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Get out into the world and see what’s going on. Sometimes, the conscious mutant will tend to withdraw from the blooming, buzzing madness of collective energy. It’s too easy to fall into sarcastic disdain towards the often grotesque and toxic goings-on. But we need to know what’s happening in our world. What is the state of the present zeitgeist? What is happening locally and globally?
Some people feel justified in not knowing about current events. They assert, with some legitimacy, that the news is usually negative and ruled by the “if it bleeds, it leads” principle of infotainment. While this is true of many news sources, it does not excuse the obligation of every capable citizen to be as informed as possible about what’s happening.
Even better than seeking out news sources is for you to be your own journalist and visiting anthropologist. The view from the street is irreplaceable if you want to know what’s happening. Many have highly polarized views of their nation compared to the rest of the world, but they haven’t been to other countries. Some naive people on the left can only find the dark side of the force in the U.S.A., Israel, and globalizing corporations and assume anyone indigenous or from an exotic culture is an oppressed innocent. Like many right-wingers, they have led cloistered lives that reinforce their distorted views.
Just before I was due to revise this card in 2009, I saw a 60 Minutes segment on Afghanistan and the general in charge there, Stanley McChrystal. What he had to say and how 60 Minutes portrayed him in the segment — he appears to be a highly focused and humble Warrior — had a strong synchronistic relationship to this card. (Of course, later, we learned that he lacked the humility to realize that he serves at the pleasure of civilian leadership.) For the purposes of this card, we can ignore the historical context and focus on McChrystal’s attitude toward leadership, which seemed streetwise and insightful. For example,
“You can listen to every radio transmission, down to squad level, and you can watch from the Predator — you can see what’s going on. But you can’t kid yourself that you know what’s going on. But there’s a danger that you do because you hear and you see it, and you think, ‘Okay, I know.’ But you’re not on the ground with that guy. You don’t feel it. You don’t hear the bullets. You just can’t make an assessment.”
McChrystal also seemed to understand that military tactics would not ultimately be as decisive as the attitude of the man on the street:
“This is something that takes a tremendous amount of understanding. What I’m really telling people is the greatest risk we can accept is to lose the support of the people here. If the people are against us, we cannot be successful. If the people view us as occupiers and the enemy, we can’t be successful, and our casualties will go up dramatically.”
If you are the leader of any sort of group, or seeking to have an influence, many of the same principles apply. Being a leader doesn’t necessarily mean you are a general, president, or CEO — it also applies to humbler positions. For example, when I was a classroom teacher and building security coordinator of an all-male public high school in the South Bronx during the crack epidemic, I needed to know everything I could about what was happening in that world. By earning the goodwill of students and staff, I could better fulfill my responsibilities. The narrator of the 60 Minutes piece on McChrystal tells us,
“When 60 Minutes went out on patrol with a squad from the 10th Mountain Division, they were not going into a village to root out insurgents but to offer the people protection and help with their daily lives, which the central government in Kabul has so far failed to do. The only way to win, McChrystal insists, is to earn the support of the people.”
You can’t learn what is going on with people or be a positive influence on them if you are disdainful, arrogant, or bullying. You can best learn and influence by being humble and receptive to others. General McChrystal, for example, gets out of his headquarters and meets people at eye level. He makes a point not to wear body armor or a sidearm. As he explains,
“If we are visiting Afghans, typically the Afghan governor, district or provincial governor, we see he doesn’t wear body armor, and yet we’re walking through his streets. I’m his guest. I think that that’s important that I send a message that I trust him, and I don’t think I am more valuable than I think he is.”
It is very easy to walk amongst people while being armored by a superior, indifferent, or cynical attitude. If people sense — and this is easy to sense — that we feel more important than them, then we lose our chance to learn from them and for any positive mutual influence to occur.
Consider this an auspicious time to take an unarmored inspection tour of the collective.
