Memory is a template. When an experience occurs, a "groove" or dent simultaneously occurs in what you refer to as your mind.

The memory stays in the "groove" ready to be activated when other, like experiences occur.

An easy example of this: a child walking down a familiar street encounters an attack dog. The dog remains securely behind the fence, but the force of the attack as the dog lunges toward the child creates a groove.

Suddenly the child does not want to go down that street, ever!

We see clearly from this that memory serves as a great warning system, as a gatherer of information about the environment, many positive things.

Yet perhaps that same street is a shortcut, or has other advantages. The child has then reduced his or her options in choosing now, in the here present moment, what is the best.

That is how memory works also. Once bitten, twice shy goes the saying and this aptly describes one aspect of memory, personal and collective.

Once we have the memory of something, usually we simply follow our inner sense: this thing is bad, that thing is good. We do this regardless of the actual value of the thing in the present moment.

We are living in memory.

The nature of dreams helps us release from the old grooves and find new and more advantageous ways to live our lives.

The nature of meditation is to help sharpen our focus and confidence so we can live in the now and not describe our lives from the predictions of the past, only.

What occurs on the individual level occurs also on the collective level. When we have information that has helped us survive it becomes part of our collective information package.

Humans need food so food is a big deal no matter where you live as a human being. Every part of the planet has humans trying to find and keep and maintain food supplies according to the collective information of that region.

The emphasis on food remains the same but changes according to the geography.

That is true of ideas, religions, and beliefs. No difference.

The collective can be helpful in giving us information about what we need to survive, but we can just as easily become trapped in the memory code which worked yesterday or several hundred years ago.

This is true on the personal level and also on the collective level.

In this sense we can more easily see we are living in a dream, or groove of ideas from the past.

Part of the big challenge of our time is to clearly see what ideas are caught in the past, may have worked then but no longer apply.

We see this easily with the current uprisings from parts of the Muslem community. Parts of that community believe we all have to be Muslem. This is an old belief that may have worked when warring tribes needed to establish control over a geographic region, but in the current nuclear age is outdated.

Whether or not you are an Islamist it must be brought to mind that dying for Allah is one thing but dying for Allah through nuclear weapons leaves nothing behind. No garden for Allah and no people.

So the old beliefs of war are outdated.