Facebook keeps showing me pictures from trips I took to Europe years ago, including one from Denmark in 2016. What I remember about that trip, other than laughing and exploring the country with a dear friend, is how everything reminded me of something else.
For instance, gazing out a train window, I could have sworn I was in Iowa, not Denmark, because the land was so similar. At the beach, the combination of the sand’s color, dunes, and water reminded me of the Outer Banks in North Carolina. I know there are places in Denmark that are completely unique, but all in all, whenever I travel, I’m reminded everything is more the same than it is different. Yes, the landscape, but also the people.
I may not speak the same language as someone else, but we both care about our friends and family. We both want to be happy, to feel secure in where we live. We all have the same needs, and in times like these, all times really, it’s important to keep focusing on what binds us.
These rocks say it all. Photo by Phyllis Poon on Unsplash
In our world, there are some people who are trying to create division. There are some people who use one group or another as a scapegoat for the world’s problems. They speak in broad strokes like, “All of these people are like this,” or “Those people are like that,” which is dangerous. When we enhance separateness, that creates conflict because at the root of mistreatment is an “us” and “them” mindset. It’s easier to justify atrocious acts when a person becomes someone who is “not like me.” Or even worse, not human.
My spiritual teacher corroborates this and says “us” and “them” thinking makes different groups become more violent toward each other. We’ve seen this over and over again. Frankly, haven’t we had enough? I’m not so naïve to think there will never be any conflicts in the world, but I think we start moving in a better direction when we realize, to paraphrase Shakespeare, that we all bleed when we are pricked, that we all feel pain and sorrow, that we all want to be happy and to realize our dreams. We want the same things even if how we go about achieving them is different.
I’ve used this quote before but it continues to be relevant. My spiritual teacher adds, “Human society is just like a garland which is made of different types of flowers, woven together by one common thread. The overall beauty of the garland is dependent upon the beauty of each flower. Likewise, each strata of society must be equally strengthened if we are to maintain the unity and solidarity of society.”
We must all be lifted up. We must support one another. We must see each other as people who are just like us if we have any hope of maintaining unity and solidarity. Peace comes from a place of connection and that starts with recognizing we are more similar than different.
I dream of a world where we recognize what unites us rather than divides us. A world where we focus on our similarities, not our differences. A world where we remember people are people everywhere. A world where we work together to create as much peace as we can.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
Like many people, Ukraine is on my mind. I’m watching in horror as Russia is brazenly invading another country in a quest for power. Republican Senator Mitt Romney told NBC in January that he believed Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to reestablish what he had before, a type of Soviet Union. And furthermore, Putin is clear he thinks the breakup of the Soviet Union was a catastrophe for Russia, once describing it as the “greatest geopolitical tragedy” of the 20th century. So, um, yeah, I’m pretty sure he’s not invading Ukraine on a “peacekeeping mission.”
Here in my own country of the United States, I’m feeling equally disheartened as I witness more and more evidence that we don’t live in a democracy, or rule by the people, but rather a plutocracy, the reign of the rich. The political system is only paying lip-service to the average person’s problems and is instead working diligently to protect and grow the wealth of the already wealthy. For instance, billionaires increased their net worth by more than $1 trillion during the coronavirus pandemic, according to Americans for Tax Fairness. Meanwhile, non-wealthy Americans have struggled to survive, closed their businesses, and generally haven’t profited due to the pandemic.
A very appropriate image by Ukrainian artist Alexander Milov titled “Love.” Photo by Adam Hornyak on Unsplash
Hearing all this is enough to make me want to lie down on the floor and moan like the Wicked Witch of the West, “Ooooh, what a world! What a world!” And unlike the Wicked Witch, I’d add, “What a cruel, cruel world!” With facts like these it’s easy to fall into despair, hopelessness, maybe some fear. After all, I’ve seen some memes circulating that we’re witnessing the start of World War III.
At times like these, I turn to my spiritual practice because it’s a source of strength and calm. My spiritual teacher said people suffer from all sorts of complexes, including a fear complex and a defeatist complex. When you’re afraid, you’re not thinking clearly. And when you feel defeated, you’re not empowered because you think some other person, system, or circumstance is more powerful than you. Sometimes it is, so that’s why banding together with others is important. What’s also important to remember though is a concept I wrote about last week: letting your life belong to love.
