….a recent example (albeit a little stale) of how easy it is to get stuck to a ‘position’ happened right here in New Zealand recently. Did you notice the “Edmonds Cookbook Hot Cross Bun broohah”? It’s certainly a wonderful example of the dynamics we live in. Here’s what happened. The Establishment (Edmonds) has a cookbook. It is iconic. Many Kiwi households have one and it has helped countless students and other households feed themselves. So all in all it’s a good thing…until it isn’t. If you haven’t seen the story, Edmonds has a hot cross bun recipe that doesn’t actually work – unless you somehow know that because fruit releases sugar when it is mixed into the rest of the ingredients you shouldn’t add it until the end otherwise the yeast won’t do its thing properly and you’ll end up with hot cross rock cakes.
Well known and much loved New Zealand celebrity cook Jo Seagar tested the recipe and found it wanting. Edmonds said they tested it three times and it’s fine. The public tested it and found it wanting. Edmonds isn’t going to change it and stands by the recipe. A former employee who was a test baker told the Edmonds marketing department several times while he worked there some years ago that the recipe needed to be changed. Edmonds says it’s fine. So, Edmonds has a recipe they say works. The environment says it doesn’t. Edmonds says it does and that people are just not following the instructions properly – they have taken a position.
The funny thing about all this is that it’s a great example and reflects the world we live in. So what can we learn from our teacher Edmonds? The Establishment has problems to solve (even if it doesn’t acknowledge them). The solutions are all around in the community already. Rather than adopt these solutions, the Establishment is closed to feedback and keeps doing what it does. The question is WHY? Why do we continue to do things that don’t work and make our problems bigger and harder to solve – especially when there are solutions already sitting there? Think alternative energy, child development, sustainability, the idea that one size does not fit all and so on… Why can’t the guy with the hugely long lasting car battery get any market share? Why is the research and development money so much less than defence spending? Why in this day and age are we still so influenced by rules made by a very few (sometimes just one individual) hundreds and hundreds of years ago for reasons that related to that time and place and no longer ‘fit’ our modern reality? Why is it when we have technologies that can improve people’s lives en mass, that we do not use them – have we not a responsibility to the planet and each other to move forward?
You thought this view was about a hot cross bun….well, I might not be a bun…but I can get hot (possibly menopause) and pretty cross when we shut our eyes and block our ears to feedback that could contribute to increased success – it seems plain silly! Come on Edmonds – set pride aside and just say thanks for the feedback, launch a nationwide competition for the next iteration of ‘the best little hot cross bun recipe in town’ and thrive on the renewed enthusiasm for New Zealand’s most iconic cookbook?’ You could call the new recipe ‘Humility’ after the guy whose death those buns are supposed to honour….
If the Establishment can’t change a hot cross bun recipe for the common good – how I wonder is Obama going to get on ridding the world of nuclear weapons that are so prolific that we could destroy ourselves thousands of times over? Humanity is revolting…(pun intended) in our own big and little ways. Make it a revolt that counts for the good of the whole – with no-one and nothing left out.
And that’s it from my view.
Cheers,
Amanda
Monday, April 27, 2009
The power and value of the Mother
One role in life I have never felt capable of attempting but one I remain in awe of is that of the MOTHER. Today I want to acknowledge the power and value of the Mother. All of us had one. Some are one. Some yearn to be one. Some like me have long known we are not cut out for it. I really do stand in awe of the women who create human life and then go about nurturing that life to independence and a full contributing life of its own, so often whilst juggling the challenges of adult relationship and work. Some mothers are ‘naturals' and they make it all look so easy, some struggle hugely and have to work at it, others are just not suited to it at all and suffer through it, but all are huge influences in a child's life. Further, I believe all mothers want to do a good job and to say someone is ‘a bad mother' is probably one of the worst things a mother could hear - she does her best even if she is under resourced herself. (Note: I know men also have a huge role to play in the raising of children and they are often under supported, misunderstood and under acknowledged but that topic deserves it's own attention in another issue!)
