FEAR: the first invariant of human unity
And of an insurmountable disunity
Fear is indeed present in every human being from the moment they come into the world, just as it is in every sentient being in the animal kingdom. Much has been written and philosophized about fear. It is a favorite subject of spiritual teachers such as Krishnamurti* and many others.
* This link opens onto the site: The Krishnamurti Centre. Another source of information on Wikipedia.*
It is also a powerful paradox to deal with human unity on the basis of what opposes humanity and eternally divides it, and the title of this page in fact resonates like an oxymoron.
If it is virtually inherent in our animal and human condition, fear is a constant challenge to our survival in relation to others and to the world. No one is exempt from fear. It inhabits us from childhood and can take many forms. It also haunts our adult life almost permanently and insidiously, whether we are aware of it or not, until death. A dark picture that some will reject, exclaiming boastfully "Fear? Me? Never!" Yet we know full well that caution is always required and that sometimes one must know how to keep a low profile, for instinctive fear can also give rise to a life-saving avoidance strategy.
There is no question here of studying fear, or fears, in the hope of overcoming them. I am neither a spiritual teacher, nor a philosopher, nor a psychologist. As stated on the Actu-News page, Terence is not an AI and what he writes comes from the brain of an octogenarian human being. And it is in this capacity that he says "I".
Yet one must face the evidence. Is not the foremost obstacle and limitation of human activity, both collectively and individually, fear itself? Paralyzing fear?
As long as we have not overcome the visceral fear that is virtually intrinsic to every cell of our body, we will always remain trapped in the ruts of the servitude to which the dominant reduce us, just as in the animal kingdom from which we proceed. For under every latitude, humanity is divided into dominants who constitute and validate themselves as an "elite" — that is to say, the "cream of the crop" (in reality a form of social ignominy) — and the dominated: the universal rank and file that this so-called elite dreams of depopulating on a massive scale, something it relentlessly works toward, if only by periodically organizing wars and using social engineering with deadly aims.
Thus our hopes will always be measured by the deep despair that our insurmountable resignation feeds. Our happinesses will always be fleeting; we will remain strangers to joy and sink day after day into a painful submission, ratifying by our passivity the universal dehumanization.
And the child in all of this — what place is given to him? What fate is reserved for him? First, of course, he must be brought into the world without resorting to that immoral surrogacy that certain "woke" activists would like to see normalized and legalized. Yet in a country like France, where climate-change propaganda is in full swing and a non-negligible fraction of the population suffers from "climate anxiety," many couples are now reluctant to procreate. Nevertheless, and fortunately, the birth rate has not dried up and is doing far better in other regions of the world.
And the question arises again with acuity: what education should we give children? And above all, can we free them from fear? Not in order to turn them into rebels, revolutionaries, professional protesters, etc., but into fulfilled human beings — conscious, lucid, endowed with courage, empathy, capable of boldness, mutual aid, generosity, openness to others…
This is possible only in the absence of fear. Let us recall what the libertarian pedagogue Paul Robin said: "Let us set good examples." Yet what examples do we set? This site is quite telling in that regard. One need only browse its pages. At present the French educational system is in full collapse, and the high-school students who as children were so badly mistreated during the Covid period are rising up with good reason. They perceive the inequity of the social order, and the future that is being shaped for them undeniably frightens them. They sense clearly how much they are being lied to and how little anyone cares about ensuring them decent living conditions. They will probably be "recovered," as the saying goes, by those professional liars and manipulators known as politicians.
Would it not rather be the task of conscious and courageous adults to open other perspectives for them, to trace out a path of hope? To bring them, first of all, educational content that is not biased toward mere existential survival, given the insane excesses of those who set peoples against one another, manipulating cultural, religious and national identities in order to foment the troubles and wars that feed their insatiable corruption. All of this can perfectly well be explained very early, in simple and clear language that any child who has reached the "age of reason," as the saying goes, is capable of understanding. Begin with the child, of course — start at the beginning — and, as was done in the mutual school, the "older," the "more advanced" will teach the "younger."
Who will set about this task?
Most will prefer to leave this site quickly, labeling it utopian, and never return. They will hurry back to their comforting hobbies: those fine books by the spiritual teacher, the great anarchist, the philosopher, the psychologist, the theorist who theorizes — and abstract themselves from the rumble of a collapsing world with a perfectly Stoic "What can I do about it?" Some, sensing the wind is turning, are even learning Russian!…
Once again I entertain no illusions. Terence is an old man who managed to survive in that miserable institution known as the French national education system thanks to those children who came from elsewhere and who continually re-motivated him to hold on to the end so that he could continue, as he does today through Holistic Educ, what he considers his "life mission" — in order, indeed, to contribute, at his very small level, to warding off the exponential horror of this world. But let us repeat: this site is A CALL, a call to individuals who are conscious of humanity's inexorable drift. Are they waiting to become its victims themselves before daring to get involved — not in some marvelous "new paradigm," some ultimate social revolution that would set everything right again and restore to each person hope and faith in existence?
And in so doing, passively await what follows, which risks being rather dark…
OR…
The two photographs illustrating this text are centered on a small "garden Buddha" (better than a garden gnome!) on the terrace of a little hermitage house in the heart of nature that could become a lasting physical anchoring place for Holistic Educ (cf. More information) if there still exist in this world bold individuals free from fear, in accordance with the gesture of the little Buddha — the mudra of fearlessness.
NB: Terence is not an adherent of any religion or any sect; he is neither Muslim, nor Buddhist, nor a Krishnamurti follower, anarchist, Satpremian, rationalist, Freemason, hardline secularist, or anything of the sort. He is of Christian culture and faithful to Greco-Latin paganism—a dual heritage that he has transcended in a transcultural dynamic, the very same one he wishes to instill in Holistic Educ.