Coming Out of Cultural Denial – 12.02.10

Student Question: When you were talking about the trauma that Japan faced in the war, I was realizing that I couldn’t really relate because I feel I’ve never identified with a nation or a culture, and I couldn’t imagine feeling trauma over my country losing a war.

“It wasn’t just losing a war; it was losing their culture,” elucidates Shunyamurti, the founder of the Sat Yoga Institute in Costa Rica. “And the whole of modern history is the destruction of one culture after another by the dominant globalizing culture of capitalism.”

For the Japanese, however, the loss in the war had “profound effects, at that moment, because they were in denial. And it was that forcible coming out of denial, with the sudden dropping of bombs that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki, that literally left the population speechless. That was shock and awe in the true sense. And not only Japan, but I think the entire world has not yet recovered from that."

They [the Japanese] were in denial of this event happening, you mean the destruction in the war? Or were you referring to a different kind of destruction?

“Of the fact that they were losing; it was inconceivable that they could lose. Just as it’s inconceivable now to many people that the present system can fall. You have people who think, ‘Ah, this will go on forever.’ People can more easily imagine the destruction of the world by an asteroid than the fall of global capitalism. It’s inconceivable and it’s not discussable.”

But this is not the end, “and we have to become very strong, and filled with the inspiration of what is going to be born through this trauma, ‘cause it’s a blessing, ultimately; everything is a blessing if it’s understood in its true significance.” Recorded on the evening of Thursday, December 2, 2010.