Initiation and initiative : an exploration of the life and ideas of Dimitrije Mitrinović

158 LIFE AND IDEAS OF MITRINOVIC

permanent. One informant advised that “it would take many pages—or eyen many books—to describe all the changes we went through and all the different notions, mythologies and constitutions which he suggested.” Another described the constant shuffling and reshuffling of groups as possessing “the complexity of a problem in higher mathematics but the kinetic intensity of a dervish dance,” remarking that “if stability comes from inertia and if inertia is the enemy of consciousness, we should have become the most conscious group of people in the western world.”

One of the more stable group formations within the wider circle was the division between the sexes. Each group met apart from the other, had its own constitution and its own allocation of functions within the groupthere would, for instance, be a woman’s senate and a man’s senate. As with all groupings, the sexes each had their different function in Mitrinovic’s scheme of things, and consequently formed a ‘natural’ basis for group formation. Women were essentially a force for the preservation of life, a unifying and reconciling influence. The essence of woman was earnestness; that of man was sincerity, the search for truth through individual initiative. In the conditions of modern life both these qualities had become distorted. Crushed under the pressures of life the average woman had become callous, believing that change was impossible, whilst the ordinary male was distinguished not so much by his sincerity as by the aggressive pursuit of selfinterest at the expense of others. Modern civilization was a male civilization. The male had become selfish, materialistic, uncreative, totally instrumental in his approach to life—always doing something for the sake of something else without any sense of goodness or the glory of human values. New principles and guidelines were needed to stop the downward path. Such an initiative must come from women. Through joining together in mutual confidence they might recover and reassert their earnestness for life and the preservation of life. They could then provide the necessary support and guidance for men who might then reclaim their manhood and independence through acting to recreate the world. In this sense the men in the group were referred to as ‘auxiliaries—instruments of the feminine initiative. The real power lay with women, without their support and guidance men were directionless and helpless. Ultimately, of course, the goal was to become truly individual and human, transcending the characterological differences between the sexes—for women to seek truth as actively as men, and for men to care for goodness more than success.

There is a mystery in becoming truly human—in repenting of being a woman, of being English, of being a certain type. The true entity to be attained is the Ego which has no attributes. Then let men treat women as their sisters, and