Resilience Tip: The Lessons of AVATAR

Just saw the movie Avatar again on the weekend - every bit as good the second time around.  If you haven't seen it, you need to - it's a visual masterpiece. 

I can't get over people who complain that Avatar's plot "isn't very original".  No it's not, although it's still very engaging.  However, Avatar as a movie isn't about the plot.  The plot is just a vehicle to bring up some incredibly important themes and deliver some hard hitting messages.

The primary message is that how we perceive the world, including our own bodies and minds, and how we act is all taught to us by our culture.  We've all been brainwashed at the deepest possible level.  Compared to that brainwashing, all the political and religious differences we have here in the Western world are largely superficial. 

If you want to become a more resilient person, if you want to develop your full potential as a human being, then do what Jake does in Avatar - go native.  I don't mean you have to join a native American tribe or go into a sweat lodge.  "Going native" here just means using whatever avenues you can to reconnect first with your own body, then with the natural world around you and finally with others on a far deeper level.

To do this you absolutely must get help.  No one can enter into a different way of looking at the world without guidance.  And that's the great advantage of experiencing life within an "Authentic Ancient Tradition", as I've called them in The 5 Pillars of Life, whether that tradition is ancient Christianity, Taoism, Buddhism, a native American path or something else that offers genuine wisdom and experience. 

The world around you is wondrous and mysterious.  It's only your cultural brainwashing and the mindset you've developed to cope with daily life that prevent you from seeing the fulness of what's really around you.  How do you overcome this?  Here's your first clue...

Start with your body - learn to breathe properly, learn to stretch, learn to meditate...

Reintegrate your mind and body - refine your mind, eliminate your internal dialogue, learn to perceive the world around you through your body, without the "static" of linear thinking

And that's just the beginning of the adventure... :-)


~ Dr. Symeon Rodger