or the Ukraine war, things like that, in your mind, do you have ideas of what you would do if you were Vladimir Zelensky, or if you were the Prime Minister of Israel, or for that matter, Vladimir Putin? Do you have ideas of how you would do things differently to move the situation toward a resolution, which is not happening at present.

Thomas: Yeah, I think we have to recognize that these are based on deep, long traumas, right? I mean, what is incredible about what we are seeing in the Middle East, it is probably rare to see such a conflict where there are all traumatized victims on both sides. So, it seems to me as if we have reached an almost historical point. Yeah, it is unique to reach that kind of situation, where you can say there is so much trauma on both sides and offenders are also victims. I think that we really need to have some place for deep collective healing. The same in Russia and the Ukraine. There is a whole history that has not been unpacked and healed, so we need to be proactive. I think we are in a process somehow, as we were saying in the beginning, of purification. All the shadows, all the bad things are coming out, asking for healing and transformation so that we can move on to the next stage. So, if I would have some responsibility about that, I would be much more proactive, intentionally creating this space for collective healing.

Rick: Yeah, which some people in those situations are doing. There are groups of Arabs and Israelis who meet together and try to do this. In fact, I think you quote Thomas Huebel in your book. I have interviewed him a couple of times. He is German, his wife is Israeli, and he has been working on trying to heal the trauma even still from the Holocaust. And I think it can be healed. You and I have been on a spiritual path for many years, and we have probably both felt that a lot of healing has taken place within us as a result of our practices. And I think the same can happen on a societal level. It is not that these patterns have to repeat themselves endlessly.

Thomas: And yet they have! Even if you look a bit at the more spiritual level, this notion of egregores. If you look at what has happened in Jerusalem over centuries, you really see that kind of pattern that always comes back and not necessarily even through the same people. But, in Europe and Russia etc., I would say there is a pattern of domination, starting with the Roman Empire and the Catholic Church etc. There is always this vision that one has to dominate to flourish. So, there is also probably some healing to be done at more subtle and spiritual levels, right? It is not only about the Palestinian and the Israelis and the Ukrainian and the Russian, there is an even deeper, more profound pattern that they are only part of that.

Rick: Yeah. From my perspective, which is relatively superficial, it seems that, as horrible as it is, sometimes a war ends up really bringing a huge transformation afterwards. We don’t want to hope for wars, but look at the transformation that Germany underwent after World War II. And Japan, for that matter, they both flipped to being U.S. allies, or Western allies. But also, their societies flourished as compared to what had been happening. So, it almost seems as if maybe they had a load of karma to pay off or something, and the leaders they chose, Hitler and Emperor Hirohito, were instruments of leading them into a dire situation which would burn off that karma. And then, once it was burned, everything could get better again, which harkens back to something I said at the beginning of the interview about our current situation. But do you think there is any merit to that, or how do you understand the somewhat radical transformation that a society can sometimes undergo after a war?

Thomas: Yeah, it is a complex process. It is true, we could say, on one side, that somehow Hitler unified Europe. If you look at history, that is what happened. And it is this process by which, in the end, the bad can ultimately be part of a deeper process that can actually bring some good. I do think that we humans seem to only really make change because of breakdowns. There is this sentence from an historian saying, “After the breakdown comes the breakthrough.” And I think that is what we see right now, it seems that we really need that kind of breakdown to be able to change our models. Otherwise, people think we can go on like that, even if it can lead to catastrophe. So, I would say at the material level, it is true that sometimes it works that way. If we go back to World War II,      we have to also look at the traumas that have been experienced, don’t we? And I think, when we are talking about what is happening in Israel and Palestine, obviously, there is some deep trauma of the Jewish people because of the Holocaust. And then that has some implications about what is going on right now. So, it is a very complex pattern. But we must say that there is the good and the bad, and they work together and sometimes, some very bad things can have some positive effects. But they do also leave an imprint that needs to be transformed later.

