Adapting to Intertidal Moments in Society
"And once the storm is over, you won’t remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won’t even be sure, in fact, whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in."
The sea is a common metaphor for dealing with life. Imagine standing on a beach with a wave coming in up to your ankles and then going back out. As you look at the sea and shore, nothing has changed, but you experience your feet shifting in the sand and sinking slightly. You feel like you need to catch your balance, but you have not really moved. This is an intertidal moment, a period of change where things don’t feel steady.
We Are Living In an Intertidal Moment
Since 1900, the world has seen radical change from one generation to the next because of technology. The 1920’s-1930’s heralded the widespread shift to indoor plumbing, electricity, telephones, the automobile, and the Golden Age of Radio. In the 1950’s television took over home entertainment. The 1970’s marked the start of home computers. The 2000’s-2010’s marked the widespread availability and use of the internet and smartphones. Today, computing has expanded to the commonplace use of Artificial Intelligence, without any controls on its safety or development. Even big AI programs like GPT-4 are known to hallucinate and lack the capacity for abstraction. The beginning of each epoch can be considered an intertidal moment that marks the beginning of major changes in our society and habits.
I always hope change is good, but the older I get, the more I feel like each change erodes the world as I knew it. To adapt to change we must learn to be adaptable, flexible, tolerant, and understanding.
Need to Anchor During a Storm
For mariners, the common advice is to anchor during a storm. A sea anchor from the stern (rear of the boat) keeps the stern to the wind when far from shore. When the boat is in harbor, an anchor from the bow (front of the boat) allows the boat to pivot into the wind and keeps the strongest part of boat (the bow) facing the waves. Aligning to the wind prevents the boat from capsizing.
The anchor in society as well as for its members (us) is family and friends, rituals or social institutions, feeling useful, and predictability and reliability of at least a part of our lives (trusted relationships, integrity).
In general, being hateful, alienating others, tearing down institutions, degrading or demonizing others, and lying is like an unanchored boat in a storm. It is just a matter of time before the boat will sink.
What to Do
Most behaviors are changeable if we want to change. We must also have some sign of progress to reinforce our efforts and keep us going. At this point, it might be good to re-read the posts on How Stereotypes are Learned and How Prejudice is Learned, psychological defenses that we use instead of trying to change, the value of political correctness and manners until we can see their value, mindfulness meditation, and motivational interviewing as ideas on how to interact.
It is worthwhile having a positive role model as well. Is there someone you wish you could be like or who you respect? If you are into negative role models, put that aside. You have to have a role model who shows as many of the six subcomponents of wisdom as you can find.