In this case, it’s about letting love move you, to act through you. When I think I’m the one that has to tackle a system that prioritizes profits over people, I get overwhelmed. When I think I have to “figure everything out,” or somehow “solve the world’s problems,” it makes me want to not even try. Who am I? My spiritual teacher would say I’m love incarnate. That the powerful, creative force that births stars and creates planets resides in me. I’m not a lonely, insignificant human being, but instead the progeny of the Divine, and that means something. It matters.
Regarding Ukraine, plutocracy, and any other issue pressing on my heart and mind, I can let love lead, guide me in my actions, and show me the way. I don’t have to do everything by myself because instead I recognize I’m a puzzle piece of the cosmos. My little actions combine with someone else’s little actions and that can topple oppressive political systems. I don’t know when, but I don’t have to, because instead I’m letting love lead the way.
I dream of a world where we allow ourselves to feel our feelings while also remembering who we really are. A world where we understand we are divine children working in tandem with the greatest force in the universe. A world where we realize we each have our parts to play and we’re not enacting them alone. A world where we let love lead the way.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
As we celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday here in the U.S., I keep thinking about one of my favorite quotes of his. There are many because the man was an eloquent speaker, but in 1963 he said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial ‘outside agitator’ idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.”
It’s an interesting concept, and one that continues to be relevant, this notion of “outsider” and how we apply justice to anyone we perceive to be an outsider. Did you know it’s been 20 years since the first detainees arrived at Guantánamo Bay? And that those prisoners were subjected to torture? Only 39 prisoners remain and more than a dozen of them have yet to face charges. They have been dubbed “forever prisoners” by some Democrats. The cost of operating the prison is about $13 million per prisoner every year, according to a Business Insider article! Are you freaking kidding me? I could think of a lot of better uses for $13 million per person.
Justice is supposed to be blind, but is it? Photo by Tingey Injury Law Firm on Unsplash
And even if you’re saying, “Yeah but they’re terrorists! They need to be held captive!” The cost to house a single prisoner in California is more than $75,000, according to the LA Times, which is still more than a year at Harvard. Clearly there’s a lot of injustice, a lot of mismanaging funds, and yet a small group of people continue to let incidents like these occur.
It brings to mind an excellent article I read on LitHub by Rebecca Solnit posted in 2018 about how there’s a myth surrounding the “real” America. She wrote:
“[I]n the news and political life, we’re still struggling over whose story it is, who matters, and who our compassion and interest should be directed at.
“The common denominator of so many of the strange and troubling cultural narratives coming our way is a set of assumptions about who matters, whose story it is, who deserves the pity and the treats and the presumptions of innocence, the kid gloves and the red carpet, and ultimately the kingdom, the power, and the glory. You already know who. It’s White people in general and White men in particular, and especially White Protestant men, some of whom are apparently dismayed to find out that there is going to be, as your mom might have put it, sharing. The history of this country has been written as their story, and the news sometimes still tells it this way – one of the battles of our time is about who the story is about, who matters and who decides.”
Precisely. So much of justice and injustice is tied to who matters and who decides. If Black people don’t matter, then it’s fine to kill them in the streets. If terrorists don’t matter, it’s OK to torture them. But who exactly is deciding they don’t matter? And why is that those people are in charge? The reality is the White population in the U.S. is declining and other races are increasing. Where I live, the majority of people are not White. To my mind, that means decisions being made about policies and procedures should take into account that diversity, should recognize this country belongs to everyone who lives here. In essence, to bear in mind what Dr. King mentioned so long ago: that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
I dream of a world where we treat all human beings with love and respect. A world where we value justice not only in word but in action. A world where we celebrate and protect human diversity while also seeking to transcend divisions. A world where we honor Dr. King’s legacy by bringing his dream into reality.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
Something I’ve heard before is that physical health is a privilege. When people said that, I brushed it aside because I thought they meant health is something to be grateful for, a blessing, a gift. But now, as I approach my 37th birthday, I recognize physical health is an attribute to be grateful for yes, but it’s also a privilege similar to how we talk about White privilege. Meaning, something most people don’t think about, or take for granted, unless they’re in the group that doesn’t have it.