While we aim resources at more prisons, boot camps for troubled teens and so on, why are we not looking more closely at giving mothers what they need to create environments for their children in which they thrive and flourish? Instead we seem to pile on the pressure to be in the ‘workforce' so there is enough family income to survive - and pay for others to care for their children, (often in large groups). Sure, many women I know who are mothers feel they would go mad without the adult environments they work in but somewhere things have gone out of whack. Women need better quality support across the board, especially in the first few years of their child's life.
Parenting is arguably the most important role on the planet. We have enough research now that tells us what we intuitively know, that the very early stages of life set the foundations for the child going forward (a child learns more and faster in the first 18mths of life than the rest of the life put together according to the experts). Why are we not focusing more resource on this period? What’s more, why not give mothers the personal development education they need to work through their own ‘leftover issues’ from childhood so the models they offer their children are even more effective than the ones they had?
Remember the old saying “Educate a woman and you educate a generation”? We have come a long way in educating women for sure, but there is more education needed about the dynamics of child development – every mother is an early childhood educator but some educate from ignorance. Rather than blaming women for not knowing any better why don't we support them to learn and value themselves and their role more. Surely we can all help with that by the way we treat mothers?
Mothers raise boys, who grow into men. Mothers raise girls who grow into women. Mothers teach boys how to treat women and girls how to be women. Children either adapt to what was modeled to them, or rebel against it. To grow into healthy adults with a sense of esteem and worth, children ideally need someone to love them, like them and believe in them. All children love having someone to look up to, to aspire to be like, to ‘show them the way'. With these things intact in the family (whatever form that family takes - and there are many), the whole society can grow in diversity and tolerance, compassion and respect.
While we need to find solutions for our current troubled youth and adults, surely it is worth some forward thinking to consider the future societies we are creating every day that babies are born - every day a baby is born, so the future is born. We will not eliminate the problems on this one until we eliminate the kinds of role models and environments that create them.
“We tell children how to be and they keep mirroring what we are. Children learn by example. If we are to raise happy, intelligent children we must bring to wholeness the models they are following.”
- Joseph Chilton Pearce
Making resources available for parents to provide those environments that help children flourish could be a helpful (for the individual and the whole) focus of our attention, not from dogma or rigid applications of self righteousness but from principles that can be used as pointers on a path. Parents can be guides on a path rather than enforcers of rules.
One key in my view is to educate parents, help them ‘compost the crap' from their own histories and thereby interrupt the patterns that foster dysfunction and low self esteem, and to teach them what builds a robust and resilient fully expressed contributing human that uses the best of themselves to serve the wider community.
I dream of a day when all parents know who they really are and how the human development process works. Everyone does the best they can with the resources they have. If we want that ‘best’ to be even better we need to add more resources. My moot is that those resources would over time lead to us needing less and less prisons, less and less need for money to deal with social problems, child abuse would be an anomaly, a thing of a distant past…every child sacred, every one a gem, and the responsibility of parenting seen as the most valuable role on the planet (which it undoubtedly is!).
To all the mothers out there I honour you. To my own mother I say “Thank you (again) for having me!” Don't wait for Mothers Day to pause and consider all your mother did for you. Appreciate her for what she gave you - whatever her resources…she did her best in her circumstances and likely deserves a medal!
And that's it….from my view.
Make it a great month,
Amanda xx
While we aim resources at more prisons, boot camps for troubled teens and so on, why are we not looking more closely at giving mothers what they need to create environments for their children in which they thrive and flourish? Instead we seem to pile on the pressure to be in the ‘workforce' so there is enough family income to survive - and pay for others to care for their children, (often in large groups). Sure, many women I know who are mothers feel they would go mad without the adult environments they work in but somewhere things have gone out of whack. Women need better quality support across the board, especially in the first few years of their child's life.
Parenting is arguably the most important role on the planet. We have enough research now that tells us what we intuitively know, that the very early stages of life set the foundations for the child going forward (a child learns more and faster in the first 18mths of life than the rest of the life put together according to the experts). Why are we not focusing more resource on this period? What’s more, why not give mothers the personal development education they need to work through their own ‘leftover issues’ from childhood so the models they offer their children are even more effective than the ones they had?
