For the longest time, animals ruled the planet. And we all know from documentations, how cruel their life can be. Survival of the fittest is no fun for the not so fit ones. In the wild every day is a day to fight for your life. And that’s where we come from.
The evolution of Homo sapiens from some kind of ape is for sure not fully understood, but there is a common understanding of what happened to make us conscious beings. It has to do with walking on our feet to overlook the grass (remember Lucy?), and having the hands free to develop tools. Then a chain reaction set in, where better tools lead to more food and bigger brains. The evolution of humans started some 7 million years ago, modern humans took over the planet only 100.000 years ago, and we have modern societies since 10.000 BC (in Mesopotamia). I would say this happened from an evolutionary point of view very recently. It is only natural that we still have a lot of animalistic substance in us. Technically, our minds should be able to tell us in a convincing way, when we should be satisfied with what we have. We should be able to see that violence is not the best answer to revenge, hate, jealousy. We should have the confidence to stand up against nonsense, peer pressure. But somehow we often don’t. The root causes can be found in our animalistic ground matter.
We are no sheep. All of our ancestors ate meat. That means they hunted animals, killed them, and dismembered the bodies. Think of humans more as a pack of wolves, lions, or a school of sharks. Buying meat in steak-shape, wrapped in plastic and free of any fur, skin, blood, or bones, and more importantly free of any fighting, panting, running, is a situation that is very new to us. So what does it need to be able to catch prey? You have to be able to observe, to find weak individuals of a group, and your body must react to the prospect to hunt, fight and kill. Nature does that in a pleasant way. Hormones make our body ready for this exercise, and hormones give us a reward after a successful hunt. In a modern society, we suppress, redirect or ignore these emotions. And this is still new to us. Suddenly one main function of our life has become redundant. We peacefully exchange money for food, no fight, no hunt, no search. Is this the root cause for many problems in our society?
We are hunters and fighters by nature. And suddenly we are in a very different world designed by a few revolutionaries. Few people invented democracy, technology. So no wonder that alcohol unleashes aggression. We all know that from parties, there is often beef at some point. The message here is, let’s not forget where we come from. Let’s make it our challenge to evolve from the wolf’s pack and proudly step even further towards the mindful human! Let us channel the unused energy to improve what we have started.
Our history explains peer pressure as well. Making a change takes time and effort, because there is the energy-saving mode of our brain. Well-known input is easy to digest, so we prefer what we know to make our life easier. Driven-in habits are easier to do in energy-saving mode. New habits that are difficult to implement. So the crowd easily agrees to continue in the most comfortable way. The pack will automatically agree to be against the one individual that suggests a different way. As a result, those who would like to try a new way don’t dare to stand up. It is just not popular. What does that say about democracy? Who is the one we vote for, or on the other side the ones that stands for an election? In nature it is survival of the fittest. And it is safer to be a member of the pack.
We are not all Einstein’s heirs. As always in nature, there is a distribution. We take advantage of the inventions of a few intelligent people. Most of us, me included, wouldn’t ever in our lives figure out how to build a car, handphone, or microwave, even after having used it for years. But on a smaller scale, some of us get life sorted out better than others. Some are easier mislead or manipulated. We are all in the same boat, or house, or planet. We are in this together, and somehow the smarter ones have the duty to take care of the others. In order to make the world a better place, or party, we need to share knowledge, and educate all equally. If we continue to not do that, we can not expect to evolve into a perfect world.
Many issues we see are in my opinion caused by the leftover mechanisms of the hunters we were. It can be a conscious decision to be kind, and find other ways to channel aggression. Being kind is the one thing we all can do, no matter what culture, shape, origin or past we’re from. If you’re kind, you don’t harm others. You don’t bully, you don’t steal, you don’t violate. Isn’t that what we wish to live in for our parents, and our kids?
