I've Been Thinking...

The other night, I was wide-awake for hours in the darkness of my bedroom. It was that time deep in the night when it’s so quiet that you can hear the creak in the floors and the sound of your own breath.

I laid in my bed thinking about the last few years and what a rollercoaster they have been. I thought back to the 2016 election night, when I sat downstairs in my family room glued to the TV, stunned as the results rolled in. Then, my mind jumped to the Women’s March, to the #MeToo Movement, to headlines about the Catholic Church. My mind flashed in rapid succession to school shootings. Marches for gun reform and climate change. Images of chaos at the borders. Russia. The impeachment trial. All the President's Men and their cries of “fake news.” The pandemic. Unemployment. The murder of George Floyd and the protests that have followed calling for police reform and to recognize that Black lives matter. And on Friday, the senseless death of Rayshard Brooks by a police officer in Atlanta.

Massive crises have one great advantage: They show you where you stand. The sight can be distressing and shocking. But it would be wrong to say “Who knew?” We all knew. In this country you’d have to be willfully ignorant to not know about racism, police brutality, income inequality, global warming, the staggering cost of medical care, and the rapacious activity of huge international corporations.

A secondary benefit of a massive crisis is that change can occur. People have waked up enough to protest racism and police brutality. COVID-19 deaths have waked up enough people that Medicare for all has a viable chance of happening. We cannot afford to keep recycling the same old story once things get back to normal. As overwhelming as a massive crisis is, the good news is that the solutions are just as well known as the problems.

I've Been Thinking...

Wow, what a week. The death of George Floyd has thrown this country into a tailspin. Protests, looting, curfews—a nation erupting before our very eyes on live television.

As I watched, my heart sank. My mind went back and forth between what was happening last night and the video, still raw, of George Floyd pinned to the street with a knee to his neck, pleading for his life with the words, “I can’t breathe.” My heart sank as I learned from news reports that he called out for his mother in his final moments.

And then, the protests. I felt the outrage and the anger pour out of Americans everywhere who are rightly furious that this kind of injustice seems to know no end. This story is yet another startling reminder that we all really aren’t in the same boat. We don’t all walk down the street or through the park and get the same reactions from one another, not to mention from law enforcement.

So here we are. Headed not just into summer, but in so many ways, into the great unknown. Most stay-at-home orders have been lifted or eased. Businesses are trying to reopen, but many of the ones that did ended up being looted this weekend.  Social distancing and mask rules are in effect, but let’s face it, they will be challenging to enforce. Just look at the pictures from this past Memorial Day weekend. In fact, it seems that in just a few short days, the pandemic has become secondary news.

How both of these stories play out moving forward will come down to all of us. Without clear federal guidelines, we are all left to our own devices. My health and safety will be dependent on your actions, and yours will be dependent on mine. In this country where independence and freedom are prized values, it will be interesting to see if there is, in fact, a common good and a higher purpose that we can all coalesce around.

I hope and trust that you and your family are safe and feeling comfortable. All of us in Humanity’s Team are here for you and with you during this challenging time. 

As we enter the third month of the global pandemic, people have many questions on their minds about health, finances, safety, and, in general, what the re-opening of the world will look like.

None of us have answers to those kinds of questions. But as the old saying goes, time will tell.

This question, though—the one I’m hearing being asked with both sincerity and anger—is one I believe I do have an answer to… “Where is God in all of this?”  

Some are saying that since we don’t want anything to do with God in our schools, at work, and in public discourse, God has retreated.

I heard one version of that sentiment that goes like this (and please forgive the overuse of the male pronoun)…  

He, being a gentleman, has deserted us and left us to our own devices. If we don’t want anything to do with God, He says “fine” and departs our life. We are now left alone to fend for ourselves during the pandemic. 

How does that sit with you?

I believe the idea that God has left us is the furthest thing from the truth. 

I believe the Divine is very present now and is speaking to each of us who are willing to hear.  

I believe the Divine actually has always been present sharing messages of love, hope, and possibility but we’ve mostly been too busy to really hear Her/His messages.  

Now, as many of us find ourselves less busy and more available, there is an opening where we can take time for silence and really listen for and hear the Divine speaking to us.  