Remember the old saying “Educate a woman and you educate a generation”? We have come a long way in educating women for sure, but there is more education needed about the dynamics of child development – every mother is an early childhood educator but some educate from ignorance. Rather than blaming women for not knowing any better why don't we support them to learn and value themselves and their role more. Surely we can all help with that by the way we treat mothers?
Mothers raise boys, who grow into men. Mothers raise girls who grow into women. Mothers teach boys how to treat women and girls how to be women. Children either adapt to what was modeled to them, or rebel against it. To grow into healthy adults with a sense of esteem and worth, children ideally need someone to love them, like them and believe in them. All children love having someone to look up to, to aspire to be like, to ‘show them the way'. With these things intact in the family (whatever form that family takes - and there are many), the whole society can grow in diversity and tolerance, compassion and respect.
While we need to find solutions for our current troubled youth and adults, surely it is worth some forward thinking to consider the future societies we are creating every day that babies are born - every day a baby is born, so the future is born. We will not eliminate the problems on this one until we eliminate the kinds of role models and environments that create them.
“We tell children how to be and they keep mirroring what we are. Children learn by example. If we are to raise happy, intelligent children we must bring to wholeness the models they are following.”
- Joseph Chilton Pearce
Making resources available for parents to provide those environments that help children flourish could be a helpful (for the individual and the whole) focus of our attention, not from dogma or rigid applications of self righteousness but from principles that can be used as pointers on a path. Parents can be guides on a path rather than enforcers of rules.
One key in my view is to educate parents, help them ‘compost the crap' from their own histories and thereby interrupt the patterns that foster dysfunction and low self esteem, and to teach them what builds a robust and resilient fully expressed contributing human that uses the best of themselves to serve the wider community.
I dream of a day when all parents know who they really are and how the human development process works. Everyone does the best they can with the resources they have. If we want that ‘best’ to be even better we need to add more resources. My moot is that those resources would over time lead to us needing less and less prisons, less and less need for money to deal with social problems, child abuse would be an anomaly, a thing of a distant past…every child sacred, every one a gem, and the responsibility of parenting seen as the most valuable role on the planet (which it undoubtedly is!).
To all the mothers out there I honour you. To my own mother I say “Thank you (again) for having me!” Don't wait for Mothers Day to pause and consider all your mother did for you. Appreciate her for what she gave you - whatever her resources…she did her best in her circumstances and likely deserves a medal!
And that's it….from my view.
Make it a great month,
Amanda xx
Friday, April 24, 2009
PUT YOUR SEAT BELT ON!
What can happen in a month or so these days? We celebrated our national day with more harmony than for a long time. A new President in the US took office, there's a miracle on the Hudson River where everyone survived and a tragedy in Buffalo where no-one did. There's been the Aussie open tennis – thrilling to say the least (for the men's anyway), a war between Israel and Palestine and elections in Israel and Venezuela. Mugabe finally makes a show of sharing power with Morgan Tsvangirai, London has been snowed in, Wellington hosted the 7's and a new season of American Idol has begun and BIG things are having prangs – space stations out there and submarines down here! And that's just all off the top of my head as I write! All of this without even mentioning the devastating Australian bushfires and floods.
In times of crisis we have the opportunity to separate and go for ‘every man/woman/family/organisation/country for themselves' but we also can choose a truth that 'we are all in this together' as a whole planet, foster healthy connections with others and be of service wherever we can. Crisis can split us asunder as fear provokes survival based behaviour, or we can move towards each other to support each other through the tough times.
This is evident in Australia right now in the aftermath of such terrifying bush fires (and the danger still lurks as summer continues). Yes, there has been unimaginable tragedy…and…all over the world human beings are intentionally creating very similar results for so many people by actions motivated by dynamics of power and control, resource scarcity, religious dogma and rigid adherence to outmoded beliefs. Does that seem completely senseless to anyone else out there? There is an economic crisis and yet how much is spent on bombs and guns and soldiers soldiering and the consequent rebuilding of communities in the aftermath? We live on an amazingly abundant planet with the potential and wherewithal to ensure that we flourish for as long as the planets life cycle can sustain us (potentially thousands and thousands if not millions of years). We are behaving like children who see their parents as bottomless money machines – it is not realistic or sustainable. Are we not being challenged to ‘grow up'?