Rick: Yeah, maybe it doesn’t always have to be that way. I don’t know, maybe in a minute I’ll ask you to think of some examples of breakthroughs that weren’t preceded by breakdowns. But even in nature, leaves have to die and fall off the tree before you can have spring and new leaves, and caterpillars have to turn into mush and lose their structure as caterpillars before the imaginal cells can mold them into becoming a butterfly. And there are a lot of examples. Things have to die and rot in the forest in order for new growth to appear. So, it would be nice if we could just transform without the trauma and without the suffering, but maybe it is part of nature’s plan. Can you think of examples of profound transformation that didn’t necessitate a breakdown?

Thomas: Well, I think, the work of Gandhi, right? I think he has been instrumental in making a very deep political transformation in a relatively peaceful way and led a strong heritage for that in history, right?

Rick: That’s a good example, yeah. And Martin Luther King, who was inspired by Gandhi, did much of the same. It could have been worse, I suppose.

Thomas: Yeah, I think it depends. The funny thing, Gandhi had a different view on Hitler, for example, than Sri Aurobindo. He was assuming maybe that his non-violent ways of working would be effective, and instead, Sri Aurobindo was saying, considering the spiritual forces that are behind Hitler, it’s a spiritual battle. And, probably, all have a role to play and some means are more effective than others in different situations, right?

Rick: Yeah, I think Gandhi thought that perhaps the same Satyagraha that had worked in India would work against Hitler. I don’t think he was right, actually. And of course, in India itself, the story of the Gita, at one point Arjuna said, I don’t want to fight this battle. Let’s just be friends and make peace. And Krishna said, sorry, it has gone too far. It has to be an actual physical fight at this point. So, get up and do it. Anyway, OK, another point here. Let’s see. Did I read this one? I read that one. Point 7. “Concrete and actionable policy recommendations supporting this agenda already exist in many sectors. A politics of being can bring them together and scale them up, articulating them in a coherent and meaningful narrative.” So how can a politics of being do that? And how can a politics of being actually begin to happen in a more manifest way? Because certainly, our contemporary politics are not much about being.

Thomas: So, but maybe back to the previous point, I think this idea that we see a lot of different social change initiatives based on these highest human values, but they are not necessarily conscious of being part of something, something that can bring them together and articulate them in a new vision for society, which is what I developed with the politics of being. What was your question?

Rick: Well, I mean, your book is beautiful and it is a nice concept, the idea of a politics of being, but it’s not the predominant politics anywhere in the world.

Thomas: Yeah.

Rick: You know, we have different politics going on.

Thomas: Yeah.

Rick: And you say a politics of being can bring them together. How does it get into the game more effectively?

Thomas: I think it is just because here and there in different fields, all the real paradigmatic solutions are from this new paradigm of being. So, if you are looking at how to deal with education, how to deal with justice, how to deal with governance, how to deal with health, you will end up with these policies, these new models that are part of the politics of being. So, being very pragmatic, probably what we will see is that all these solutions will get traction in themselves, because they are the real solutions, before we bring them together, before we can assemble them in a new vision for society, because it is a big shift to have people seeing progress in that way. So, I trust that although these are separate solutions, they will all make their own ways before being assembled into a new meaningful vision and narratives. While I was working on this book, I really reflected on why it is that I was starting from spiritual insights and just seeing how they were translated into different sectors, basically, in different parts of society. And then I was really pleased to see that actually, these are the real solutions. And people who are, in my opinion, the smartest people thinking about these problems in all these different fields, they come to the same conclusions. And so why is that? And that just made me realize it is because we have gone so much in the direction of the old paradigm, so there is a kind of imbalance and now all the solutions are on the other side.

Rick: So, in other words, you are saying that the pendulum has swung about as far as it can swing, in terms of the old paradigm, and its ineffectiveness will become glaringly obvious and inevitably, it is going to have to swing back in the other direction at this point.

Thomas: Yeah.

Rick: Yeah.

Thomas: Just we have been so limiting and playing so negatively with human dimensions, and that has brought a lot of problems and ineffectiveness. And that is why most of the solution need to address that inner human dimension.

