How does the minimalist movement fit into consciousness?
Last week I was on a podcast discussing human history through the lens of Integral philosophy. If you haven’t listened to it yet, please do so – it’s my first time on a podcast interview and it provides a really basic introduction to worldviews and the development of consciousness over time.
One of the topics we didn’t get to discuss in detail is the concept of minimalism as it pertains to a shift in consciousness. I said on the podcast that the minimalist movement is one mechanism that people can use to shift from a modern worldview to a postmodern worldview. This post will describe why this is the case.
It had occurred to me that I didn’t get to explain the differences between modernism and postmodernism due to the time-limited nature of the podcast. A much more in-depth look at the levels of consciousness is in the works, especially once we look at Ken Wilber’s AQAL model. For this post, I’ll briefly touch on the two levels of modern and postmodern consciousness. From there it will be easy to see how minimalism fits in the transition.
The source of work I cite for this entry is the book Integral Consciousness and the Future of Evolution. It’s a good overview of the Integral philosophy and draws on prior works by other Integral philosophers. In fact, I recommend it more than anything written by Ken Wilber as an introductory read.
Basics of Modernism
The modernist philosophy evolved from the Enlightenment as a way out of the religious- and feudal-based hierarchal worldview. Prior to the Enlightenment, many people were living in societies dominated by religious institutions, monarchies, or aristocracies that wielded all of the power. In European cultures, this started to dissolve when people became tired of being used and abused by the authorities. Modernist consciousness was assisted by the printing press, the Age of Reason and the evolution of hard sciences that started in the Renaissance. The founding of the United States in particular was a marker of the newly formed modernist philosophy.
Modernism consciousness is essentially an individualized, rational, objective worldview. Logic and reason reins supreme, and over time wealth eventually transferred from the aristocracy to individuals who had the ingenuity to build businesses. Modern democracy, capitalism, science, and individual liberty are the building blocks of this level of consciousness. The inventions and discoveries of modernist culture helped many people free themselves from abject poverty and lower forms of philosophical existence. Universal education, the corporation, science and medicine are some of the pinnacles of advancement that the modernist consciousness has contributed for the betterment of humanity.
Unfortunately, today we are seeing where modernist consciousness is starting to fall apart. At modernism’s best, concrete, objective numbers and logic reign supreme over the environment and human resources. The structure of the corporation is used as a way to “make it” in society – show up, perform work, get paid and live a good life. But what do people do with this wealth? They save, of course – but they also buy stuff that corporations provide, typically material goods, so they can live a better life. Hence there is a push at this level of consciousness to show power and status not by nobility, but by being able to buy goods and services.
Over a couple of hundred years, modernism developed into the situation we’re in now, where material goods are cheap, people value their material goods highly, and capitalism is starting to exploit workers and natural resources across continents like never before. In response to this worldview, a philosophical and cultural shift in consciousness started to take hold as recently as fifty years ago but has grown significantly in the past couple of decades – the framework of postmodernism.
Basics of Postmodernism
Postmodernism in this context sees the beauty in personal growth, sustainability and equality. No longer is life about acquiring the most wealth; people realized they would still be dead in the long run. Nor is it all about being 100% rational and objective in their life’s experience. This doesn’t imply that postmodernists are insane and crazy; rather, postmodernism bases its values on equality, inclusion and diversity. Postmodernism favors holistic, inclusive, worldcentric solutions to problems. The environmental and multiculturalism movements are borne out of this consciousness, as is decision making by consensus. Another aspect of postmodernism in society is that spirituality (but not necessarily in the form of religion) starts coming back into the culture – but that’s for another blog entry.
The Minimalism Movement
From this (admittedly very simple and basic) explanation of modernism and postmodernism, it’s easy to see how the minimalism movement fits in philosophically. People that were living in a consciousness focused on maximizing wealth expanded their personal worldview and started placing their priorities on caring about other people and the environment. They also started to see the exploitation of others and themselves (via their jobs) and chose to make life changes. Part of this change can involve abandoning materialism and choosing minimalism as a framework in order to minimize their consumption footprint.
Note that this minimalism movement is different than the minimalism demonstrated by people prior to modernism. At prior consciousness and societal levels, minimalism was the de facto standard of living either as a requirement of religion (e.g. monks and nuns) or because of the economic realities present in that society (e.g. feudal serfs). While people chose to live by vows of poverty from a religious standpoint, this particular evolution of minimalism arose from a conscious choice by people who lived in a society influenced by modernist consciousness.
I hope this entry serves as a way to understand how consciousness can evolve and as a way to describe some of the factors of modernist and postmodernist consciousness. They’ll be more to discuss, especially once we start looking into how Integral philosophy was formed and how Integral consciousness is starting to take shape. I will be writing more about the structure of Integralism in the coming weeks.
image credit: Editor B