Our collective future

 

Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.
  George Orwell

A cynic is not merely one who reads bitter lessons from the past;
he is one who is prematurely disappointed in the future.
Sydney J. Harris

Yesterday I was struck by these two great quotes. The first one told me something which I was already finding out and put in two simple sentences. The second one confronted me in one striking sentence with my own former worldview. This worldview was indeed one of resentment and often resulted in an almost paralyzed state of being in which I would see myself as a victim of something which I couldn't even name. Needless to say this made me little hopeful about the future. It actually forced me to flee from the inescapable future and lose myself in pointless behavior fueled by the little inspiring western consumer capitalist status quo. Now I can look and say that it is a good thing to be lost, it is great to be confused, because out of this seeming chaos something new will come into creation. Looking back at the future this pattern can be clearly spotted along the line of our cultural development. When the need was the highest and Europe was about to collapse the Renaissance arose out of the ashes just like a phoenix and Europe spread its wings to fly toward the Western Enlightenment. On a personal level my suffering taught me that I had to stop fighting against this invisible enemy and turn inwards to contemplate on my situation. Quickly I found out that we actually lived in a time in which we are very blessed bacause we have the opportunity to stand on the shoulders of so many giants that have come before us. I discovered then that it is possible after all to change the world around us if we first allow ourselves to heal our bodies and minds  and to reconnect with our hart, soul and the universal spirit that binds us all together. It became clear to me that we are all interconnected with eachother, with nature and even with the entire Universe. I experienced that we can create a peaceful, meaningful and righteous future by living in the here and now and being this change that we want to see. This is however an ongoing process and I often feel some tension when practicing this. Sometimes this tension resulted in a pressure that made it hard for me to truly live up to my highest truths. But through dedicated exercise and endless perseverance I have become convinced that this change is absolutely possible for anyone. It is even unavoidable because all around me I see the old world crumbling and I see it getting harder for people to hold on to it. This is a logical process ofcourse because ego-based consciousness will do anything to hold on to conservative structures. This is also very reasonable because these structures do seem very large and very real and have kept me in their grip for quite some time. But once we experience that our destination lies somewhere else we will do everything to reach this. And even though It is impossible to fully see this destination I can feel that I have arrived in a place where I wholeheartedly want to be even though I am constantly moving towards this next step in evolution. By holding this image clearly in my mind's eye I can see that the tension I experience is a positive evolutionary tension that makes me achieve the very best that is possible. Which makes me think about a quote from an enlightening spiritual leader, the fourteenth Dalai Lama; In the practice of tolerance, one's enemy is the best teacher.

Now I want to get back to the future by taking a good look at the first quote that I used to start this writing with. This one teaches us that we can reclaim a positive outlook on our future by completely being in this moment and use all our abilities to control our past in a rational and meaningful way. Right now this is what I see happening all around me. Many inspiring people are actually re-writing our past so that we are able again to imagine, visualize and create a future in which we can live life in freedom, peace and connectedness. My experience is that once one starts to see these possibilities and one starts to participate, or co-create this future, the boundaries between past, present and future slowly fade and life is experienced much more fully in the here and now. At a certain point I realized how fruitful it is for us as a species to rewrite our history and heal the wounds in our collective consciousness. I am convinced that this will make it more and more easy for anyone to make this switch to a positive, veritable and fullfilling look at oneself, the world and all of life. To me it is truly miraculous that it is possible to have such a radically different perspective. Einstein once said: ""There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle." Let's make that obvious choice every day.

Peace, Light and Love to All