There’s a lot to say about White privilege but to summarize, it’s the obvious and less obvious passive advantages that White people may not recognize they have. It’s moving through the world with relative ease. Swap out “White” for “healthy” and the privilege is similar (similar but not the same). This post is focusing specifically on physical health, but there is also mental health privilege.
For someone like me – a person recovering from adrenal fatigue, a sleep disorder, digestive issues, a spoonie – I’m not able to navigate the world with relative ease. I’m forever worried my small business will crumble because I can’t work full-time due to limited energy. And supporting myself with a part-time job is challenging, which I know, because I did it for years.
This graffiti says it all. Photo by Claudio Schwarz on Unsplash
In the days before my birthday, I’m crying because I feel like I’m getting older without ever having been young. For only three years in my 20s did I feel mildly energetic, healthy, vibrant, pleased with how my body looked and functioned. The rest of my life has been one issue after another after another. And as I’m crying about my own health challenges, I think about friends of mine, or people I know, who have chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, Crohn’s disease, thyroid issues, etc., and I realize we’re sold this image of what is “normal,” of how our bodies are “supposed” to be. Not unlike the ideals sold to us via White supremacy like beauty standards and the body mass index.
Thinking about all of this, I really get that health is a privilege. Not everyone is given health. We aren’t all born with perfectly functioning bodies that slowly deteriorate over time as we age. No. Some of us never have perfectly functioning bodies. Some of us have to take medication and eat certain foods and take daily naps to even approach what others have naturally.
Now instead of feeling sad, I’m angry because I’ve bought into this message about an ideal body – and I’m not talking shape and size – that is literally not achievable for some people. The kicker though is our bodies can change drastically from one year to the next depending on a multitude of factors – some of which we control. I personally spend an inordinate amount of time on those factors. A soul sister tells me, “I don’t know of anyone who takes as good of care of their body as you do.” And yet, all of that care barely moves the needle on my health. And I’m lucky because I don’t live with constant pain unlike some people!
It seems to me we’re in the age of celebrating diversity with race, gender, sexual orientation, and cognitive function (in some circles). It’s time to welcome in the body too. Not only when it’s obvious, but when it’s subtle.
My spiritual teacher says, “Human society is just like a garland which is made of different types of flowers, woven together by one common thread. The overall beauty of the garland is dependent upon the beauty of each flower. Likewise, each strata of society must be equally strengthened if we are to maintain the unity and solidarity of society.”
To me that means normalizing some people have health challenges in the “prime” of their life. It means recognizing some people never experience relative ease in how they move through the world on a physical level. It means making room for and supporting people like me who have invisible illnesses. It means not relegating us to the shadows or acting like we’re an anomaly because we’re not. We’re just as normal as anyone else.
I dream of a world where we create space for all people and not act like some are part of the “in” crowd and others are not. A world where we recognize diversity is what makes human society beautiful. A world where we understand that uniqueness is normal and in turn means it’s important to create a more accessible, supportive world for us all.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
I love a good Hero’s Journey as much as the next person. If you’re unfamiliar with the concept, it’s a common story arc found in movies like Star Wars, The Matrix, and Lord of the Rings where the hero goes on an adventure, is victorious in a decisive crisis, and comes home changed or transformed. The hero can also be female, as we see in The Hunger Games.
However, despite swapping out a male character for a female one, the hero’s journey is not the same as the heroine’s journey, meaning it doesn’t address the psycho-spiritual journey for many women. (I’ll also add in here it’s likely the hero’s journey doesn’t work well for some men either.) Joseph Campbell popularized the Hero’s Journey in 1949 with men in mind and said “Women don’t need to make the journey. In the whole mythological journey, the woman is there. All she has to do is realize that she’s the place that people are trying to get to.”
Um, thanks Joe. I mean, on the one hand I get that he’s pointing toward wholeness and encouraging men to embrace the more feminine aspects of themselves, but on the other hand, what about us ladies?!? For women, there’s the Heroine’s Journey, developed by Maureen Murdock. If the Hero’s Journey is about ascending a mountaintop, the Heroine’s Journey is about descending to the underworld. When a friend said that to me recently, my response was, “Yeeeesssssssss,” because that’s EXACTLY my experience. All of my demons have been internal. All of my personal development work has been about confronting my own shadow and reclaiming wholeness.
