Our Evolutionary Potential

What does evolution have to do with Dharma?

And what does either have to do with conflict?

We often think of spiritual practice as moving us beyond conflict.

But development may actually ask something more interesting of us:

to become capable of meeting conflict differently.

In 2018, Diane Musho Hamilton and I explored this question in a series of conversations on Dharma & The Evolution Of Conflict.

Our first conversation focused on Dharma itself.

In this second conversation, we turned toward our evolutionary potential.

What does it mean for a human being to develop?

How does our relationship to difference change as we mature?

And what role might conflict itself play in that development?

Dharma And Evolution

Dharma traditionally points toward truth, reality, or the nature of things as they are.

Evolution points toward change over time.

At first these can seem like very different directions.

One points toward something timeless.

The other points toward development.

But human practice happens where these two meet.

We may awaken to something universal through meditation or contemplative practice.

Yet we still have personalities.

Histories.

Relationships.

Cultural conditioning.

Blind spots.

And very different capacities for navigating complexity.

Spiritual realization does not automatically erase these developmental differences.

So alongside the movement of waking up, there is another movement:

growing up.

Our capacity to hold complexity can develop.

Our capacity to take perspectives can develop.

Our relationship with difference can develop.

And our ability to meet conflict without collapsing into automatic opposition can develop.

Conflict As An Ingredient Of Evolution

Conflict is usually experienced as a problem.

Something has gone wrong.

Someone disagrees.

Two needs collide.

Two perspectives cannot occupy the same space.

Naturally, we want the discomfort to stop.

But from a developmental perspective, conflict can also contain information.

Difference reveals the limits of our current perspective.

Resistance shows us where our identity is invested.

Another person’s viewpoint may expose something our own worldview cannot yet include.

In that sense, conflict can become an active ingredient of evolution.

Not because conflict itself is inherently good.

Some conflicts are destructive.

Some situations require strong boundaries.

Some differences cannot simply be reconciled.

But conflict often brings us directly to an edge.

And an edge is where development becomes possible.

Becoming Familiar With Difference

One of the important capacities in human development is becoming increasingly able to remain present with difference.

At earlier stages, difference easily becomes threat.

If your worldview challenges mine, I may need to prove that you are wrong.

If your identity conflicts with mine, I may experience your existence as an attack on my own.

If your values differ from mine, I may reduce you to those differences.

Development gives us another possibility.

We can learn to differentiate without immediately separating.

We can recognize:

You are not me.

Your experience is not my experience.

Your view may not be my view.

And yet I do not have to destroy, dismiss, or absorb your perspective in order to remain grounded in my own.

This capacity is essential to mature conflict work.

More Perspectives, Not No Perspective

Development does not mean becoming neutral.

It does not mean losing values or refusing to take a position.

A more developed perspective can still be clear.

Still committed.

Still willing to act.

The difference is that it becomes increasingly capable of including more of reality.

Instead of seeing only my side and your side, I begin to see the system in which both sides are arising.

I can ask:

What conditions produced this conflict?

What does each person see that the other cannot?

What values are being protected?

What histories are present?

What power dynamics are involved?

What am I contributing?

What is the conflict itself trying to reveal?

The picture becomes more complex.

But complexity does not have to produce paralysis.

It can produce greater choice.

From Zero-Sum Toward Greater Possibility

One of the developmental movements in conflict is from a purely zero-sum orientation toward the capacity to recognize larger possibilities.

A zero-sum conflict says:

For me to win, you have to lose.

Sometimes reality genuinely contains competing interests.

But sometimes the zero-sum frame itself is the limitation.

With greater awareness, perspective-taking, and relational capacity, we may discover possibilities that were invisible from within the original opposition.

This is one of the reasons conflict can become a Path.

It pressures us to grow beyond the response we already know.

Evolution Requires Friction

There is a temptation in spiritual practice to imagine that development should become increasingly comfortable.

But growth often involves friction.

Our assumptions are challenged.

Our self-image is challenged.

Our preferred perspectives are challenged.

Relationship challenges us.

Life challenges us.

The question is not whether friction appears.

The question is whether we have the awareness and capacity to work with it.

If we only defend ourselves against what is different, our existing structure remains intact.

If we can stay present long enough to learn from the encounter, something new can emerge.

That is evolutionary potential.

Watch The Conversation

In the conversation below, Diane Musho Hamilton and I explore Dharma, developmental perspectives, and the evolution of our relationship to conflict.

Among the questions we explore are:

• What is Dharma’s relationship to evolution?

• What are the developmental moves toward a more evolved relationship with conflict?

• How can conflict become an active ingredient of evolution?

• Why do we need to become more familiar with difference?

• What are the characteristics of a more evolved perspective on conflict?

Where is conflict currently showing you the edge of your own development?

Not simply who is right or wrong.

What is the situation asking you to become more capable of seeing, holding, or doing?