Unification is a recurring theme everywhere: between and within families, individuals, groups, nations, races or species. This age-old theme has become especially important in recent years because there is already a whole-thinking revolution occurring around the world. After a long period of separateness and disunity strewn with invasions, civil wars, world wars and cold wars, the world now seems to be entering a fascinating period of connectedness and unity. Those who participate in this great renaissance will enter a new era of opportunities and will enjoy prosperity. Those who do not will suffer from misery. They may also become tormentors of all and strongly armed with weapons of mass destruction, may forever wipe out all life from the face of the earth.
As such, the wealth and happiness burnt out through defense preparedness, civil strife and terrorism is colossal. In spite of its importance, unification is often treated as a utopian esoteric aspect of religion, politics, psychology or management. There are a million interpretations of the word unity and it is even mistaken to be orderliness, uniformity, merger or dissolution of identity. As a result, the present state of knowledge and awareness on unification is inadequate for the stupendous task of saving the earth from the lurking dangers of disunity. The problem really calls for urgent and world-wide attention.
Dynamics of Unification
We are living in an era of rapid and profound changes: changes in our thoughts, structures, processes, systems and paradigms. It is a time of unprecedented global communication, awareness, networking and integration. It is a time of truly massive, and yet, peaceful reorganization and restructuring. It is a time of massive dissolutions and awesome creations.
Driven by the new spirit and its requirements, a quest for peaceful systemic improvements is occurring throughout the world. Newer structures and processes are emerging to strengthen the spirit of unity, amidst diversity and change.
We have sometimes mistaken unity to be a physical, structural entity, and tried to force ourselves into all kinds of uniformity through the force emanating from all authoritarian forces such as kings, selective gods, jails, hell, religions, governments, norms, enemies, threats, or tasks. Uniformity is the outcome of 'brain-washing' as in accepting religious or political dogma without questioning. In such a state, evolutionary differentiation calls for repulsive forces amongst the constituents. Structural uniformity thus enforces disunity. Although, structural diversity may not guarantee mental unity, it is an indication that one natural process, i.e., differentiation, is active and that the complementary natural process of unification must also be active.
We need to emphasize that unity is only a state of mind, and has nothing to do with structural uniformity or identity of all components. Thought, goodwill, consciousness and awareness are the thin webs that connect the entities, leaving all free and yet, invisibly holding them together.
Disunity is where, due to fear, greed, and influence of a variety of barriers and vested interests, our minds are unable to focus on unity. It is our mental illness. Unity is a state in which our minds are able to focus on reality, the inherent unchangeable, timeless oneness.
We often sense powerful forces arising in us and binding us together through a variety of transactions, sharing and exchange processes among individuals, families, friends, organizations, nations or species. Transactions are nature's primordial ways for activating the origin of forces for unification.
Complementary transactions are those transactions through which we improve our fullness, and our mutual positions and discover ways of doing things better together than separately. They enable us to enjoy the company of our partners. Nevertheless, should there be a need for departing, being full, we depart with mutual goodwill and awareness. Following complementary transactions, we would thus be in harmony with each other, whether together or not.
Along with transactions there are two other things which influence the process of unification. The first set which we call 'methods', are the ways we actually conduct ourselves while attempting to set things right. The second set which we name 'fields', are the net environmental effects on us. Our transactions, methods and fields together determine our overall development. We may clap and rejoice, or we may miss and repent; we may fight and go extinct, or step aside and survive; we may join hands and grow, or leave hands and wither, it all depends on our transactions, methods and fields.
The stimulating medium thus assists the individual to access the partner and quietly, as if in the darkness, deposit the unruly and often unreasonable dark remainder. There, the dark remainder interacts with the universal uneasy darkness and gives birth to compatible, complementary awareness and reason. The loving, fearless reasonable thus emerge out of the marriage of the fearing, threatening unreasonable. The darkness, buried in the dark with the greater darkness, brings forth light! The light enables awareness and complementarity.
While construction of open structures is a powerful route for unification, destruction of closed structures is a useful supporting step. The most powerful agent for destruction of closed structures is the concept of freedom which can literally break open, burst or cause collapse of many closed structures.
The process of transforming the mind consists of generating an intense feeling and appreciation for one's surroundings - past, present and future, known or unknown. It consists of generating an awareness that everyone is one's neighbor and partner.
"Practice of yoga can lead us to great achievements, complete unity and life worth lived"
For successful unification, the artistic jiggles need to have adequate freedom to cross the barriers. They may get frustrated or destroyed if they are controlled by culture-mania or any craze for standardization or claim of superiority. The frustrated jiggles may rebound which indeed may have a disuniting effect.
Myths too may cause disunity. Such situations arise when any myth begins to strongly glorify specific individuals, groups, periods, or places and when it generates compulsive comparisons and condemnations. Hitlers, Stalins, Genghis Khans, holy warriors, crusaders, or many violent revolutionaries were indeed created by myths which proclaimed superiority of some and inferiority of others and advocated their subjugation, destruction, or conversion. Myths of exclusive nature are always dangerous. Exclusive myths are immiscible with other myths, and generate violence and division as they travel through space and time. Exclusive myths, be they religious, political, national, or racial in origin divide the minds in very powerful ways indeed. For unification, we need new open myths which cover the entire earth and all the species. As each such open myth passes by the minds, it unites those participating in the excitement. All such myths need not be identical and may even be contradictory, or competing. So long as they do not explicitly refute each other, people will ignore the contradictions. Such miscible myths travel freely from mind to mind, from group to group, from time to time, and from place to place. They mingle with each other and unite the minds which revel in them.
There are three factors which affect the proneness to disunity. The first is related to the environment. The other two are specific to individuals or groups and depend on the quality of their transactions and the methods they adopt when they try to set things right.
Thus, the growth of disunity and an intensification of the process of extinction can be traced to a persistent high level of non-complementarity in our actions. The field of opponency, field of conditions and methods of fighting, or containment create a process of reflective amplification which can accelerate the transformation. They expand the domain of chaos and extinction, increase fear and mistrust, and lead to disunity.
Unification is not utopian. It is a practical necessity and everyday possibility. If we can set up our stage so that differentiation and complementary transactions can proceed harmoniously, unconditionally, non-violently, co-operatively, clearly, openly, and freely, and in a state of stimulation, communication and goodwill, we shall attain unification. That is the theory.