Rick: Yeah, so another thing I think I heard you say just now is that, maybe visionaries initially have these concepts of how it could work, how it could be more ideal than it is, and initially those visions are just in their heads, but they are perhaps just more sensitive receivers of ideas whose time has come. And that, over a period of however much time, a few years, many years, whatever, those ideas will percolate into the mainstream, be received by less sensitive receivers than the visionaries themselves and become more normalized.

Thomas: Yeah, I would say maybe. At least I have found this, coming from a spiritual understanding of things, but people who are dealing with very concrete problems in health, for example, or in education, we see that the smartest people are getting to the same solution that I come to from my spiritual understanding.

Rick: Yeah, it is in the zeitgeist somehow. You are probably familiar with Rupert Sheldrake’s work, “Morphogenetic Fields” and so on. I think he cites examples of ideas that someone had at the same time.  Sir Isaac Newton, also had that situation, but perhaps Newton was able to publish it first. Or Charles Darwin is another example who was able to publish it first, but the idea was ready to pop.

Thomas: Yeah,

Rick: And people were starting to get it. People who had not even communicated with each other about it. It is starting to rise up in society. So, just to reiterate a point I was just making, perhaps the visionaries, the mystics, pick up on ideas first that are surfacing in collective consciousness, but they are surfacing irrespective of the mystics, and they will soon become more prevalent. Less sensitive people will begin to pick up on them, and at a certain point they could become mainstream.

Thomas: What I would say is, that also a lot of the solutions that I’m pointing to, and maybe at some point we can mention a few of them, are not necessarily recognized as spiritual by the people who are reaching that conclusion. They are not really thinking that these are spiritual solutions, because they don’t look like that necessarily. But I think an important part of my work has been to be able to recognize the spiritual nature by defining it, so that I can recognize it in other completely different language, words or aspects, right? So, one thing is for specialists in one field, education or health, to point out these solutions, but they don’t necessarily see them as spiritual solutions. And my own vision, the way I define them, trying to be very simple with spirituality, translates in terms of the highest human values. For example, as we have said, they parallel certain ways of thinking that we find in Buddhist traditions, etc. But what often is also missing is the acknowledgement of their spiritual nature. And it goes both ways, because often, when you think of people talking about spiritual evolution, of humanity, etc., often they are not able to lan     d that vision into practical solutions. So, I think what you may have seen in my book is that I am trying to make that bridge between a very deep understanding, spiritual on one side, and a very concrete, grounded way of translating that in societies.

Rick: Yeah, in a way, it’s an artificial dichotomy, because everything is spiritual, so all the practical concrete stuff has its spiritual essence. And so, maybe it is a little artificial to say spiritual solutions or practical solutions. So, maybe you could give us some examples. You mentioned that you could give a few examples of some of these so-called spiritual solutions that practical people might begin to implement without even using the term spiritual.

Thomas: For example, if you look at health, especially in our Western countries, we have an aging population, the costs of health are rising, there is a whole industry that is looking for how to maintain or increase their profits, and if people are healthy, maybe it doesn’t work. So, all these costs and the main burden now is coming from what we call civilizational disease, right? They are not like in the past infectious disease, they are more related to our way of living, right? Do we live healthy lives? Do we eat well? Do we sleep well? Do we exercise? Do we avoid having so much stress? Etc. So, I think all societies will have to empower people to live healthy lives. And that is the main insight of an important wisdom tradition in relation to health, such as Ayurveda, right? So, there is this whole chain of causality leading to disease, and at some point, there is a healthy lifestyle. And this is the end goal, but before that, the way you live your life is a reflection of your own mental health. If you are healthy internally, let’s say, you will live a healthy life. So, I think that brings us to mental health, just to remain very concrete. And we have a mental health crisis in many of our countries. It causes huge economic costs and it can make a lot of sense to try to address our health crisis from that level of a healthy lifestyle and mental health. And then, even if you go one step further, a lot of mental health issues begin in and also have to do with some trauma, so we need more trauma healing. So, I think there is a good case to argue that a public health policy should not focus so much on that kind of disease-centered paradigm, but on a health-centered paradigm, prevention and the quality of being of the people, we could say, as an important part of their health.