For some people, they undertake the heroine’s journey. Photo by ActionVance on Unsplash
Part of confronting the shadow comes from interacting with other people of course. I’m not saying the Heroine’s Journey takes place in a locked room. We see this in two popular movies that follow the Heroine’s Journey arc: Pixar’s Brave and the first Wonder Woman movie. I remember when I watched both those movies for the first time how touched I felt afterward. They impacted me in a deep way and I could see myself reflected in the characters that I couldn’t as much when watching the original Star Wars, for instance.
What makes the Heroine’s Journey different? Instead of ending the story after successfully conquering ogres and dragons, the heroine becomes disillusioned and realizes she feels unfulfilled. Something is missing in her life and she falls into despair because of it. She yearns to reconnect with her whole self – the feminine, soft side and the wounded masculine – and integrates the two. After doing so, she interacts with the world beyond binaries and understands complexity.
This is forever what I’m working on and in fact is a part of the spiritual journey as well as the journey society is taking. My spiritual teacher says, “Until recently there was a defective idea in all the corners and amongst all the groups of people on the Earth, that males are blessed beings, and not females. In your family life, you know, you feel that the parents cannot have any sense of disparity in their mind regarding their sons and daughters. Both are equally important; both are equally loving. I said my sons and my daughters are just like two hands of mine. They are just like the wings of a bird. A bird having one wing cannot fly.”
My teacher is speaking specifically about the role of women in society – women need to be respected and treated just as well as men – but I think the concept also applies within a person as well. We are like birds and can’t fly properly if one wing is more dominant than another. The Heroine’s Journey is one mechanism that supports our return to wholeness and one that I’m now embracing.
I dream of a world where we realize the Hero’s Journey is not everyone’s journey. A world where we understand the alternative, the Heroine’s Journey, could help us become more whole. A world where we integrate all aspects of ourselves – masculine and feminine – in order to fly freely through the world like the beautiful birds we are.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
This week I read a Twitter thread about the creator of the latest Netflix phenomenon “Squid Game.” According to several news pieces, Hwang Dong-hyuk wrote the show in 2009 but was rejected by studios for 10 years. He once had to stop writing the script and sell his $675 laptop because of money struggles. The Twitter thread author, Ifę, @ifetalksback, said as a writer they find the story terrifying more than inspiring.
As part of the thread, Ifę said, “They’ll be like ‘I had to wait 15 years, my mother don’t speak to me anymore, I lost a finger to typing so much, I can’t remember the last time I saw the sky. But now I have a show,’ And the comments from everyone who ISN’T a writer is like ‘NEVER give up bro, so inspiring.’”
I agree – on the one hand, it’s always inspiring when long-awaited dreams come true, but on the other hand, I find the story to reflect poorly on not only the film industry, but also us as a society in general. Hwang had to literally sell one of the tools of his trade in order to make ends meet. That’s not OK.
The picture says it all. Photo by Patrick Perkins on Unsplash
My spiritual teacher says it’s the duty of society to support its artists because artists are pioneers. “If those who are the pioneers of society … if they are forced to starve or half-starve, this will certainly not be to the credit of human society. It is unthinkable that these creative geniuses should curse their own fate.”
Seriously. Artists – and that includes writers – have a special role to play in society and letting them struggle is not cute or inspiring or romantic or whatever notions we have in this modern world. It’s a travesty. Especially during the pandemic, we’ve seen the importance of art and literature. What would we do, how would we survive if we didn’t have books to read, movies to watch, games to play? For many, escaping into entertainment was, or is, the only way to feel joy during an otherwise extremely bleak period. And yet we let artists like Hwang Dong-hyuk toil away and then romanticize his rags-to-riches story? No.
What would happen if artists were supported and didn’t need to work “day jobs” or have numerous “side hustles” or live with 10 roommates just to survive? What sort of art would they make? What would they be able to accomplish if they weren’t constantly worried about money? In case you can’t tell, I’m PISSED this is the situation we find ourselves in. Not only for artists, but for everyone.
