New is what you find at the beginning of a cycle, which was little used, just bought, or that had not been thought about or materialized before. It replaces something already outdated. It is something whose form, structure or appearance is modified compared to the previous one, but it is also that without experience; immature, novice, an apprentice, who did not develop satisfactorily, or who is not mature.
What is new may frighten because it is not yet understood, by changing what was taken for granted, without guarantee. It is a possibility of evolution. However, more and more rapidly the traditional way of life and thought are altered by what’s new, brought by new ways of understanding life and the world. It is very easy to find the beliefs and behaviours of our grandparents who were overtaken by the new, funny. Yet it is difficult to be aware that what we believe today may soon be outdated. With the new brought in the arms of globalization and the rapidity of the current means of communication, mankind does what it can to adapt to the change of ideas and concepts.
Since the beginning of the twentieth century great achievements in science were made by questioning the knowledge that was largely confirmed by the facts closest to humans. Einstein’s famous theory of general relativity, for example, came to light through the questioning of Newton’s gravitational theory, which held almost a sacred status on the part of the scientific community at the time. In the heart of the positive changes brought by the new to society – advances in health, transportation, communication, etc. – there are many problems, such as atomic weapons, industrialized foods and the destruction of nature.
Most of humanity suffers or enjoys the effects of change without having an active role in them. Being bombarded daily by large amounts of information, and faced with the impossibility of absorbing everything, people become apathetic and unable to see differently from what they already know. In an intricate set of causes and effects, the human being believes that he has the power to make decisions, but it is difficult to know to what extent he is not just a wheel in the countless wheels in the great machine of the world, which makes the present being, fruit of the past, and the future, a consequence of what we already live.
There is a part of humanity, however, which in order to understand the present, turns its gaze back to the past, when exceptional individuals, moved by a different consciousness, proposed ideas that promoted changes in the world in a very positive way, exceeding the ephemeris of everyday life. To this consciousness, new to all ages in which it arises, we will give the name of “young consciousness.”
If we imagine a scale of consciousness and compare this to mountains, we might say that some people have reached the peak of Mount Everest. And of course there were and there are climbers who do not reach the top but also travel the path of the “young consciousness” at lower altitudes and even without having to become notable people.
The “young consciousness” is above the duality of the new and old. To find the new may seem like a mockery, as if the search had always been for the “youthful consciousness” but on the way, humanity was distracted by little found novelties, never reaching its true goal.
The “young consciousness” is a consciousness from which the human being has the capacity to innovate, to question, and finally, to modify the world around him. It is independent of age, creed, religion or political position. People gifted with this way of seeing the world have the ability to expose themselves and think freely, seeking the truth in themselves and not merely information that corroborates their opinions.
If this “young consciousness” were asked what she wanted, she would probably respond that she wanted people to speak the truth, to live freely and to be autonomous, to free the world from their bonds and to remove the veils that separate them from the truth. The idea of such a life could shock those who believe that certain values and ideologies should never be questioned. On the other hand, there are people in the world with the impetus to break paradigms and give new direction to the course of history. Such people can be milestones in humanity’s journey or simply people who make a difference in their communities or families.
However, while the existence of exceptional people is truly beneficial to humanity, the questions remain legitimate: how much longer will fundamental decisions for the lives of all remain under the shadow of exterior enlightenment? Is it necessary that the young conscience always manifest itself as an exception?
The answers to these questions point to the need for a fundamental change in everyone’s attitude of life. For a true transition between the habitual consciousness with which we are accustomed, and the “young consciousness”, autonomy is required over our own lives, or at least the desire to develop it.
Autonomy, in turn, provides for the acquisition of an inner authority, which comes to dissolve the human tendency to cling to outside authorities. And why is inner authority necessary? In a way, it is a matter of distinguishing the external phenomena from the inner, since everything that is thought or lived today has probably been thought or lived by someone, but certainly no one, before or after us, will know what lies deep inside our being, who we really are, and what is the source of true change in life: that which we cannot name, yet which we know exists within us.