Rick: Yeah, good point. To take an example that came to mind, let’s say you live down at the mouth of the Ganges as it enters the Bay of Bengal, and there is all this garbage floating down the river, and you think we must do something about this garbage. So, you have boats going out and picking up the garbage and taking it to the shore, and you keep doing that every day. That is going to be an endless task if you don’t prevent the garbage from being put into the river upstream. So, a lot of times modern medicine, of course, we hear about preventative medicine and don’t smoke, don’t drink, get exercise, people are encouraged to do all these things. But then ultimately, the majority of cost involves treating people who have not done those preventive things, who end up sick and then are trying to deal with their sickness.

Thomas: There is a whole industry around that, the prevention, as at some point a health centered paradigm goes against the logic of economic growth. You know, if you don’t attend to the root cause, you always have symptoms to treat. And that is a business. If you address the root causes, there is a business for that. And so, obviously it probably can be much more economically sustainable to our societies to direct our attention to these preventive things.

Rick: Yeah, I think I forget, I heard some quote the other day, something like, “There isn’t a hunger problem, there is a greed problem,” or something like that. There are so many examples we can think of in so many different areas, health as we are discussing now or hunger or various other things where, to quote Benjamin Franklin, “A stitch in time saves nine.” In other words, if you could stop these things at their root cause, then it would be so much more efficient than having to deal with the symptoms later on.

Thomas: Yeah, and what is the main driver of public health? It is not healthcare facilities, et cetera. It’s economic inequalities.

Rick: Yeah.

Thomas: A lot of social health issues we have, crimes, teenage pregnancy, even level of education, etc., and there is a book on that, and they say you can tell people to behave, to avoid getting pregnant early, to do sports, to do things, but the real driver of all these manifestations is actually economic inequality.

Rick: Yeah. It is interesting to ponder this stuff. As I try to understand it, I keep trying to put it in the spiritual context and I keep thinking of metaphors such as getting to the source of the river rather than trying to deal with things downstream. And you know, again, you can think in terms of education. There is so much that could be done in preschool and early education and everything else that would change the whole trajectory of children’s lives. And I don’t think society has quite gotten that point yet, of getting to the root of everything rather than dealing with the symptoms.

Thomas: Yeah, especially if the root is inside each of us.

Rick: Because it is, ultimately.

Thomas: I think what we see in general is that, for human beings, we prefer to avoid looking inside until we have to do it. And doing all this research, I was surprised about how there are some studies that show the economic benefits of investing in addressing trauma or taking care of children’s well-being, etc., or mental health. But it seems as if we are not able to see these potentials, because we are just so used to look for external solutions, that we don’t see all the potential that lies in terms of addressing these issues at the root level, inside our own consciousness.

Rick: That’s very interesting. I mean, just the way individuals are structured, the senses are designed to be pointed outwards, to be directed outwards, and that becomes deeply ingrained. And starting a spiritual practice is a process of turning 180 degrees and beginning to go inward. But the vast majority of people are not, and yet, if the majority of people were doing that, then the society would do that also. Our systems and our policies would be inward looking and preventative and so on. But if the majority of people are not doing that, if they are habitually directed outwards, then it would be impossible for our systems to be anything other than outward-directed.

Thomas: Yeah, and I think we have seen a lot of progress in societies over the last centuries, thanks to science, which led us to understand how the material world works, and develop the technologies to be able to live better in that material world. I think we are on the verge of starting off to the next stage of our evolution, and that requires us to look inside and develop that collective understanding of human psychology and consciousness, and then to honor that for our collective evolution, for progress. And obviously it has a huge potential, even greater than this attempt to control the outer world. And that is really the shift, the politics of being, I call it a development paradigm. Right now, we have economic growth, it is a reflection of that culture that we have with modernity, and the new paradigm would be the politics of being, how we can flourish as human beings, even as souls coming to earth for their own evolutive purpose. And once we develop an understanding about what needs to happen for that, we will create the basis for a flourishing world.

Rick: Yeah, I don’t know about you, but I know in my own case, I didn’t have my big turnaround until I had reached rock bottom and just realized that whatever I was doing was not working. And I had to totally change my life and my direction. They say that with alcoholics, too. They have to bottom out before they can seek help. And perhaps that is also true of society. Maybe it has to be unavoidably proven to us on a mass scale that the way we are doing things does not work, and doing them more is not going to yield different results.