Who does this capitalistic, hypercompetitive economy work for? Very few, that’s who. And the reality is we don’t have to live like this. I don’t know how we release ourselves from the shackles of capitalism, but I do know there are other ways to live. Ways in which people are guaranteed the basic necessities of life like food, clothing, education, shelter, and medical care. Ways in which people are valued over profits, the environment is respected, and we as a society are able to satisfy our higher intellectual, artistic, and spiritual aspirations. Ways in which artists like Hwang Dong-hyuk don’t have to sell their laptops in order to pay their bills.
I dream of a world where we not only praise artists and writers, but we value them with our wallets. A world where we support artists and writers so they can do what they were put on this Earth to do – create. A world where we understand artists barely making ends meet is appalling, not romantic.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
P.S. This might be a good time to mention I have a Patreon campaign. If you value my work, consider contributing.
Something that’s been on my mind a lot, as I’m sure it has for many others, is the situation in Afghanistan. I’m watching in horror as the Taliban is taking over once more and all the progress from the past 20 years is disintegrating. How does this happen? Why hasn’t the narrative we’ve been sold – that the U.S. brings democracy and freedom to other countries – work? (I know we invaded Afghanistan in response to terrorism, but we also tried to establish a Western-style democracy.) It doesn’t work because there’s a very specific dynamic at play.
When a foreign country invades to supposedly make things better, they are often viewed as a bully throwing their weight around. They become resented and are seen as meddling in affairs they know nothing about. And if the foreign power does set up projects and organizations to aid the local denizens, those projects and organizations often crumble when the foreign power leaves. Why? Because the foreign country is enacting subordinated cooperation instead of coordinated cooperation.
Coordinated cooperation all the way. Photo by Melissa Askew on Unsplash
Where people do something individually or collectively, but keep themselves under other people’s supervision, that’s subordinated cooperation. It’s the traditional power structure we see, well, pretty much everywhere. It’s the traditional work situation where a boss issues commands from on high and the employees follow those commands. The employees have less agency or power and aren’t as invested in their work because they don’t have a say.
In the case of Afghanistan, our military trained and equipped nearly 300,000 people to take over when we left. It was justification for our withdrawal. What happened when the U.S. withdrew? That army dwindled to only about 500 people.
U.S. News and World Report stated the local forces “simply put down their weapons, defected to the Taliban willingly or because their families faced threats, or succumbed to the other forms of bribery and waste that American inspectors general have been publicly documenting for at least a decade.”
In the same article, Army Gen. Mark Milley is quoted as saying, “They had the training, the size, the capability to defend their country. This comes down to an issue of will and leadership.” His quote is very revealing – he said the issue came down to “will” and “leadership.” He’s a military man looking for a military solution. The military is all about subordinated cooperation and not coordinated cooperation so of course as soon as the head honchos left the army fell apart.
Imposing ideas and dictates upon another group doesn’t work. What does work is coordinated cooperation. It’s when cooperation is between free human beings, each with equal rights, mutual respect for each other, and they are working for the welfare of the other.
To quote my spiritual teacher, “Only the cooperative system can ensure the healthy, integrated progress of humanity, and establish complete and everlasting unity among the human race. People should work to enjoy sweeter fruits by establishing the cooperative system.”
A cooperative system cannot exist if one group is considered inferior to another. Nor can coordinated cooperation exist if it’s imposed upon the group. They have to believe themselves equal, to demand it, and not take anything else than they deserve. Local culture and customs must be respected and the local people must be the ones to initiate change – not someone who is considered an outsider. The situation in Afghanistan is a clear example of that.
I dream of a world where we employ coordinated cooperation and not subordinated cooperation. A world where we respect local customs and cultures while also empowering the disempowered. A world where we support change not in the form of imposition but instead in the form of nurturing.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
I keep thinking about an essay I read in the book All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten by Robert Fulghum. He writes about how he lived at the dead end of a dead-end street, two blocks long, at the bottom of a hill in north Seattle. At the top of the hill, two big yellow and black signs declared: STREET ENDS. And at the end of the street where Fulghum resided, another big sign with stripes and reflectors stated the obvious: DEAD END.
