I am sure you will ask, What do I mean by a Paradigm? And what is a Paradigm Shift?
To me the word Paradigm means a generally accepted world view. It tells us what is possible and what we should believe. It has been shaped by science, religion and culture over many generations. It also tells us how we should understand and react to what we experience.
A Paradigm Shift may take place when the old paradigm can no longer explain important new observations or discoveries.
A Paradigm Shift occurs when you can suddenly see further than you did before, or see things that were invisible to you before but existed all the time.
Imagine for instance that you live in a valley and that your vision is limited by the surrounding mountains. So the mountains are like your paradigm that limits how far you can see. Now, if you can climb one of the surrounding mountains, then you will suddenly be able to see much further, beyond your own valley and over a wider landscape and maybe many other valleys. Your horizon expands and you can see much further and see a lot of new things. This is what a Paradigm Shift does: It expands your vision and allows you to see things that were invisible to you before.
A new paradigm opens up new perspectives and makes many things possible that the old paradigm insisted were impossible.
250 years ago, it was impossible to communicate by telephone, radio, television, cell-phones, satellites or Internet. Or to record sound and pictures. Why? Because we had not yet learnt of the existence of electricity and radio waves. They were invisible to us, and therefore we believed they did not exist.
Since the middle of the 18th century the horizon of the ruling paradigm has been expanding faster than ever through new scientific discoveries and new ways of thinking. Today it´s easy to see how ignorant our ancestors were 300 years ago compared to ourselves. And this development continues. In 300 years from now, people may marvel at how ignorant we are today compared to them.
Paradigm shifts seldom come without violent resistence from those who are heavily invested in the old paradigm. You may not have noticed it, but a relentless struggle is being fought right now between greed-driven destructive old-paradigm technologies, and enlightened constructive “green” or “organic” technologies of the fast emerging new Paradigm. The outcome of this fight will determine how soon the new paradigm I call the Aquarian Paradigm will finally take over and transform our world into one where everybody can live in peaceful and prosperous cooperation with equitably shared resources and no scarcity. If you think this is impossible, it´s only because you are conditioned by the old paradigm, in other words, you suffer from “paradigm blindness”. If you expand your vision to that of the new paradigm, you will see that it´s not only possible, but it´s the only thing that makes any sense. And not only that: it´s the only way to save Humanity from grievous agony and, ultimately, extinction.