It seems certainly time for different behaviour and to foster that we need new thinking that focuses us on the whole rather than just the parts. When we eat we don't just feed the stomach – we feed the whole body. We need more wisdom based decision makers. I am reminded of an old Greek proverb “A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they will never sit in”.
I dream of a day when the ‘armed services' have transformed into simply ‘The Services', as Army, Navy and Airforce become the organisations with the resources to go anywhere on the planet and assist in times of inevitable natural catastrophe as weather systems become more extreme. It seems absurd that NGOs that do Humanitarian work seem to always be struggling for money and resources. New Zealand is a peace loving rather than aggressive country. We can't afford to be aggressive. Given our size, our small, smart little country has had to learn how to negotiate to get our way – to compromise, communicate, cooperate and collaborate. We simply don't have the military might to impose our will – and long may that be so!
What would it be like if all over the world, those who could were given the opportunity to serve in one of the ‘services' with the purpose of educating and giving people the skills to handle themselves and be of service to others in a crisis? Imagine how many different careers one could pursue and the work that could be done. Australians are now considering education about bushfires as a compulsory topic in schools now – isn't it obvious how valuable it is to know your environment and how to safely live in it and with it?
I believe it's time for some central government leadership on this one. We are all capable of learning how we can move beyond donating some money, food and clothing – and yes we still need to be generous in those ways but could you look after yourself and your family for a couple of weeks if you had to? We don't need to resist planning for disaster, we just need to be confident we will be resilient if the time came that we needed to really dig deep. Don't leave it to Civil Defence and other services to rescue and sort us out, let's make it ‘normal' to know what to do.
And that's it from my view.
My very best to yours,
Amanda xx “With beauty and goodness all around may you walk” (Old Navajo saying)
In times of crisis we have the opportunity to separate and go for ‘every man/woman/family/organisation/country for themselves' but we also can choose a truth that 'we are all in this together' as a whole planet, foster healthy connections with others and be of service wherever we can. Crisis can split us asunder as fear provokes survival based behaviour, or we can move towards each other to support each other through the tough times.
This is evident in Australia right now in the aftermath of such terrifying bush fires (and the danger still lurks as summer continues). Yes, there has been unimaginable tragedy…and…all over the world human beings are intentionally creating very similar results for so many people by actions motivated by dynamics of power and control, resource scarcity, religious dogma and rigid adherence to outmoded beliefs. Does that seem completely senseless to anyone else out there? There is an economic crisis and yet how much is spent on bombs and guns and soldiers soldiering and the consequent rebuilding of communities in the aftermath? We live on an amazingly abundant planet with the potential and wherewithal to ensure that we flourish for as long as the planets life cycle can sustain us (potentially thousands and thousands if not millions of years). We are behaving like children who see their parents as bottomless money machines – it is not realistic or sustainable. Are we not being challenged to ‘grow up'?
It seems certainly time for different behaviour and to foster that we need new thinking that focuses us on the whole rather than just the parts. When we eat we don't just feed the stomach – we feed the whole body. We need more wisdom based decision makers. I am reminded of an old Greek proverb “A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they will never sit in”.
I dream of a day when the ‘armed services' have transformed into simply ‘The Services', as Army, Navy and Airforce become the organisations with the resources to go anywhere on the planet and assist in times of inevitable natural catastrophe as weather systems become more extreme. It seems absurd that NGOs that do Humanitarian work seem to always be struggling for money and resources. New Zealand is a peace loving rather than aggressive country. We can't afford to be aggressive. Given our size, our small, smart little country has had to learn how to negotiate to get our way – to compromise, communicate, cooperate and collaborate. We simply don't have the military might to impose our will – and long may that be so!
What would it be like if all over the world, those who could were given the opportunity to serve in one of the ‘services' with the purpose of educating and giving people the skills to handle themselves and be of service to others in a crisis? Imagine how many different careers one could pursue and the work that could be done. Australians are now considering education about bushfires as a compulsory topic in schools now – isn't it obvious how valuable it is to know your environment and how to safely live in it and with it?
