At first glance it seems that the hardest thing to change about the current situation is the deathgrip in which the health insurance con has trapped us all. The stupendous amount of money involved is a big contributor to that belief, I suppose. How exactly does one go about unwrapping people’s fingers from around such big piles of cash?

But I think that that problem can be solved if we can find away to solve the deeper problem of the denial of the impermanence of human existence: birth, old age, sickness, and death are how the story goes, along with life, youth, health, happiness, and enjoyment. It is a package. The health insurance con has been successful at least partially because the con men and women have been playing on our deep wish that we could have the good stuff and make the bad stuff go away. If there were a way to see through that, then the con would no longer have any kick to it.

In fact, most human cultures have aspects that do address the impermanence of existence and how we can live fully and richly in the light of that. All of the world’s religions of which I am aware offer their practitioners ways to understand and live with the inevitability of death. They offer ways of valuing life and living as good people in light of the fact that we will all die. It is not a coincidence that the last 200 years or so, when we have been seduced by science into hoping that maybe death will be overcome, have seen such stunning displays of human cruelty as those still going on today.

Maybe when we lose sight of the fact that we have things in common as human beings, one of them being the experience of age, illness, and death, we become more prone to separating people out into groups which are more or less worthy of our care. I have been struck over the last twenty years or so with the polarizing of people that has happened. I know people will say that this is a media artifact, and I think that is often true, but consider this. The U.S. is divided politically by something like 51% to 49%. But if you take one half of that divide, the Democratic party, and have two people run in a whole series of primaries, they wind up divided, again, by something like 51% to 49%. What is going on here?

I do not claim to have an answer to that question, but I do think that the fact that we have lost a spiritual sense of our common humanity is a big factor. We have divided ourselves into the fundamental duality, Us and Them. If I can convince myself that the man I know who died of a heart attack, died because he was at fault, because he ate the wrong things or was unable to make himself exercise enough, then I can maintain my belief that maybe it will not happen to me.

I know that religion is a bad word in some circles lately. I even understand that fact, given the atrocities that have been committed in the name of religion. But I think it’s possible to reclaim the gifts that the spiritual traditions of our various cultures have for us, and thus reclaim some moral compass in dealing with the human condition.