Thomas: What was it that…

Rick: That was another Einstein quote, I think he said something like: his definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

Thomas: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I think it is what we are seeing happening. Yeah, that is a definition somehow of intelligence and wisdom to be able to anticipate and take the right decisions before you see the consequences. But I think what we see often, both at the individual and the collective levels, is that there is very little anticipation. We try to keep the same way of doing things until we really face a wall and we need to change, right?

Rick: Yeah, yeah. Well, maybe that wall is getting closer, because we definitely need to change.

Thomas: Yeah, that is what we were saying at the beginning, after the breakdown comes the breakthrough. I think it is also very important, that is how I see my work, is also preparing the ground so that, when we have this opportunity for breakthrough, there is a new model that is already almost there.

Rick: That is a good point, it’s not like you have to wait until this thing can actually go mainstream before you develop it, you get it all ready.

Thomas: At small scales, as I see, I’m building on a lot of things that are already happening. Maybe it will not become the new paradigm before breakdowns happen, because we are so attached to our ways of doing things. There are so many powerful interests that are keeping things in place      and through our many political systems we really do not see the way to make these big shifts. Even in the political conservation, to surface one problem, it needs to have something really serious to happen often, so that we change on one thing. But to change the whole society and its direction, yeah, it will probably take really major crises that force us to change and really overcome the hold of powerful interests, right?

Rick: Yeah, so true. Okay, I will read the next point here. “Spiritual teachings and wisdom traditions, through dialogue among them and with science, have much to bring, to inspire, help design, and implement a politics of being. They are our most valuable common heritage, able to offer a profound understanding of human nature as well as practical knowledge and tools for inner and ultimately social development.” So spiritual teachings and wisdom traditions. Again, most people in the world, even though they might be religious people and they go to church and all that stuff, they probably – well, I don’t know. Maybe I’m wrong. I was about to say – a lot of people do seem to think that their religion has practical application to current situations. Although, sometimes they support policies that I think are retrograde or not so positive, like homophobia or, even the 10th Commandment says you should not covet your neighbor’s slaves, basically. They want to put the Ten Commandments up in the school, so the Bible actually condones slavery. So, I think, just because spiritual traditions are ancient does not mean they are right about everything. But obviously, there is a lot in them that is good, and perhaps that is where science comes in, helping to separate the wheat from the chaff and distill out the stuff that is still applicable in the modern age.

Thomas: Yeah, and also inter-spirituality, through a dialogue among themselves. I think the more you look into different wisdom traditions, where you see convergence, there are some bad points also, but you can recognize a common direction. And I think it is more of an insight, we could say, a direction that tells you what to look at, somehow. And then we can move on to specialists of a specific situation to see what does that mean in practice. A good example I like to mention, is the Baha’i vision, you know the Baha’i religion?

Rick: Sure.

Thomas: So there has been a prophet in the 19th century, Bahá’u’lláh, born in Iran, and he was said to be the new kind of prophet for all times after Jesus, Mohammad etc. And he had this vision of a progressive revelation, that all prophets come from the same source and their teachings vary according to what is needed in different times and different places. And he realized that often, the clergy was a barrier for the next revelation, right? And so, he decided to be very intentional in building a way to organize his religion without clergy. And he designed an institution that could provide a template for humanity to freely adopt if they choose so. And it is very interesting, well, I can go into more details about what it is in practice, but it has a lot to do with a pyramid, where people elected at the local level, name or choose among themselves a representative for a higher level. There is also a collective use of the power. So, they have a whole system. And in my book, I mentioned a book which tried to ask people in Asia, what is an ideal governance system. They also asked people in America, what is an ideal governance system? And both converge into a middle way, combining somehow the best of democratic system, from America, and the best of what they call meritocracy, where the learned decide, combined into one system. And this system has striking similarities with the Baha’i system. And it has a lot also about how to avoid political polarization, which is the main ill we see now in our modern democracy. So, in that case, I do really think there has been a very deep vision from Bahá’u’lláh and the Bahá’ís about developing some great wisdom that is proving to be probably a direction of a solution for our times.