I believe it's time for some central government leadership on this one. We are all capable of learning how we can move beyond donating some money, food and clothing – and yes we still need to be generous in those ways but could you look after yourself and your family for a couple of weeks if you had to? We don't need to resist planning for disaster, we just need to be confident we will be resilient if the time came that we needed to really dig deep. Don't leave it to Civil Defence and other services to rescue and sort us out, let's make it ‘normal' to know what to do.
And that's it from my view.
My very best to yours,
Amanda xx “With beauty and goodness all around may you walk” (Old Navajo saying)
Thursday, April 23, 2009
The gift of George W. Bush and the potential of the new world?
So it’s done. George W. Bush is gone and Barack Obama is the man of the moment. He and his family are already being mythologised as the world craves a new saviour.
With all the vitriol about Bush I found myself feeling (along with what feels like the whole world) much relieved in watching his departure after Obama’s inauguration…and, attempting to view the whole process with evolutionary eyes, I can’t help feeling that without Bush and his agenda there would be no Obama. George W’s legacy may be that he operated from a world view that is no longer (if it ever was) relevant to the shared planet we call home. His decisions though have inadvertently released boundless energy for change (I’m sure it wasn’t his conscious intention!). In pursuing his agenda of domination in the name of freedom, believing God and might were on his side, he created consequences that increased rather than decreased human suffering (wars, economic meltdown, denial of climate change and so on…). I believe history will say that Bush’s greatest achievement was to create a climate in which Obama could rise. The pain and suffering of so many along with our instant access to what’s happening in the moment due to the wonders of technology have been the accelerators for a quantum shift in thinking all over the planet.
If everything was rolling along well for the US when election time came in 2008, do you think the Senator from Illinois, with his youth and inexperience (let alone racial mix) would ever have had a chance against the Clinton machine? As it was, the people had to choose between the McCain/Palin fear based rhetoric or take the risk of going for hope. Obama’s timing was impeccable and his communication skills struck chords around his own country and the world. Many see his whole life story being divinely orchestrated so as to bring him to being ‘the man of the moment’ living in the White House. He is a man with very different views, values and beliefs than his predecessor and large numbers of people feel those values ‘fit’ with the momentum gathering all over the world. He feels like ‘a man of our times’ who actually has the power now to make fundamental changes to the way the US operates, to have a different sort of influence.
So before you write off George W. Bush completely, consider sending him a blessing, (this is not to excuse any of his choices) for paving the way for the people of the United States to choose a new style of leadership that embodies a very different consciousness that what came before it. Without George W. Bush, would American’s have heard Obama’s voice and elected him President? We will never know what might have been but I wonder….is this is a classic example of crisis driving human evolution?
And that’s it, from my view,
My very best to yours,
Amanda xx
With all the vitriol about Bush I found myself feeling (along with what feels like the whole world) much relieved in watching his departure after Obama’s inauguration…and, attempting to view the whole process with evolutionary eyes, I can’t help feeling that without Bush and his agenda there would be no Obama. George W’s legacy may be that he operated from a world view that is no longer (if it ever was) relevant to the shared planet we call home. His decisions though have inadvertently released boundless energy for change (I’m sure it wasn’t his conscious intention!). In pursuing his agenda of domination in the name of freedom, believing God and might were on his side, he created consequences that increased rather than decreased human suffering (wars, economic meltdown, denial of climate change and so on…). I believe history will say that Bush’s greatest achievement was to create a climate in which Obama could rise. The pain and suffering of so many along with our instant access to what’s happening in the moment due to the wonders of technology have been the accelerators for a quantum shift in thinking all over the planet.
