There is, of course, an age-old argument about whether morality is just a construct arising out of a mutual agreement. In essence, then, this means that it is a selfish philosophy: “I’ll be good to you if you are good to me” — like the good ole Golden Rule that is in all religions.

Psychopaths aside, empathy seems to be part of a normal amygdala in the brain and therefore morality arises from the empathy. One might consider that, since empathy exists even beneath all the selfishness and busyness of the mind, it could come to the fore simply by placing the attention on someone besides one’s self. So to my experience, morality and empathy have more to do with attention than anything else. I am suggesting that if we were to really be attentive, to observe closely how others react and feel, as well as how we think and who we are beyond a shell of beliefs, then morality wouldn’t be an effort or a rarity. And in this observation it would become apparent that thoughts, feelings, emotions, trauma, unmet needs, etc., are obstacles to the clarity of mind that dissolves the belief of “the other.”

Without the clarity of which I write, there is conflict: the conflict within the thinking and feeling processes of the individual, and by extension, conflict within society. This conflict causes what we may label as unfairness, racism, misogyny, biases, violence, resistance, close-mindedness, unfriendliness, nationalism, religion, divisiveness, antisemitism, and so on. An unhappy, conflicted world doesn’t come from a lack of morality directly, but rather, at the core, a lack of attention — enough attention to create an epiphany of what we are.

You bring up the role of nature... Nature, to the conditioned thought, is chaotic, dangerous, unpredictable, and frightening. But with a clear enough mind, everything about nature, and nature as a whole, becomes realized as a dynamic totality of a single movement. It only seems chaotic due to the limited mind full of thoughts.