The Bridge – what are we afraid of?

Here’s a question that has been with me for a long time:

Is there a correlation between the strength of a culture, its sense of “we are who we are, and you better don’t mess with that”, its sense of closing itself off against the outside, on the one side, and the amount of courage it takes to step out of the ordinary, and embrace change?

Then, a friend asked me to write story about overcoming resistance for his book.