How environment affects our survival strategies

[mandyjw]

What Leo said about how the techniques you must use to survive vary depending on your environment got me thinking.

I was extremely sheltered as a child. I never realized how rural the area I grew up in was, I assumed all 50 states had similar populations, and that all interstates had just two lanes.  In my early 20's we went to New York City. My reality was shattered. On the subway, I sat and looked around at all the people. Someone got up and started talking, it was a black guy and he was wearing winter boots that were untied on an extremely hot day. He locked eyes with me and didn't look away, he was explaining his predicament and asking for money. I realized that no one else on the subway even acknowledged his existence and I realized my mistake. I thought it was funny how the more people there were in a place, the less they connected with each other. I loved the energy of the city but found the lack of connection horrific. I thought all the women I saw were stunning! I realized how little work, money or thought I put into my appearance in comparison. I realized that if I stayed very long that my compassion for other people and my lack of self awareness about my appearance would go away quickly. It was not nearly strong enough to survive that environment. 

My life flashed before my eyes after a recent awakening and I sort of reverted back into something like what I was as a child. That included an increased interest and passion for the religion I was raised in, Christianity. My dad was a passionate Christian, now he says he is an atheist. I tried to talk to him about it and he got angry with me. "We sheltered you, you don't know how bad things were, how women were treated in the church!!! etc" I never had to go to church, or summer camp, I just studied the parts of the Bible that resonated with me and formed my own idea of Jesus. I even pictured him as an animal, not a human. I was sheltered BY Christianity from a lot of bad decisions my secular peers got involved in, and I was also sheltered FROM the worst of Christianity. Because we were so secluded, I didn't have a lot of opportunities to hang out with kids my age, so I spent a lot of the time alone in the woods. I would also visit my Grandmother or spend time with people much older than me and I gathered a lot of wisdom that way. My first introduction into Buddhism was one of my mentors, she seemed like she was part Buddhist/ part witch and she was brilliant and creative. She deepened my understanding of the magic of nature and gave me the courage to go into art because of her. 

My best friend was the only other girl in my gradeschool. Her parents we classic stage green and they moved her to escape the materialsm of the very wealthy neighborhoods they grew up in. She expanded my stage blue worldview from a young age. 

I realize now that I accidentally was born into the perfect environment to awaken. It's almost as if it were designed for me to awaken. I always thought that I wasn't living up to my potential by staying in such an economically depressed rural area, but I got something way more valuable out of it. 

I believe that each and every one of us is born into the perfect environment for us to awaken. But I still draw the conclusion that cities and rat races and that collective feeling of stress and pressure to achieve and "make it" that you feel in a city is the need to survive on steroids. 

I wonder if I'm woke enough to survive a city now, but I still don't think so. 

[ColdFacts]

I'll tell you mine. I'm from some developing country, probably first or second stage in the spiral dynamics, grew up in a village, farm and stuff. People are as you might imagine and things are super super corrupted, you would not believe. While this was already hardcore to even survive i added another thing to this because i wanted it to be more challenging, and that is always telling the truth, being nice no matter what, honest, and fair in everything i did. I always did this without people knowing what was going on, and that was pretty easy because no one expects such a person in real life and whenever i did things for their sake, told the truth, was nice, honest, fair they always always would take it as weakness, foolishness, ignorance ect and for my cause or challenge that was the best that could happen to me the most awesome way to hide my intentions without lying. Around 13 or something i got into self help for obvious reasons, since i needed a upgrade for my challenge but unfortunately i could not meditate because that is seen as a mental disease or crazy religious person(i could not judge them though) another thing to make mattes worse is that during meditation i would give up my ability to react to things in a way to focus more on nothing and as a result i can't wake up or react if anyone comes in and finds me, i might become aware of them but can't move unless they push me or i somehow finish my meditation. While i was in a village with forests and such i could not meditate for those reasons and because my parents together with other people would follow me if i did something weird or that they could not see the reason of, pretty crazy i know haha. I guess this is enough for now heheh.

[CreamCat]

You can become enlightened in new york city and wall street.

[mandyjw]

@ColdFacts That's awesome, sorry you have so many restrictions so deal with! 

@CreamCat For sure, but you'd probably need more tools and dedication to get there, either that or have a huge break when you lose it all or something like that. Most people survive in high stress environments because they have a drive to chase something, and that thing is not a sense of Peace. 

[Apparition of Jack]

I feel like I have the opposite story, Mandy. For most of my life I have grown up and lived in large urban conglomerates, and living in the country was not something I ever could've or would've imagined myself desiring (which I now do, for a whole list of spiritual / ethical / philosophical reasons.) In fact, I even remember visiting my grandparent's holiday property in the country and being afraid to go out at night because everything seemed so "lonely" and quiet!

However, after developing spiritual tendencies in my late teens and having a very rude spiritual awakening in my early 20s, I have found myself detesting the ethos and aesthetics of modern urban society, probably for the reasons you've listed out. Being a spiritually sensitive person, I've found the urban environment I once loved and cherised (or perhaps had internalised?) to now to be borderline nightmarish at times. Endless electro-magnetic radiation, hordes of people whos faces look like they're on the verge of a nervous breakdown every waking moment, pollution, obnoxious, mind-controlling advertising everywhere, etc. It has resulted in me being diagnosed with "agoraphobia", yet I feel the more accurate diagnosis is simply "being fed up of modern bullshit"

That's not to say there aren't benefits of living in such over-crowded hive-cities though. Having so many different types of people in one place means you're able to meet so many interesting characters with all sorts of wisdom to offer you. Also, since there's less of a strict "communal" culture, people tend to be more open-minded and relaxed about lifestyle choices, beliefs, etc. There's less pressure to conform to a set of family ideals or religious beliefs and so on. I could choose to do anything with my life and the society around me would be more or less accepting (unless it was something crazy like trying to evolve the stage Orange/Green paradigm towards a more Yellow/Turquoise one  ;P )

In a sense, living here, in this environment, is kind of like being part of a "spiritual underground" for awakening. There are places you can go and people you can meet who will assist you along your journey, but they're few and far between and you have to be keen-eyed enough to know how to spot them and what to look for. For the most part, you have to put on a "mask" or a facade of the sort of "regular, mundane" (or in my view, crude and ignorant) life people expect of you, and its only with those you're very close to and in moments of privacy can you really be free to explore the universe.