The COVID crisis is being fought on two fronts, medical and economic, but most people are suffering psychologically. The word “existential” rarely comes up in normal everyday life, but the crisis has created all the symptoms of existential dread: a sense of futility, anxiety about the human condition, and a deep fear of death. This comes as a shocking occurrence, and if there is such a thing as existential healing, now is the time for it.

Questions about existence baffle people, and there seems to be no reason to confront them until the last moment. One of the reasons that Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s 1969 book, On Death and Dying, was seized upon by millions is that she drew a map of grief that showed dying patients that the inevitability of death wasn’t terrifying in the end. The five stages of grief outlined by Kübler-Ross—denial, anger, depression, bargaining, and acceptance—coincides with what is seen in hospice care. The prospect of death for most people leads to acceptance.

But there is a sixth stage of grieving that applies right now: meaning. The most fortunate patients go beyond acceptance to see that their lives had purpose, that existence is meaningful, and therefore that death lost its final power, which is fear and dread. This is the healing that I think should be embraced now. The actual deaths caused by COVID-19 are outnumbered by the cases of fear and dread being experienced on a mass scale. One way or another, we have all entered the grieving process.

The phrase “the Unbearable Lightness of Being” was introduced as the title of a 1984 novel by Milan Kundera. (It also became a movie). It uses Friedrich Nietzsche’s doctrine of the Eternal Return to illustrate Lightness.

The idea of “eternal return,” explains that our universe and our existence, has occurred an infinite number of times in the past, and is cyclical and will continue to occur forever.

This is a heady, intellectual concept, but I’ve been thinking about it lately in terms of how to make sense of the earth (and soul) shattering times we are currently in.

Last year I discovered a new word, liminal, which is also appropriate for these times.

Did you truly choose this path?

The Practice:
Find your own way.

Why?

The human body has about 100 trillion cells (plus another ten quadrillion microscopic critters hitching a ride, most of them beneficial or harmless). Each one of your cells has aims – goals, in a sense – controlled by its DNA: cells conduct processes aimed at particular functions, like building bones or gobbling up harmful invaders. Cells also work together in larger and larger assemblies in pursuit of broader goals, such as the 100 billion neurons in your brain that run the nervous system, which as a whole is itself the master regulator of the body.

In effect, there are layers, hierarchies, of goals in the body – and a similar architecture of aims in the mind. For example, operating right now is the goal of moving your eyes over these words, which serves the goal of understanding them, which serves larger goals such as desires to learn new things, new skills, and to be truly happy.

In short, whether in the body or the mind, there is no life without goals. Trying to “transcend” goals is itself a goal. The only question is: Are your goals good ones? In other words, do they lead to happiness and benefits for you and others rather than suffering and harms?

Much of the unconscious world is collapsing under its own weight.

Many forms of commerce are hitting full stop. Ships are idle. Planes are empty. Even automobiles are parked without riders.

As old establishments fail, this is making room for new institutions and ways of living that are more fruitful and productive.

There will be some rebuilding of the old norm but, in many cases, new organizations will offer something fresh, something new, something conscious.

Those of us on the conscious journey have been calling forth a new humanity and a new earth.

Could it be that we’ve found our moment in the midst of so much challenge and hardship?

Perhaps.

A friend of mine, who is a gifted attorney, is leaving his lucrative practice to create educational programs for conscious professionals. This is a calling so, even though it is scary on many levels, he is moving forward with plans.

How about you ? What are you being called to at this time?

Social isolation gives us time to examine our lives in a new light, suddenly faced with economic collapse, empty streets, current panic and future uncertainty, and death appearing out of nowhere—in other words, the conditions that confronted every person on a daily basis during the lifetime of Shakespeare. What feels horribly abnormal to us was routinely normal for him and every member of the human race in the 16th century.

In statistical terms, Shakespeare is just another survivor. Unlike his son, Hamnet, who died at 11, Shakespeare didn’t die as a child, nor did his mother die giving birth to him. He also escaped the plague. Ever since the Black Death swept across the globe in the 14^th century, bubonic plague remained a threat, killing on average one to three people in every house where it struck. In Shakespeare’s lifetime, there were four plague years, 1582, 1592, 1603, and 1607, when London, including its theaters, shut down because of the disease.