Rick: Yeah, you talk about that quite a bit in your book. Okay, we will go to the next point. “Each nation needs to reconnect to its own soul and wisdom to develop its version of a politics of being that can support its development and help it bring its unique contribution to the world. Unity in diversity is the key to harmonious coexistence of nations in a globalized world.” Okay, a couple questions about that. If you think of the soul of a nation, let’s say the soul of the United States, is that Native American? Because those are the people who were here for thousands of years, and now we are a mishmash of immigrants from other places. Or do the immigrants, such as myself, whose ancestors came from England, is there an English soul for the people from there, a French soul in America for the people who came from France, and a German soul for the people who came from Germany? What exactly is the soul of a nation in this age when everything is so intermixed.

Thomas: So, I think, to start with, yes, it has to do at some point with the land. In the land are certain energies. Even indigenous people in different parts of the world see the earth as one living organism, with different parts having a specific function, like organs in a human body. So that is one thing, and we could say, for example, that America would probably be where a lot of different people in the world connect, a kind of spine or nervous systems. So, each nation has a specific function and has a specific mission to realize, a specific energy. I would think, in the history of a nation, we have seen people first as an ethnicity, then, as a project so that people are there to express some specific values. And then I think the next stage, which is more of a spiritual understanding, is that nations are actually like energetic fields, and people connect to that energetic field. We could say, souls connect to that, choose to incarnate or come to a specific place because they feel it is an opportunity for their evolution. If I look at France, for example, I think the soul of France, it is interesting to see what it has been. If you look at Paris and how a lot of artists and intellectuals, who have made what France is and what Paris is, actually have come from outside. So, they can probably embody that truth of the French soul, even if they have not been born in France. Think about Picasso, and more, who all converged on Paris in these times. So, I like that vision of a nation, which is more, it has a specific purpose, it has a soul, it is an energetic field. And so, from that point of view, an immigrant who comes to a specific country, sometimes maybe even more recently, may have come there because they are more intentional about it, for being there and participating in that soul of a nation than the people who are there, but may feel less connected or have less energy to nourish the kind of energy that is there.

Rick: Hmm. I remember when Seals and Crofts were very popular in the early seventies, they were Baha’i musicians. Yeah, you remember Seals and Crofts? “Summer Breeze” was one of their songs.

Thomas: I am not sure.

Rick: Anyway, they are a couple of white guys and they both married black wives. I remember hearing at the time that that was some part of the Baha’i tradition or faith, to intermingle the races, and I believe your wife is what?

Thomas: Costa Rican.

Rick: Costa Rican, right. And obviously, you know, we are all one planet. Do you think that there is some kind of destiny of the world where eventually there will be a blending of all the different races, or do you think that something of cultural integrity will be lost if we do that?

Thomas: Yeah, I think that vision of unity and diversity is important. And I think a lot of different cultures need to somehow protect their uniqueness, so that they can offer their gifts to humanity. I also think that humanity is going in the direction of being one. That is destiny, but while one, still diverse also, right? So that we can keep maintaining all the different wisdom, the different visions, different cultures, so that they can enrich all humanity. And I think we are talking about nations. I think the US mission somehow has to do with that kind of unification of humanity. Just by observing the history and how this country has populated itself and what it is now, I think it has a great role to play in that process of unification.

Rick: When this point comes up, I often think of the rainforest, where you have the most fertile growing conditions in terms of the soil and the rain, and that results in the most diverse plant and animal life, all in one particular environment. So, you would think, perhaps, that diversity will not be blotted out by global spiritual awakening, but it will actually be enriched and enhanced and even magnified.

Thomas: It is the same thing, I think, at the individual level. I think spiritual growth brings people together, but it allows everyone also to manifest more, realize more his or her own specificity, right?

Rick: Yeah, it is true. People tend to be more, be less conformist, more autonomous, more blossomed in their own unique personality.

Thomas: More authentic, yeah.

