It Takes One Self To Raise A New World
— Celebrating FLIA’s 7th Birthday
We are seven years old! It is truly such an amazing feeling to grow and evolve with the world, with the planet, and with everyone and everything.
During the past seven years, we have witnessed so much and we have engaged in so much. I am so grateful for all of our teammates and partners. It is absolutely a privilege to be able to share this journey with people who share the same vision for the world.
As we grow, I am more and more convinced that one of the biggest challenges we face in our society and in achieving global governance today is the knowledge and information gap and the human-made walls that are involved in what we do and how we think, especially when we encounter them in cross-sector, cross-culture and cross-border scenarios. These types of lack of knowledge, information and awareness act as blocks to our understanding for each other. I call them “false boundaries in global governance.”
Since the establishment of FLIA, our team has been addressing this issue and developing knowledge and tools to dissolve the false boundaries from different angles. For example, we developed the Inclusive International Negotiation Model to facilitate an inclusive decision-making process involving all stakeholders. We launched the “Inclusive Diplomat Program” to empower and support people who desire to create an open and resilient future for mankind through awakening the power of the inclusive mindset and empowering their creative ideas and solutions. We teach the rising generation a holistic and interdisciplinary thinking mindset, expand their knowledge and understanding system, help them to look at the world beyond a certain type of collective mindset, respect the rule of law, and eventually empower them to break down these human-made false boundaries.
However, beyond the lack of knowledge, information, or understanding, there is something much deeper towards this concept. That is that the real false boundaries are actually the shadows that are embedded in the spectrum of our own consciousness. They are hidden in our emotions, thoughts, beliefs, subconscious mind, and collective mind that we never thought to check in on. They were not seen by us or were simply ignored. Many culture wars, biases and hatred exist just because of the ideas we hold on to about nationality, social and political ideology, cultural roots, and other kinds of collective mindset. They are only conditions in one’s mind, there by the cultural or governance system that was formulated at a time that has long passed.
I always believe that global governance happens at an individual level.
Each of us is a unique piece of the entire picture. Today, we are often more reminded that we embody very different perspectives structured in different perceptions, which is true, but sometimes we forget that we are all the same as well. It is just like water that is bottled and labelled as different brands. Some water might even become snow, ice, or rain. Being in different bottles or even different forms does not change the nature that we are the same formula of water. But somehow, we forgot this very fact and we believe that we are not related, or we are only the bottles, or some are superior to others, and therefore, we work and fight to justify these false ideas. But these ideas are only rooted in human history and no longer really serve to explain where we are in today’s world.
We have evolved into a different stage now, a stage where information flows unrestricted and where we no longer need to enslave others or conquer others’ lands to survive. We live in a time where we can absolutely thrive, create, and serve others. Future governance, or I should say current global governance, needs a system not based on the thoughts of separation or lack thereof, but on connection, fullness, inclusiveness and compassion.
Many scholars have talked about a similar vision of this global governance. Ken Wilber, one of the pioneer researchers in the field of consciousness study, pointed out that there is a trend in human value structure of being from dominant hierarchy to growth hierarchy. The overall evolutionary journey of our society shows developmental waves unfolding, each one being more and more inclusive. The famous psychologist, Carl Yung has also described a future for humanity in his book, Aion, saying “Individuation is to divest the self of false wrappings.”
As a research-based organization, we tend to build on existing theories and propose better methods and approaches to address how the world is changing, and prepare the rising generation to cope with the world they will be living in. We look at issues that involve the economy, the environment, geopolitics, society, technology, the law, and so on. While facing the future global governance, I believe that what we really need to do is integrate and dissolve the false shadows in all levels of our consciousness, recognize that everyone else is just ME with the same formula as a human being, but in another perception and with their own false shadows, just like I am, and know that everything I experience is within my own consciousness, and therefore my own responsibility.
This is the message I would like to share with our community today as we celebrate our 7th anniversary. It was said that it takes a village to raise a child. But I also want to say, it takes one self to raise a new world, because global governance happens starting within each of us.
Our work will continue, I thank everyone who has been with us on this journey, and I invite all those who are motivated to create a more inclusive world to join us. We will not stop until all of us have made it to the new world where we all live a very informed, liberating, peaceful life. That is the foundation for the global governance we are building upon. Together, that is what FLIA will achieve.
Thank you for all of your support during the past 7 years. Stay with us and expect more!
Shaoming Zhu
Founder & President,
Foundation for Law and International Affairs
shaomingzhu@flia.org