We have now reached the dawning of the 7th Day of the current and last level of the Mayan calendar and moved into concluding Light. It is an amazing picture I draw in my mind’s eye of all of 7th Days going back to the beginning of Creation, one from each of the nine levels or “Hells”; each one simultaneously rounding up to individual and nested completion.
As things go along towards whatever kind of shift might be coming for humanity in 2012 or beyond, it strikes me that something inside me has changed. I no longer occupy myself as much with simple thoughts about how I can help myself, or even our Mesa students, friends, or healing clients. It’s not that I’m giving up on them at all, it’s just that I see my opportunity to help others as expanding rapidly outwards somehow, extending beyond our little “tribe” to the whole planet without having to leave where I sit.
The place I begin is with the recognition that something particular in the world needs to change and I must turn my personal energies towards it however I can to make it happen. It’s a simple idea: We need to work together for our common good and stop merely pretending we are. I’ve probably thought about this in vague terms before, but now as the Mayan calendar long count cycle is ending it is somehow solidifying energetically and spiritually in and around me. I’m feeling the call to help Humanity, my species, but how will I ever do that? There is a need for something new and I can help bring it about if by nothing else than by focusing upon it. Where intention goes, energy flows and I can start with that. I can “vote” with my consciousness.
Curious things happen out in Nature. Whales midwife and babysit each other’s young. Forest trees communicate with each other to ward off insect infestation. Horses in the pasture stand tail to head to swish away flies for each other in graceful symbiosis. I see the state of the human world and find myself wondering if I’m the only one who is asking the question, “If we are the most intelligent and creative species on Earth, possessors of computers, rocket ships, and opposable thumbs, why aren’t we acting together for the benefit of our species?” It just doesn’t make cosmic sense the way things are.
Technologically speaking, we’re able to cooperate to make cell phones, build skyscrapers, and photograph distant galaxies, but in terms of relationship are still very much stuck in ruggedly individualistic, every-man-for-himself mode. Yes, herd mentality can be a bad thing, but that depends on the level of consciousness of the herd in question. What if it was intelligent unity at work, instead of fear and distrust? The highest common good instead of “goody for me”? The “herd” would steer into green pasture instead of rushing headlong over the cliff.
We waste so much in endless competition that comes from “I-ism”. We think only of the short run, and not of the next seven generations. We use up resources to build grocery stores across from grocery stores as if there wasn’t enough food in the first ones to keep the locals from going hungry. In this way we replicate instead of innovate, continually and maniacally crashing together like bucks fighting over a doe for a quick and temporary fix of personal gain as our civilization mortgages its future.
This is exacerbated by the fact that so many of us are dealing with warring identities within ourselves and don’t know how to placate, soothe, cajole, unify, or just “play nice” inside of ourselves, let alone with our fellow humans. I guess I’m just getting to the place within my own healing where my inner parts realize their interdependence with each other and people outside the self, and I can no longer justify putting myself as alone or first. I can no longer accept meanness as business as usual. I can no longer indulge in separation or feel OK about another’s lack.
Taken together, aren’t we all smarter than this, I ask myself? Can’t we work together to find solutions that ensure the health, survival, peace, and advancement of all of us in equal measure? Strangely, I’m beginning to really believe we can. There’s a weird new hopefulness developing within me, despite what I see at the highest levels of our society; the chaotic, writhing, and imminent collapse of the existing institutions we have previously entrusted to steer our course. They are what doesn’t seem real to me.
What would I like to see instead? In my mind, I’m making new pictures of a near-future with the best and brightest of our kind coming together in benevolent agreement instead of angry debate. They are speaking softly; calmly and lovingly finding new solutions to our common problems and dire needs all inclusively. (OK, so I also see them wearing angelic robes…) The hearts of these gentle, dedicated, and selfless souls have been awakened to a new reality of connection, trust, and unity beyond survival level necessity, and their egos have been laid to rest. They have been entrusted with a future that is common to all and recognize the gravity of it.
With measured patience, they are taking steps to ensure that everyone has enough clean water to drink. They’re making arrangements to make healthy food available for all. (I see them leaning gently on each other as they softly discuss…) Together they are designing the safest, most efficient transportation systems, integrating clean, safe, equitable energy production, and sketching out new, simple, more humane ways of dealing with the imbalances that cause disease. The rest of us surround them, eagerly watching, ready to willingly support and cheer them on; knowing they will succeed for all of us because there is no other way.
In my vision the Earth herself relaxes and accepts us, because our kind leaders have recognized her equality and will never again allow her to be hurt for anyone’s personal gain. They agree that no plant or animal, fish, bird, or bug will ever be disrespected or ungraciously exploited. The planning is done leaving out no economic, social, age, ethnic, or religious group, but thoughtfully and compassionately for all as if they were family—because they are seen no other way. Furthermore, the process is actually easy, with everyone in agreement and eagerly waiting to pitch in and help in implementing the plans, doing so because it makes total sense and is simply the right thing to do for each other.
Even if I don’t see it happening around me yet, I can feel the energy for this change building out in the Allness. It’s growing like spring grass out on the prairie, silent and undisturbed except by the winds of invisible optimism of more and more people as they wake up to a new reality of unity. It is buoyed up on waves of longing for togetherness instead of separation, and suppressed love yearning to be released.
OK, so it sounds like a Utopian dream, but I feel that as more and more people wake up to the understanding that there is more to life than selfishness and self-indulgence, they will acquire tolerance, and arise from their slumber of conspicuous exclusion. They will awaken to this new, shared approach to our commonality and soundly, gently, but firmly insist upon it.
I’m finding myself more and more hopeful that we will not have to go all that much farther down the road to destruction before we realize the madness of our ways, stop acting against our own shared good, and join together as the brothers and sisters we are. What am I going to do about it in the meantime? Keep dreaming, for that is how change will happen—by each of us sending out the mental, emotional, and spiritual blueprint for it. You already know what it would look like.
