I recently heard the term moral elevation on a radio podcast. In doing follow-up research I learned that this is a simple, yet important psychological concept, which is in essence that warm, uplifting feeling you get when you see someone do something good, something selfless. This feeling not only lifts our spirits but can also motivate us to act kindly and ethically ourselves.
It is not hard to see why this is important and encouraging in a time when we hear so much about acts of selfishness, strife, polarization, and cruelty. We can be intentional about practicing moral elevation by doing random acts of kindness, doing volunteer work for the good of others, surrounding ourselves with positive, caring people, and showing up with love and compassion. Moral elevation is a powerful feeling that can drive positive change in ourselves and our communities. By understanding and engaging with this phenomenon, we can not only elevate our own spirits but also inspire those around us to do good.
I just finished reading a book; First Principles and First Values by David J Temple. Temple is a fictional personality created for enabling ongoing collaborative authorship at the Center for World Philosophy and Religion. The two primary authors behind David J. Temple are Marc Gafni and Zak Stein, along with Ken Wilber.
These authors write about what many of us are feeling and wrestling with, which is the sense that we are living in frightening times where the values and the stories we have known and relied upon are breaking down and a way forward is not yet clear. They argue that we live — like in the Renaissance — in a time between worlds and a time between stories. As the world broke down around them toward the end of what is known as the dark ages, Leonardo da Vinci and a small band in the Renaissance created a new story of value. That new story raised the level of society and birthed the age of modernity. The Renaissance laid the groundwork for the transformative cultural and intellectual developments of the following centuries, including the Age of Exploration and the Scientific Revolution.
Outrageous Love
To create this new story, the authors insist that we must embrace a personal path of love and a global politics of love. Not ordinary, emotional love but what is called “Eros or an Outrageous Love”, which is the heart of existence itself. They believe that the only response to outrageous pain is Outrageous Love. “The choice is to love or die”. As a Christian, I hear this as the same message that Jesus brought and the Outrageous Love we call God. However, the new story must be understood and lived from an integral perspective, not the traditional, ethnocentric level of judgement and exclusion.
These authors argue that there is no separation between our personal evolution and transformation and the transformation of the whole. The personal and the cosmic are understood to be both distinct and inseparable. They suggest that this new story of shared value involves both being and becoming, and value that is eternal and evolving. Creating this new story will demand the wise integration of the power of science and technology with the power of value, meaning, and purpose that comes through a world philosophy and religion. To avoid falling victim to the potential disasters we can see on the horizon, they urge us to humbly do our part to “bring forth a future we do not own or control, as servants to principles and values that are eternal and that we help evolve through our unique individual and collective expressions”.
Personal and Collective Evolution
Moving up the spiral of personal and collective evolution is a process and a journey. We can embrace the path of love at our current level of development and focus on growing up to the next level by learning and doing the necessary work. As a therapist, I know this means working on the beliefs and the wounds that are holding us back. Personally, I have had an awareness of being in transition and living in some kind of in-between state, wanting and hoping to break through to a higher level of being, of spiritual awareness, and emotional maturity. Breaking through to that higher level requires healing that which holds me back, letting go of the old and opening to something new.
The things that hold us back are different for each of us but often it is our shame-based wounds stemming from our history. These shame-based wounds may come from our experiences in our family, our religion, school, or some kind of trauma or abuse. You may, for example, have unresolved anger about some of these past experiences and find yourself still getting triggered and reacting badly to those triggering events. Often, we need to learn to not react, step back and reflect on our feelings and thoughts. Doing this allows us to challenge our perceptions, realize it may not really be about us, and offer some grace to ourselves and others. Practicing this helps us to mature and choose how we want to respond instead of mindlessly reacting and repeating our old patterns. We can then integrate our wounds and allow them to become a part of our new story and a source of strength. This then allows us to evolve into a higher perspective, find new meaning, and hopefully contribute to the new story of value and moral elevation we need to avert existential disaster and instead realize a higher potential for ourselves and humanity.
Therapy Tip
Notice what kind of thoughts and feelings this article stirs up inside of you. What kind of questions do you need to explore further? Can you see some old patterns and beliefs that hold back your growth? Are you willing to challenge your beliefs and perceptions and how you show up in the world, especially to those most important to you? You too may be in a time of transition and feel the desire to personally evolve. Doing the work of shame recovery, maturing, and growing into whole-hearted faith grounded in intrinsic value as well as objective truth may be painful at times, but it is also rewarding and vital. It is nice to remember that we are all in this together and can learn from one another and support each other on the path.