You could see that “DEAD END” sign a long way off – in other words, the dead end didn’t sneak up on you. However, what’s so remarkable is people drove down the street anyway and seemed to be baffled when the street did, in fact, end.
These signs are pretty obvious . . . if we accept them. Photo by Gabriel Soto on Unsplash
Fulghum writes:
“Not just part way, mind you. Not just to where the reality of the situation cleared up. No, sir. They drove all the way down, right up to the sign, the big black one with stripes, the one that said DEAD END.
“And they read that sign two or three times. As if they were foreigners and had to translate the English. They looked on either side of the sign to see if there was a way around it. Sometimes they sat there for two or three minutes adjusting their minds …. There was no pattern. All kinds of vehicles, all kinds of people, broad daylight and pitch dark. Even a police car a couple of times. And once a fire truck.
“Innate skepticism or innate stupidity? I confess I do not know. A psychiatrist friend tells me it’s a sample of an unconscious need to deny – that everyone wants the road or The Way to continue on instead of ending. So you drive as far as you can, even when you can clearly read the sign. You want to think you are exempt, that it doesn’t apply to you. But it does.”
His last two lines especially strike me. We want to think we are exempt, that whatever we’re confronting – a dead-end street, a deadly virus, whatever – doesn’t apply to us. But it does. I’d wager the majority of us want to feel special. We want to be right, to know the truth, and even when there’s evidence demonstrating we’re wrong, we can’t accept it. Why is that? I think one reason is U.S. culture doesn’t have many examples of people saying, “I don’t know.”
Instead of saying, “I don’t know,” we make something up, we pretend to know. We try to save face versus practicing humility and admitting, “I don’t know,” or even, “Maybe I’m wrong.” Who says maybe I’m wrong these days?!? I can’t remember the last time I heard in a public space someone open to the possibility they don’t know everything. It’s as if due to the internet and having so much knowledge at our fingertips we’re loathe to say, “I don’t know” or “I could be wrong.”
Also wrapped up in “I don’t know” is fear, in my opinion. My spiritual teacher says, “Humans do not fear to tread a known path, but they always hesitate and fear to travel unknown paths.” Sometimes those unknown paths are intellectual ones. It’s far easier to cling to a thought or belief you learned early on and is corroborated by friends and family than to change your mind and believe something new. I, for one, value bravery and I want other people to be brave too. I want us all to say “I don’t know” and “Maybe I’m wrong” when that’s the truth for us. And also, to pay attention to evidence when it stares at us in the face. We’d all be better for it.
I dream of a world where we recognize we aren’t exempt. A world where we understand if there’s a road sign that says “DEAD END,” that the street ends. A world we understand if we think we know something other people don’t, we’re likely deluding ourselves. A world where we’re OK with some uncertainty and we embrace the power of saying, “I don’t know” and “Maybe I’m wrong.”
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
I watched a viral video of a woman in California arguing why her kids shouldn’t be required to wear a mask to school. She told the school board they don’t have the authority to make that decision, and she cited the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and for some reason, the Federalist Papers.
My first response was to mock her, tell her what an idiot she is, why she’s wrong, etc. As we’ve seen though, fighting fire with fire only results in a conflagration. I kept mulling over the video and stumbled upon a passage from my spiritual teacher that softened me and offered some perspective on the situation. He said, “Everyone longs for liberation because bondage is not conducive to happiness …. all long for some kind of liberation – some in terms of freedom of action, some in terms of freedom on the intellectual level.”
We are all longing for liberation. We all want to escape from chains whether literal or metaphorical, and now when I think about the video, I start to wonder if maybe that’s what’s going on for this woman too. She doesn’t want someone else to tell her what to do or what her kids should do. She wants freedom but it’s coming out skewed. What I mean is, we as a society are brushing up against the confines of freedom in the physical and mental spheres. People want more and more freedom but the physical world imposes limits. You can’t have unlimited freedom on the earthly plane. You just can’t. But we still long for that so some people are taking that energy and ranting about wearing masks. I think what people are actually longing for is liberation from the bondage of being human.
