Groucho Marxism

A spiritual awakening is a profound shift in consciousness, moving beyond the ego to a deeper sense of self, reality, and connection. It is often triggered by life events or contemplation, leading to transformation, new perspectives, heightened awareness, compassion, and a search for deeper meaning, sometimes feeling disorienting but ultimately bringing clarity and purpose. A political awakening, on the other hand, is the process by which an individual or a group of people develops a heightened awareness of political issues, power structures, and their own place within society, leading to increased political consciousness, engagement, and activism. In this blog post, I will put forward the view that spiritual and political awakening are two sides of the same coin.

I will start with a confession: I used to be a centrist. If you’d asked me 20 years ago what my political position was, I probably would have told you that I was centre-left. I was once firmly of the view that although all political parties are far from perfect, there is still sufficient difference between them to make it worthwhile going out and voting for the least-worst option. I had swallowed the narrative that the only way change can realistically occur is gradually, through evolution rather than revolution. In fairness to my younger self, I was a product of my upbringing (as we all are). I am of the generation that grew up during the fall of communism in Eastern Europe, which gave a lot a credibility to the idea that capitalism is the only viable system.

I am also of the generation that grew up during the ‘great moderation’: the period roughly from the mid-1980s to 2008 characterized by remarkably stable macroeconomic condition, featuring lower volatility in output and inflation, longer economic expansions, and generally improved living standards. Up until 2008, you could make a case that capitalism, although far from perfect, creates stability and prosperity overall. That all changed with the global financial crisis, which exposed the supposed stability of capitalism as a sham and marked the beginning of my political awakening. Like many people, I was appalled when the UK government responded by introducing its austerity program, punishing ordinary people whilst simultaneously rewarding those who had caused the crisis.

A couple of years later, I came down with a mystery illness. The symptoms were acute and included extreme fatigue, loss of sense of smell, loss of balance, shortness of breath, and partial loss of sight. Despite the acuteness of these symptoms, nobody could work out what was wrong with me. Eventually, after a year or so and many visits to my local hospital, I was diagnosed with an autoimmune condition called sarcoidosis. An autoimmune disease occurs when your immune system mistakenly attacks your own healthy cells, tissues, and organs, causing inflammation and damage. Nobody really knows what causes such illnesses to occur, but one theory is that they are caused by chronic stress. That certainly seemed to fit with my situation as at that point I had been living under chronic stress for many years.

When I reflected on it, I realized that this stress was caused primarily by being forced to participate in capitalism. It was then that I really started to understand what a rotten system capitalism is. Being forced to work for forty plus hours per week against your will is just about bearable when you are in good health; but try doing it with as chronic illness. It was around this time that I started meditating as a way to cope with my health issues. This further increased my spiritual awakening and helped me see what was really going on around me. And what I saw was that capitalism is a perverse, unjust system based on a web of lies and illusions, which forces people to give up the best years of their lives doing activities that are at best pointless and at worse actively harmful.

The point I want to get across here is that my political and spiritual awakenings were one and the same thing. My spiritual awakening was what enabled me to see the world clearly, which reinforced political awakening. Conversely, my political awakening led to me wanting to understand the world on a deeper level, which reinforced my spiritual awakening. These were not two separate processes but a single process acting as a kind of iterative feedback loop. Having gone through this, I now look back on my younger self almost as a different person. I realize that I was going through life in a kind of dream (or perhaps nightmare would be more appropriate), completely oblivious to the true nature of the world around me.

The problem with going through this awakening process is that it makes it painfully obvious when others haven’t. This can create difficulty with interpersonal relationships, which can start to seem quite superficial. You can feel yourself gradually outgrowing old friendships and patterns of socializing. Note that I am not claiming any superiority here; on the contrary, I feel I was lucky to have gone through such an awakening. As difficult as having a chronic illness was, I now realize it was an essential part of my spiritual development. But I believe that everyone is capable of spiritual and political awakening given the right circumstances. The question is what the right circumstances are. This is a question we socialists need to answer if we want to bring about a successful revolution.