The strength of a large, strong central entity such as a government is that it makes possible some rather amazing accomplishments that reflect the scale of its size. On the other hand, the weakness is that a collapse of the central node in this web of businesses, non-profits, civic groups, and individuals will invariably cause massive casualties to its constituents. Thus, we are only deceiving our selves if we allow our "leaders" to make backroom deals and act in the narrow interests of a few who seek their gain above all; the society it supports will in reality be weak and vulnerable.
The integrity of the whole entity depends on the transparency between the individual parts in the system "knowing" how the other parts work and what they value. Businesses value profit, growth, and reputation. Individuals often value wealth, sometimes growth, and most definitely, reputation. A working society gains strength and stability when it can see everything about its structure and know how its parts work together based on the values of each individual part, and of groups and subgroups. To what end? So that it can grow as a single entity and meet the desires of each of its constituents simultaneously, is what I hope.
This can be applied at every level. It struck me that it applies to me especially at an individual level: if I am willing to leave the privilege of privacy that degenerates into careless debauchery, on the table and not pick it back up, and I declare that I am open on all matters, except to maintain my right to sometimes be silent, in the manner of a certain man who did so when brought unjustly and on false charges due to jealousy and desire for control, then I will make it possible to build a strong foundation that ensures my physical, psychological, mental, and emotional integrity -- and maybe through my actions, help to influence others to do the same.
It is not skeletons I am afraid of in my closet: it is rats and pests, things still being fed and nurtured. The metaphor of the skeleton in the closet is interesting, because as anthropology can attest, bone can last for thousands of years; living flesh attached to bone, lasts for a fraction of this time, precariously often, requiring consistent, daily nurturing and feeding for an "optimal" life of typically less than 100 years.
So the skeletons will be there, probably long, long, long after I am, unless some external natural force happens to erase the evidence. It vibrates intuitively, and it is pleasantly logical, that whatever actions we take that we regret, inevitably cause whatever it is that they naturally do, and that the world being rather small, really, it will have some often unforeseen effect on our own lives sooner, or later. However, if we as a practice extend the courtesy of not judging someone else for their skeletons, however unpleasant they may be, we can reasonably expect a higher probability of a local trend toward "open living". It feels good to feel given a new life, a new chance to prove one's mettle.
Now, skeletons are not the same as active, leaving breathing demons we feed, so to speak. Skeletons are the dead, solid structures left of the ravenous beasts we used to feed, but which we have starved to death, metaphorically speaking. If I am lying to my wife continually and cheating on her behind her back, putting up a continuing pretense of fidelity, then this is not a "skeleton in the closet" at all, but an actively fed and nurtured growling, menacing beast that can devour me, or my wife, or others. If I cheated on my wife, told her, and daily face the painful reconciliation and continue to live with a renewed thankfulness for the chance at reconciliation or, frankly, separation -- either is a possible consequence that must be accepted, in reality -- it will quickly decay and it will obviously be seen for what it is: before, an active component of me, and now, one removed from my life that has passed into death.
Consequences can never be avoided, but they can be trans-formed. This is to say, the form that they take may appear less menacing to me, if I have tuned into another view of the universe and the values that I had then that caused the consequences to ensue in the first place, are different than the values I have now.
We can think of our actions, physically, and in every other dimension of our experience -- mental, emotional, psychological -- as creating collisions of matter and energy that impact our environment. If I chop a tree down, and stand in a certain place, there is a high probability I will be impacted by the tree coming down on me. If, I however, only chop the tree after giving some consideration as how I should orient myself with respect to the tree to not be united with it in a collision, and execute it efficiently, I will not enter the "universe" where the tree falls on me.
I am building something with my life. If I maintain my personal integrity by living truthfully, and speaking truthfully or else maintaining silence, and I am eager and open, I will gladly accept my chances that what I build will be integrated into the fabric of our continuously evolving life.