Rick: More authentic, yes. And you know, sometimes just very distinctive, colorful personalities. If you think of some of the spiritual greats throughout history, they really stood out in terms of their uniqueness.

Thomas: Interesting.

Rick: So, I didn’t think the whole world could be like that. We could all be like the rainforest where we are all brilliant in our own right, but quite distinct from other people with a common unifying foundation.

Thomas: Yeah, that brings me to the last point you mentioned. I think each nation has its own view of the good life and somehow it relates also to their spiritual understanding. And, we have mentioned these different human values. It is interesting to show that somehow, they are present in all traditions, in all wisdom traditions. But, if you look at different cultural contexts, they will emphasize one or the other. Let’s take the example of Buddhism and Bhutan. There we have this gross national happiness because a lot of Buddhism has this vision of happiness. Another one I mentioned is in South America and all indigenous cultures, living well, good living, also emphasizes very much a connection to nature. Different cultures will have different labeling on this politics of being, will put some emphasis on different things, but when they are balanced, all these values are connected and in a balanced vision, you will find them all. Maybe they will put different names to the top of their list, because they have a different understanding of the good life, right?

Rick: Yeah. This reminds me of when the October 7th happened in Israel and the war started and everything. I began having conversations with this woman in Israel named Georgi Y. Johnson, who has been on BatGap. She is a therapist, a very wise person. But we were talking about how difficult it is to arrive in any kind of harmony there, because there are so many extremists on either side. There are reasonable people in the middle, who could actually get along. But the extremists insist that, no, Israel has to be wiped out! Or no, Gaza has to be wiped out! Back and forth. And it is really hard to resolve, but this whole notion of the ground of being, being a unifying force, which enables differences to thrive and yet be harmonized, you could have uniqueness and distinctiveness and yet harmony simultaneously. It does not have to be that everybody becomes the same. I think that is really the solution.

Thomas: Yeah, definitely. And to me, that conversation brings to me the point about how I’m surprised that we are not trying to be more intentional in looking into wisdom for dealing with the problem that we have. With this book, I made that very concrete: what is a wisdom-based approach to politics and development and so on. I, myself, as an individual, at some point, when I had a lot of problems in my life, to me, it is natural to take refuge in wisdom and to try to find what would be a wider perspective to deal with these things. And I think if we go through that journey and unpack that reflection, I think we could manage, that is why I am trying to show in the book, we could really agree about these universal human values and then all these principles and what they mean, what they mean in our societies. And if we would have that understanding as our collective basis for our discussion, then I think we would have a greater possibility to deal with what we are facing now.

Rick: Yeah, and I think some people are doing that, specifically in Israel, and also obviously around the world. But generally, that is not the way the powers that be think, those who are actually in control at this point. And maybe that brings us back to the point of trauma, which is actually the 10th point in your list here. You say, “Healing trauma is, for individuals and societies, the gateway to being. It is fundamental, in order for new ways of being and living together to be possible, and for the whole Earth community to flourish.” So perhaps the reason that these opposing forces in these different places like Ukraine, Russia, or Israel, Gaza cannot resolve things, is that they have not addressed their trauma and that keeps their thinking polarized and fragmented.

Thomas: Yeah, definitely their thinking, but also, all these emotions that manifest because of these traumas. I think it is just a recognition that healthy human beings naturally do good. And why we are not manifesting that healthy human, the healthy ways of being, is because of the traumas that have disconnected us from what we really are. And I think that is the work of our times, to address that at the individual and collective level. And we have to be proactive for that. We cannot wait for conflicts to manifest. We need to discuss and heal all these aspects in advance.

Rick: Yeah, and unless we do, conflicts will continue to manifest.

Thomas: Exactly, yeah.

Rick: Yeah. Did any questions come in, Irene? Okay. So, do you outline in your book ways of healing trauma?

Thomas: Well, I mentioned, Thomas Huebl’s work, for example, which, may be more on the subtle level part of things, even indigenous people also do ceremonies, to take care of these things at more subtle levels. But historical examples, the truth      and reconciliation process, for example, in South Africa, we have it in Canada also. I think these are very good models that have proven quite effective in terms of opening the conversation and developing spaces where truth can be said and healing and reconciliation can happen, right?

