It’s only frightening when you think about it:
Our DNA only takes us so far in the universe – with a primary emphasis on things like survival and perpetuation of the species – and gives us little evolutionary underpinning for functioning in “civilization” at large, never mind AT LARGE!. So we have to superimpose the more esoteric “civival” attributes on whatever our DNA gives us to make it work. All of us struggle with the process. And it doesn’t help that the world around us keeps changing faster than we can adapt. [It further doesn’t help that we’d simply rather NOT if we don’t HAVE to!]
Point to Ponder
From a single, fertilized cell, our DNA takes us through an incredible journey of
biological “becoming”, and it’s a circuitous route:
“By studying ontogeny (the development of embryos), scientists can learn about the evolutionary history of organisms. Ancestral characteristics are often, but not always, preserved in an organism’s development. For example, both chick and human embryos go through a stage where they have slits and arches in their necks that are identical to the gill slits and gill arches of fish.” [http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evosite/evo101/IIIC6aOntogeny.shtml]
[NOTE: This is simply a means of conserving an already established technology.]
Thankfully, it doesn’t stop there!
The momentum of development carries us through many additional stages, including biological maturation and perhaps even aging.
What evolution DOES endow us with – to get the “rest of the way” to wherever it is we’re going – is the ability to LEARN and ADAPT. It doesn’t have to “wire” us for everything; it simply gives us an incredible toolkit, which we have to learn how to use.
So, then, the question becomes: How far can we travel beyond our individual biological “roots” to develop essential “civival” attributes?
Some are more inclined than others. Some adamantly won’t (it impinges on their freedom of individual expression); more than a few simply don’t (“keeping up with the Joneses isn’t my bag”); and a significant number can’t. Genetic “predispositions” DO play critical roles. Some have inborn aggressive tendencies, some passive.
My own “predisposition” was passive – a “Type C” personality. I liked daydreaming, listening to and performing music, reading and writing poetry, reading the comics, etc. – until I realized I really didn’t want to end up mining coal, slopping hogs or hauling sludge from oil refineries in order to put food on the table and a roof over my head. Being raised in a foreclosed bank building carried its own mark of foreboding.
Moving from a “Type C” to a “Type A” personality wasn’t easy … and it turned out to be an unending process – perhaps a “road less traveled by”. But I now have a roof over my head and food on the table, “and that has made all the difference.”
Some are obsessive, some have ADHD … The range of human “wirings” and “inclinations” is mind-boggling (sic.). An exhaustive list of clinically diagnosable derangements is only the tip of a very large iceberg caricaturizing the full spectrum of differentiation anomalies. (http://www.psyweb.com/ICD/ICD10/icd10.jsp)
Point to Ponder
What’s YOUR inclination/caricaturization?
How “aboriginal” are you?
How is your wiring helping or hindering your progression to “civival”?
And how successful have you been in pushing
beyond the limits of aboriginal endowment?
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
Take heart!
The outcome CAN be influenced to an incredible degree.
Think positive, feed your passion, and keep pushing!
Quartermaster