If everything was rolling along well for the US when election time came in 2008, do you think the Senator from Illinois, with his youth and inexperience (let alone racial mix) would ever have had a chance against the Clinton machine? As it was, the people had to choose between the McCain/Palin fear based rhetoric or take the risk of going for hope. Obama’s timing was impeccable and his communication skills struck chords around his own country and the world. Many see his whole life story being divinely orchestrated so as to bring him to being ‘the man of the moment’ living in the White House. He is a man with very different views, values and beliefs than his predecessor and large numbers of people feel those values ‘fit’ with the momentum gathering all over the world. He feels like ‘a man of our times’ who actually has the power now to make fundamental changes to the way the US operates, to have a different sort of influence.
So before you write off George W. Bush completely, consider sending him a blessing, (this is not to excuse any of his choices) for paving the way for the people of the United States to choose a new style of leadership that embodies a very different consciousness that what came before it. Without George W. Bush, would American’s have heard Obama’s voice and elected him President? We will never know what might have been but I wonder….is this is a classic example of crisis driving human evolution?
And that’s it, from my view,
My very best to yours,
Amanda xx
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
An Introduction to Conscious Evolution
We all know what happens when you drop a pebble in a pond…there are ripples. Imagine what happens when a larger than life avalanche leaps into an ocean….seas rise and there are much bigger consequences.
What we see in the US right now is such an avalanche, for consciousness … and the ‘seas’ will rise, all over the world. This is a very exciting gear change and a dynamic evolutionary step for Humanity that I don’t believe we have even begun to see shake down yet although it is more and more evident in cyber space as people all over the world seek to connect with like minds and hearts. This rising of the collective consciousness will unleash enormous creativity, the emergence of new solutions to our problems and new and bold views of possible futures that are worthy of the becoming Humanity. No doubt as well, there will be the inevitable backlash of fear of letting go of what we know and have been used to (or ‘the devil we know’ as the saying goes). I am thrilled to see and experience this massive shift in my lifetime as are so many others who have been working to raise awareness in our own small ways for many years. Transformation is happening from the ground up and it feels like a highly significant moment indeed. I don’t believe we can even comprehend just how significant from where we sit right now.
Future generations will study these days and know they heralded a turning point for Humanity, not just in politics but in the sense of possibility such transformation can inspire, in any area of life. Individual stories of inspiration are beginning to emerge very fast now - watch for the books and movies! When change occurs there is always the potential for things to ‘change back’, like water can turn to ice and back to water again. With transformation there is no going back…it’s a long road for wine to turn back into grapes again, or for the butterfly to reappear as a caterpillar.
Anyone who watched the moment when Obama’s election was secure will have seen the rawness of feeling in the faces of people of all ages and races. There was something profoundly right about it. Something fell away and something new was fertilised. I believe it was the face of a new resonance and all over the world including right here in New Zealand we tuned in to that resonance. Humanity took a significant evolutionary step on November 5th, 2008 - a step I believe is towards a more universal species. If we ever had an opportunity to consciously evolve our identity out of ‘victim’ and into ‘co-creator’ that opportunity is here, now! And it’s not about one human ‘fixing’ everything, if we think that’s how it is we will be disappointed. The call is for us all to step up and take more responsibility for our own destiny - together. As Buckminster Fuller once said - “There are no passengers on spaceship earth – only crew”. Every one of us has a purpose.
Many many people are now at a point where they can more deeply embrace the idea we are all co-creators of our own realities. The challenge now is to choose to be conscious co-creators. In other words, to become the conscious creators of the future human history book - not from unconscious individual survival based motives, but from wisdom and an impulse to discover what really works for the whole planet - the conscious application of our intelligence and our compassion. Instead of fighting for our own separate interests and lives, we are now challenged to see a new world view of ourselves as a whole species living on a whole planet, and not at the expense of the individual either. The mindset of life being about either/or is being replaced rapidly as we seek to live with the mindset of both/and. The individual and the collective need to thrive in order for us to experience ourselves as whole.
When we are lifted by our own efforts and those of others to see new horizons of possibility and potential, we can also see a clearer view of what bought us to this point. For humans, our evolution is most often provoked by crisis. Crises drive evolution. To see crises this way is a new view for many and yet how many times have we all experienced the truth of this? It seems to be part of the human condition to stick with ‘what is’, to maintain the status quo until there really is no other option but to change, before we will change. And yet we are so good at it! Humans are incredibly resourceful and we can choose to do and be pretty much anything we decide, as long as it is sustainable and in alignment with our own potential (there’s not a lot of point using up the planet’s resources faster than she can replenish them or wanting to be an ‘Idol’ if you weren’t gifting with singing!)
