Jem Bendell

“One of the basic tenets of Buddhist teachings is the realization of impermanence. The perspective that the self is an unchanging, separate and coherent phenomenon is not accepted in Buddhism. Instead, we are invited to consider, and through insight meditation to experience, the self as a moving assembly of sensations, emotions and thoughts (Hagen 1998). The potential of experiencing self in that way is that we become less attached to the processes of self-construal, as described above, and therefore less engaged in unconscious ‘othering’. In such meditation, we are also invited to notice how we are either averse to or desirous of certain thoughts and emotions in ways that can influence our decisions about what to focus on or what to believe to be true. That level of detailed attention to our inner thoughts and emotions can help reveal the moments when we label and judge stimuli of any kind, and whether we accept an idea or not. If people can bring that greater awareness into the moment of interpersonal interactions, to maintain an orientation towards inter-subjectivity in their relations with others (Irigaray 1985) and a more ‘critical’ interpretation of everyday culture, then there is greater opportunity for disengaging or disrupting systems of oppression and destruction.”
― Jem Bendell, Deep Adaptation: Navigating the Realities of Climate Chaos