By Kurt Johnson, Elena Mustakova, Robert Atkinson
PUBLISHED IN SPRING 2021
We find ourselves awash in oceans of misinformation, with millions detached from reality. The world endures a pandemic that has fully exposed lingering social and economic injustices. Current adversities make opposing forces even more pronounced, resulting in deeper divisions everywhere.
This historic “dark night” of the collective soul requires us to pause, reflect, and take the action needed. We are well into the throes of a great shift in the way we relate to each other and the planet we share. Signs of a collective leap in consciousness are clear, as is the necessity of applying a universal framework of ethical standards and shared values for the good of the whole.
We have critical choices to make in this moment of transformation. Will we allow polarization to further divide us, or will we walk toward cooperation and unity? Will we leave behind an adolescent way of relating to others, or will we embrace living in harmony with all others? This is our moment to choose the future we want to live in.1
A holistic vision of evolution and consciousness sees a purpose to these turbulent times. Cycles of transformation and renewal punctuate our evolutionary progress, as we see in this year of lockdowns, demonstrations, and confrontations. Yet, all the divisions that natural differences create are essentially due to an incomplete investigation of truth.
This can result in extreme antisocial orientations and behavioral patterns that support separation, create hierarchies, and endanger our very survival. On the other hand, an unfettered search for truth leads to a prosocial orientation and actions built upon a consciousness of wholeness, which also fulfills our innate potentiality. Consciousness is designed to evolve toward wholeness and unity.2
Living by a consciousness of wholeness prioritizes the whole, engenders a response based on harmony and cooperation, and places a unity of purpose above all else. At the same time, a consciousness of wholeness acknowledges our diversity of views, appearances, and contributions to the whole as our sustaining strength.
This consciousness calls for a complete shift in how we relate to reality. Seeing beyond the illusion of separation allows us to focus on the one reality which is already a unified whole. Anything currently dividing us is also a catalyst for uniting us. We saw this last summer when the streets filled with people calling for racial justice and deep systemic change. A convergence of forces is building like never before. As we join hands across differences, we seek to heal a great divide in the human family.
In so many ways, this is a new Day. A relentless pandemic, and an even more pervasive pandemic of a profound loss of faith, are propelling us to the very edge of familiar life. We attempt to preserve control by replaying old power games, or fabricating conspiracy theories. Yet, each next day of new threats pushes us further into unknown territory. Our perceptions of reality are being reshaped.
We can keep holding on to what we know, or we can summon our courage and leap toward an expanded perception of the material, social, and spiritual reality we are living.
From that core, we know it is not right to hate, to turn a blind eye on suffering fellow humans, to cast judgments, to sneer, to live without discipline and integrity, to blindly go along with what ‘everyone else is doing’. We know we can act with conscience, rather than across party lines. We know our planet urgently needs us to change our lifestyles, or fires, hurricanes and other natural calamities will keep intensifying. Within us, we know what is true and what is real.
In our collective adolescence, arguing our differences was more important than listening for common ground. Discipline and character got discarded as old-fashioned limitations to the individual’s freedom of self-expression. Savvy technology is what we put our faith in. When we found that nothing holds, we end up swimming in a sea of addictions and apathy.
Conflict reaches its climax in adolescence, and neither institutions nor individuals appear trustworthy. Our public life has massively forfeited rational inquiry and integrity, embraced fabrications, and become defined by the lowest common denominator of expediency. We are left bereft of anything to put our faith in. And life without faith is only existence, permeated by self-defeating ego, and collective dishonesty.
Faith in something that matters most to us, in our ability to become better humans, in our collective will to live more honestly together, whatever that may be for us, is what sustains us, gives us hope, and inspires us. It’s time to admit that we cannot live and thrive without a faith that strengthens our backs and gives us the fortitude to do right. It is time to redefine and reclaim faith.
Faith is what withstands scrutiny, fosters on-going self-regulation and development of the mind, contributes to the growth of discernment, and cultivates a spacious, attuned, and generous heart. Such faith is infused with comprehensive and encompassing spiritual, material, and social understanding of the evolutionary and interdependent nature of consciousness and life, and of the law of love driving this evolution.3
We have to ask ourselves: does the faith I live by truly make me more coherent in both heart and mind, more loving, compassionate, disciplined, trustworthy, generous, and service-minded?
Does it allow me to engage in rational consultation with people from different backgrounds and perspectives, and build trust and good will? Does it strengthen me to withhold judgments and reactivity, and remain constructive through the harder negotiations and choices? Does it encourage my mind to engage scientific perspectives? Does it strengthen my heart’s ability to perceive an underlying oneness in all our diversity?
Notes:
[1] See Atkinson, Johnson, and Moldow, eds. (2020) Our Moment of Choice: Evolutionary Visions and Hope for the Future, Simon & Schuster.
[2] See Atkinson, (2017) The Story of Our Time: From Duality to Interconnectedness to Oneness, Sacred Stories Publishing.