To consciously engage in our own evolution we need to see ourselves as central to our own lives regarding our creative power. There is in every one of us, an intrinsic impulse towards the expression of our particular version of individuality. To learn to cooperate with this impulse consciously and contribute it to the whole is to become a conscious co-creator of our lives, or as Barbara Marx Hubbard says a ‘conscious evolutionary’. We all have incredible powers, gifts built into us that are our best resources…all free to use in abundance. We have free will, the choice to act or not in any circumstance. We have the extraordinary gift of intuition, a built in guidance system. Obvious too is our impulse to grow and unfold that we need only to tune into in order to cooperate and reap the benefits. We have imagination and an incredible capacity for learning…and, we have the ability to make meaning of our experiences, self reflective consciousness. This last gift is a real ripper – we can choose to make meaning that assists our evolution, or we can allow our minds to hold us back by rigidly holding onto unhelpful ideas of who and what we are - often based on early conditioning that is no longer useful going forward.
I choose to believe we are all local separate seeming (but not really) expressions of the divine creative impulse that powers the entire universe…we are this divinity, with a mind, with a heart and with a body – all of which we get to use to manifest the creation we are on this earthly plane. A pretty amazing creation are we not? Think of the path….billions of years of creation and here we are, homo sapiens sapiens, only 25,000 or so years old and the potential jewel in Creations crown. We are the ones with the ability to self reflect, to know our own powers and potential. What a difference we have made to each other and our world thus far and it's very obvious we have not seen the best of ourselves yet!
Where we go next is up to us. We have the power to shape our world, we have plenty of evidence of that! We are now getting very clear messages from our environment. We are being called from unconsciousness to consciousness, from autopilot to manual control, from “I don’t make a difference” to “Everyone makes a difference”. What difference we choose to make remains our choice and our responsibility. We have all the tools, we just need to keep learning to master them and use them in service to the whole rather than solely for our own individual gratification. I believe when we do that in numbers, we will reap the rewards in abundance and truly be conscious partners with Creation. As Alice Walker says “We are the ones we have been waiting for”.
We can all contribute starting at home base, our own individual life. By tuning in and examining our own personal evolution, how we have been shaped and molded, we can move beyond our conditioned limitations and become conscious co-creators of our future. Conscious evolution - a more exciting adventure I cannot imagine!
What we see in the US right now is such an avalanche, for consciousness … and the ‘seas’ will rise, all over the world. This is a very exciting gear change and a dynamic evolutionary step for Humanity that I don’t believe we have even begun to see shake down yet although it is more and more evident in cyber space as people all over the world seek to connect with like minds and hearts. This rising of the collective consciousness will unleash enormous creativity, the emergence of new solutions to our problems and new and bold views of possible futures that are worthy of the becoming Humanity. No doubt as well, there will be the inevitable backlash of fear of letting go of what we know and have been used to (or ‘the devil we know’ as the saying goes). I am thrilled to see and experience this massive shift in my lifetime as are so many others who have been working to raise awareness in our own small ways for many years. Transformation is happening from the ground up and it feels like a highly significant moment indeed. I don’t believe we can even comprehend just how significant from where we sit right now.
Future generations will study these days and know they heralded a turning point for Humanity, not just in politics but in the sense of possibility such transformation can inspire, in any area of life. Individual stories of inspiration are beginning to emerge very fast now - watch for the books and movies! When change occurs there is always the potential for things to ‘change back’, like water can turn to ice and back to water again. With transformation there is no going back…it’s a long road for wine to turn back into grapes again, or for the butterfly to reappear as a caterpillar.
