I was watching the new movie "Year One" yesterday and there was this scene where a large crowd was cheering the execution of two men. Then the two men distracted the crowd by changing their attention to something else and soon the crowd was cheering on that other thing. To me, it was a humorous connotation about how easy it is to manipulate a group consciousness, or how easy an individual will give up his/her individuality to be part of a "crowd mentality".

I see this group consciousness thing playing out all of the time in every aspect of society. It's in friendship circles, political parties, sports, religions, everything from small groups to whole countries. Sometimes it's obvious to see, like at a sporting event, and sometimes it's very subtle, like when you find yourself agreeing with somebody about something, that if you thought about it, you really don't agree with them at all.

Whenever I read or listen to a right wing dissertation about something else that Obama is doing wrong, and it's by a commentator or a writer who has never agreed with one thing Obama has done yet, I have to believe that person is just caught up in a group consciousness. Most group consciousness dynamics seem to be centered around a "we're right and your wrong" or "we're better than you" mentality. I guess we all get caught up in these things now and then, some certainly more than others, but I have to wonder....what kind of personality is more prone to become a part of a group consciousness and what types are not?

My brother made a great point when we were talking about this today. He said it was a "lazy mind" that is more susceptible to these things. It's so much easier to be told what to believe, be told who's side your on, or to just go along with the majority, than it is to try to figure it out for yourself. Freud believed that a group consciousness was always centered around a leader. I think that may be true but sometimes the "leader" can just be an "idea". People have died for an "idea".

I suppose the "group consciousness", like every other dynamic of society, goes back to ancient times when such a thing was necessary for group survival. From there it somehow evolved to "Go Dodgers!" The worst example I've seen in my life was when we invaded Iraq and the brain dead from the right were calling anybody who disagreed with the war "unpatriotic". Talk about getting caught up in your own self righteous group hysteria!

So what type of person gets caught up in a group consciousness the easiest? To me it's simple, and I mean that literally....a simple mind. A simple mind is easily led. But here's the tricky part about all this....a simple mind can also be a very intelligent mind. We tend to confuse intelligence with awareness and they are not the same thing. That's because awareness is not a function of the mind, at least not the same part of the mind where intelligence comes from. My Dad used to say that the world was full of intellectual giants who were spiritual dwarfs. How right he was.

Through self awareness (awakened consciousness) we know when we are acting or reacting. Acting is a creative expression done consciously. Reacting is always unconscious and therefore more prone to following the path of least resistance. The path of least resistance will always lead you away from individual creativity and right into the heart of the "group". We are always drawn to the group because there is safety in numbers. Sometimes the safety we seek out is to be safe from ourselves, from our own personal feelings and ideas because to stand alone with your own feelings and ideas is to often challenge the crowd or the group. The easy way, the path of least resistance is to join the group. History often shows that new ideas, ideas that change and uplift humanity usually come from an individual who stands alone and challenges the status quo of the group.

As parents, we try to make our teenagers aware of the dangers of "following the crowd". We encourage critical thinking and creative expression, we want them to become "their own person". But do we lead by example? Not really, not most of us. We demonstrate our own willingness to "follow the crowd" by allowing ourselves to become absorbed into the group consciousness of our political party, our religion, our unions, our favorite sport teams, and every group that we feel we have an allegiance with. It's one thing to align yourself with a particular group because you believe in their cause or because they represent you in some way, but it's another to follow that group blindly and to leave all the decisions up to others who are willing to lead, and to unconsciously echo whatever the dogma is of that group because you have been told that "this is how it is."

Just as Jesus tried to teach us how to "be in this world but not part of it", I think we can belong to groups and still maintain our individualism within that group. It's easy, just be yourself.