Rick: Yeah, President Biden recently apologized to the indigenous people in America for those schools that were set up, which tried to strip the children of their cultures. I think perhaps it takes a lot more than an apology to really heal deep trauma. But there are a lot of methodologies. All the different spiritual practices and therapies and possibly psychedelics and just all kinds of things that are becoming more and more popular perhaps will be healing trauma more and more deeply.

Thomas: I see psychedelics as, well, there is more and more science about showing their effectiveness at the individual level, I would say. But I think it is quite amazing what can be done with ayahuasca, for example. But that is the individual way. I think the collective way has more to do with restorative justice. We have been holding circles where we can really listen to the pain, to the violence that has been done, and to take responsibility for what has been done and find ways to allow victims to feel that they have been heard. And we are able to find ways that can compensate or provide some healing in a way that is a bit more concrete. But we need to have these conversations, I think.

Rick: Yeah. I didn’t hear, were there any questions that came in? No, no questions. Okay, good. Well, I think your book will prove to be prescient. I think people will look back and say, “Wow, this guy really saw the future when he wrote that book.” I think we will eventually end up with a politics of being and a world based on being. I don’t know exactly how much turbulence we are going to have to go through between here and there, between now and then, but I suspect there will be a fair amount of it. But in any case, I hope it can be as smooth as possible. And to whatever extent the recommendations you provide in your book can be adopted, they can help to make it more smooth.

Thomas: Thank you. Yeah, I think it is also, but I am not naïve, I know that doesn’t work the way you are saying. I think there is a sentence in a Yiddish proverb saying, “tell your plans to God and he will laugh,” or something like that. So instead, it is to make a map, so that we can know how we should proceed, what we decide, what we discuss. How does this fit? How does this fit into the journey of where we are in this paradigm of “having” and economic growth and a modern worldview towards a more evolved “being” paradigm and what it means for society.

Rick: Yeah.

Thomas: So, to navigate that transition, I think the book is a kind of a map to navigate that transition.

Rick: So, besides your United Nations work, what are you doing? Do you hold courses or webinars or anything like that?

Thomas: Do you mean on Politics of Being?

Rick: Yeah, is there any way that people can interact with you about this stuff?

Thomas: Well, they are welcome to connect with me and spread these ideas. I have not yet planned a course, I think I will in the future or maybe create a community. But yeah, I am quite focused on my work with the Conscious Food Systems Alliance, which I think is also a great opportunity to pilot that from the United Nations, that agenda about the role of consciousness and inner transformation, for systemic transformation. So, I feel I received that opportunity, the way to test in one sector, the food and agriculture sector, to test what conscious systemic transformation means. And so, I’ve been spending quite a lot of time in the recent years on that. But yeah, I think in the future, I want to. And I said, obviously, this is a collective project. I would really like to bring together all the people who are part of the solutions in many different sectors and have all of us be able to work together to support that change.

Rick: Yeah, I’m sure there are a lot of conferences and things where you could speak, that would be relevant to this, like Bioneers as you mentioned earlier.

Thomas: Definitely, I do some speaking and teaching and even teaching for some universities, etc. But not a whole course on Politics of Being. I have also been part of different collective books with different communities that think about these ideas. Yeah.

Rick: Good. All right. Well, thanks, Thomas. I really enjoyed speaking with you. Any closing thoughts?

Thomas: Well, I don’t know, maybe just to thank you also, Rick. I think it is very great work you are doing. I have enjoyed watching a few videos and you are spreading an understanding and that already is an acknowledgement that there is a lot of this spiritual transformation happening in the world, which often goes a little bit unnoticed. So, I think it is very important to make that more known, tangible, acknowledged, and that is the basis for the change we want to see outside in society. So, thank you. It is really great work.

Rick: Thank you. And thanks to those who have been listening to or watching this interview. Stay tuned for the next one. Visit the website if you like. You can sign up for an email list to be notified of future interviews and check out the menus on the website for a few other interesting things we have to offer. So, thanks, Thomas.

Thomas: Thank you, Rick.