Anyone who watched the moment when Obama’s election was secure will have seen the rawness of feeling in the faces of people of all ages and races. There was something profoundly right about it. Something fell away and something new was fertilised. I believe it was the face of a new resonance and all over the world including right here in New Zealand we tuned in to that resonance. Humanity took a significant evolutionary step on November 5th, 2008 - a step I believe is towards a more universal species. If we ever had an opportunity to consciously evolve our identity out of ‘victim’ and into ‘co-creator’ that opportunity is here, now! And it’s not about one human ‘fixing’ everything, if we think that’s how it is we will be disappointed. The call is for us all to step up and take more responsibility for our own destiny - together. As Buckminster Fuller once said - “There are no passengers on spaceship earth – only crew”. Every one of us has a purpose.
Many many people are now at a point where they can more deeply embrace the idea we are all co-creators of our own realities. The challenge now is to choose to be conscious co-creators. In other words, to become the conscious creators of the future human history book - not from unconscious individual survival based motives, but from wisdom and an impulse to discover what really works for the whole planet - the conscious application of our intelligence and our compassion. Instead of fighting for our own separate interests and lives, we are now challenged to see a new world view of ourselves as a whole species living on a whole planet, and not at the expense of the individual either. The mindset of life being about either/or is being replaced rapidly as we seek to live with the mindset of both/and. The individual and the collective need to thrive in order for us to experience ourselves as whole.
When we are lifted by our own efforts and those of others to see new horizons of possibility and potential, we can also see a clearer view of what bought us to this point. For humans, our evolution is most often provoked by crisis. Crises drive evolution. To see crises this way is a new view for many and yet how many times have we all experienced the truth of this? It seems to be part of the human condition to stick with ‘what is’, to maintain the status quo until there really is no other option but to change, before we will change. And yet we are so good at it! Humans are incredibly resourceful and we can choose to do and be pretty much anything we decide, as long as it is sustainable and in alignment with our own potential (there’s not a lot of point using up the planet’s resources faster than she can replenish them or wanting to be an ‘Idol’ if you weren’t gifting with singing!)
To consciously engage in our own evolution we need to see ourselves as central to our own lives regarding our creative power. There is in every one of us, an intrinsic impulse towards the expression of our particular version of individuality. To learn to cooperate with this impulse consciously and contribute it to the whole is to become a conscious co-creator of our lives, or as Barbara Marx Hubbard says a ‘conscious evolutionary’. We all have incredible powers, gifts built into us that are our best resources…all free to use in abundance. We have free will, the choice to act or not in any circumstance. We have the extraordinary gift of intuition, a built in guidance system. Obvious too is our impulse to grow and unfold that we need only to tune into in order to cooperate and reap the benefits. We have imagination and an incredible capacity for learning…and, we have the ability to make meaning of our experiences, self reflective consciousness. This last gift is a real ripper – we can choose to make meaning that assists our evolution, or we can allow our minds to hold us back by rigidly holding onto unhelpful ideas of who and what we are - often based on early conditioning that is no longer useful going forward.
I choose to believe we are all local separate seeming (but not really) expressions of the divine creative impulse that powers the entire universe…we are this divinity, with a mind, with a heart and with a body – all of which we get to use to manifest the creation we are on this earthly plane. A pretty amazing creation are we not? Think of the path….billions of years of creation and here we are, homo sapiens sapiens, only 25,000 or so years old and the potential jewel in Creations crown. We are the ones with the ability to self reflect, to know our own powers and potential. What a difference we have made to each other and our world thus far and it's very obvious we have not seen the best of ourselves yet!
Where we go next is up to us. We have the power to shape our world, we have plenty of evidence of that! We are now getting very clear messages from our environment. We are being called from unconsciousness to consciousness, from autopilot to manual control, from “I don’t make a difference” to “Everyone makes a difference”. What difference we choose to make remains our choice and our responsibility. We have all the tools, we just need to keep learning to master them and use them in service to the whole rather than solely for our own individual gratification. I believe when we do that in numbers, we will reap the rewards in abundance and truly be conscious partners with Creation. As Alice Walker says “We are the ones we have been waiting for”.
We can all contribute starting at home base, our own individual life. By tuning in and examining our own personal evolution, how we have been shaped and molded, we can move beyond our conditioned limitations and become conscious co-creators of our future. Conscious evolution - a more exciting adventure I cannot imagine!
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