Institute for Cultural Evolution
Focusing on the Cultural Roots of America's Challenges
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Institute for Cultural Evolution
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Boulder, Colorado 80302 USAThe Institute for Cultural Evolution is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, tax-exempt organization.
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Load More...Polarity #4 is MERCY & JUSTICE. Mercy for the individual becomes unjust without concern for the good of the whole. And to be truly virtuous, justice must be balanced with care for each person.
Polarity #3 is COMPETITION & COOPERATION. One without the other can become problematic. But when both of these are brought together in a mutually correcting relationship that provides for both *challenge and support,* the value-creating potential of each side is maximized.
Polarity #2 is REAL & IDEAL. Each pole needs the other. Realism alone can lead to a cynical acceptance of a dysfunctional status quo. And unrealistic idealism can result in ineffectual wishful thinking. But through mutual co-correction they can fortify our power to improve things
In this new article by Carter Phipps, he asks where 50 years of "I'll do me and you do you" has gotten us.
https://post-progressive.org/article/fifty-years-of-authenticity-and-all-we-got-was-the-qanon-shaman/?fbclid=IwAR1O1a1u2nImITLf5KVDfvC0ys8XdGsqh1bkfEbfFe3Qb0LYC6LKugA9qMsThis tweet is the first in a series of our favorite positive-positive interdependent polarities: LIBERTY & EQUALITY. These two values need each other to maximize their value creating capacity. Through a dynamic relationship of challenge and support, each pole trues-up the other.
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Three specific examples of completed Portraits of the Good
Example 1 of 3
Example 2 of 3
Example 3 of 3
Character Development Exercise
What Does “Transcendence” Mean?
“Transcendence” or “the transcendent” generally refers to the people and things that are ultimately more important than yourself or your perceived self-interest. For example, that which is transcendent for you could include: Your family, humanity, your deepest convictions, the environment, God, Oneness, your country, animals, freedom, adventure, art, science, a better world, or anything you consider authentically “higher.” Your personal ideals of transcendence are grounded in the people and things that you’re dedicated to, and might even lay down your life for, if it became necessary. Your ideals of transcendence therefore help define your life’s higher purposes.
The word transcendence is used in this exercise as an umbrella term that is friendly to both spiritual and secular notions of transcendent higher purposes. In other words, you don’t have to be religious to recognize the significance of transcendent ideals. Our attraction to a greater good that lies beyond ourselves—our ceaseless striving to serve something higher and create something better—is a fundamental part of what makes us human.
The connection between your ideals of transcendence, your virtues, and your basic moral obligations—to self, to others, and to the transcendent—is illustrated by the graphic below. The specific virtues shown in this graphic are the 7 fundamental virtues, but the specific 7 virtues you choose in this exercise may differ from these classical 7.
For more on virtues and their relationship with transcendence, see the book Developmental Politics, by this exercise’s author, Steve McIntosh.