According to my spiritual philosophy, every living being is on a journey from crudeness to subtlety. Every living being evolves over time to become more and more complex in all ways until finally that microcosmic entity becomes one with the macrocosmic entity. In other words, the source of all things. That’s what we’re all doing here. We’re constantly evolving physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually until one day we’re no longer even human. Watching this woman yell about freedom of choice, I now see her soul is yelling about a different sort of freedom. A thirst for freedom that will never be quenched on the physical plane and instead can only be satisfied on the spiritual one.
To quote my spiritual teacher again, he says, “There is in the living being a thirst for limitlessness. It is not possible for limited objects to quench one’s thirst. Brahma is the only limitless entity, and so establishment in Brahma’s bearing alone puts an end to all thirsts or cravings …. [A]nd so knowingly or unknowingly, human beings are indeed running after limitlessness.”
All of this is to say, I hear you, anti-mask lady. I hear your desire for freedom, for limitlessness, for no longer being ensnared by various bondages. I long for the same things and that’s why I have a devoted spiritual practice because I know what I really, really, really want cannot be found on Earth. And what you really, really, really want can’t either.
I dream of a world where we recognize the physical realm has its limits. A world where we understand our thirst for freedom can never be satisfied here, and instead, we turn to a spiritual practice to quench it. A world where we understand ultimately what we’re all longing for is liberation.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.
I realize Juneteenth has come and gone but I keep thinking about an article I read by Robin Washington where he said Juneteenth has been whitewashed. The tale we’ve been told is Union soldiers arrived in Galveston, Texas, on June 19, 1865 to inform enslaved African Americans they were free. As if they didn’t already know. However, historian Gregory P. Downs has firsthand accounts from people demonstrating they did know. Galveston’s Blacks knew they were free and so did their slaveholders, who nonetheless kept them in bondage using brute force.
That means General Gordon Granger didn’t read off from a scroll and let slaves know they were liberated. No, Granger and his soldiers let the slaveholders know the slaves were liberated – at the barrel of a gun. They used force to say, “Let these people go.”
One of the reasons this article has stuck with me is because it illustrates what motivates people to change. So often I think we as a society want to believe that if people only knew the truth, they would change out of the goodness of their hearts. If people only knew that by purchasing products made with palm oil, such as shampoo, cookies, peanut butter, microwave dinners, and more, they are contributing to the extinction of orangutans, they’d stop. (Side note: Palm oil has many names like “stearic acid” and “sodium lauryl sulphate” so it could be hiding in your products and you wouldn’t know.) And it’s true that sometimes informing people does move them enough to change their behavior.
Will you help the orangutans? Photo by Marija Zaric on Unsplash
For instance, a friend of mine became vegan after watching a couple of documentaries. Up until that point, she didn’t put it together cows are raped and separated from their young in order to produce milk. She didn’t think about how cows, pigs, and chickens have personalities and consciousness like her dog does. She didn’t know the animals she ate screamed out in pain as they were slaughtered. But when she learned more, she changed her eating habits. However, not everyone is like my friend.
Some people know the truth and are still unwilling to change because it’s too hard, too complicated, too whatever. Some people, like the Civil War era Galveston slaveholders, will maintain the status quo until someone else forces them to change.
I think that’s why my spiritual teacher is not a pacifist. He says, “In all actions of life whether small or big, the unit mind progresses by winning over the opposing trends. Life develops through the medium of force.” Later on, he says, “In the absence of the ability to resist evil and also in the absence of an effort to acquire such ability, declaring oneself to be nonviolent with the purpose of not admitting all these weaknesses before the opponent may serve a political end, but it will not protect the sanctity of righteousness.”
My spiritual teacher cares about protecting the sanctity of righteousness, about making life better for everyone, and so do I. Does that happen sometimes through petitions, boycotts, and protests? Yes, absolutely. But sometimes that also happens at the barrel of a gun and I think it’s important for us to recognize that. I’m not encouraging everyone to go out and buy a gun, rather I’m saying force has its place in the world, if it’s used wisely and used for the benefit of all.
I dream of a world where we understand what motivates people to change. A world where we recognize sometimes learning the truth is not enough. A world where we realize force has its place in society and sometimes it’s necessary to employ force in order to create a world we wish to see.
Another world is not only possible, it’s probable.