EARTH & US: Evolutionary Leap
On the eve of the presidential election, it seems that our future hangs in the balance. What if we had 10 years for humanity to transform its presence on the Earth? 2030 is indeed the date by which many scientists and observers believe we will need to have transitioned not only from fossil fuels, but also from extractive economies that have ravaged the planet and made parts of it uninhabitable. The Shift Summit earlier this month brought together a large group of visionaries who shared their insights on this remarkable moment. Here are a few of my favorites:
Michael Beckwith says that Apocalypse means “the lifting of the veil,” and he foresees a rebirth of humanity. He believes we must raise our frequency or vibration to catch the ideas that will help us create a kind and just world, the Beloved Community. “We need to work FOR, not AGAINST,” he enjoined, adding that “fear hijacks imagination,” and that we must create by design.
Andrew Harvey sees us in the dark night of the soul/death of the old self, which is also the birth canal leading to a completely new way of being. To aid this process, he advises us to study the mystics, do profound spiritual practice and ground ourselves in divine consciousness, align ourselves with a higher vision, and engage in sacred activism.
Jean Houston, speaking from the Women’s Empowerment stage, gave a delightful look at “The Wizard of Oz” as a heroine’s journey, calling women to step into their power. It starts with a wasteland, a bleak landscape of gray where all authority seems to be against Dorothy. Then she is thrown into the air, “over the rainbow,” and set down in unfamiliar, but colorful territory. First we must find our companions for the road, who may not look at all like us, even other species or robots! Each of Dorothy’s allies had self-doubt. We must befriend our brain, our heart, and our courage! In community, we will find friendship, challenges, and risk. We yearn to find our true home, and set out on the yellow brick road, the great road of spiritual power. Magic is important and Glenda gives her gifts. When they’ve almost arrived at Oz, they fall asleep. (Sound familiar?) The Wizard gives them a sacred task; it is a bucket of water, like the water of life, which destroys the Wicked Witch of the West. What talents do we think we’re missing? Each of the travelers had it all along, the heart, brain, and courage. And Dorothy had the power to go home all along, no balloon needed, just by clicking her shoes. After the initiation, “there’s no place like home” — the home of our deeper selves.
We are in the tornado, the breakdown now, Houston believes: fires, racial conflict, Covid, climate change. It’s the moment to use the gifts we have! These are evolutionary times, like “transition” in the birth process. “There is a great quaking, as the cosmos says ‘Wake up!’…Women must lead!” Houston declares. She urges us to find our companions, and shift our relationship to conflict. “See conflict as a spiritual force taking us deeper, a GIFT,” she says. “When we can shift from self-protection to curiosity, compassion and love, we’ll be building bridges, not walls!”
Lynne Twist of the Pachamama Alliance believes that women’s time for self-actualization and shaping the new world has come. It’s women’s role not just to pursue gender equality in the old paradigm of control/domination, but to recreate every sector of society. We need communities of practice, to collaborate and co-create. Wisdom is available when we listen to one another. Empowered female leadership will midwife the new humanity. She told the indigenous tale of a bird trying to fly with just one wing (the masculine), because the other wing (the feminine) was holding back, folded up, doubting its abilities. The hyper-masculine wing working so hard became too aggressive, even violent, and the bird could not fly on course. Finally the feminine wing unfolded (women stepping into our power!) and the bird once again came into balance and flew with ease.
According to Monica Sharma, of the UN, women must transcend our “inner glass ceilings” — the belief that we aren’t smart or strong enough, not good enough, to step into leadership and collaboration. Women make shame- based self-assessments 80% more than men. We need a “radical growth mindset.”
Charles Eisenstein spoke of the unraveling taking place now, in the “space between stories” — the old one (story of separation) is non-functional and the new ones are not here yet. “We must sacrifice certainty to serve love and create beauty,” he urged. Generosity, nonjudgment, compassion, and love are the most important, and every small act counts.
Echoing the importance of taking one step at a time, Sahara Rose reminded us that when we start to take little actions, the next thing will show up. “Time to live as if it’s our final year, and change the world through following our souls’ purpose,” she exhorted. “Ask, where am I called to serve? What am I guided to create? What feels most expansive?”
Thomas Huebl, a spiritual teacher from Germany with an international following, and my favorite of all the speakers, reminded us: “Our body IS the planet, we must step into right relationship with her.” The trauma we all have suffered, some intergenerational and some fresh, has led to a sense of separation, rather than experiencing our bodies as an integral part of planet Earth. Trauma is in our bodies, nervous systems, and emotional systems, so we shut down parts of our body or dissociate. Hence, we don’t feel grounded. Our bodies are like the view of the planet from space at night: veins of light, with dark spots where there are no electric lights.
“We don’t know what we don’t feel,” he said, underscoring the value of feeling and of being in our bodies, in order to act sanely and wisely. The multiple crises — covid, climate, economic — have overloaded our capacity to relate and respond, so we are somewhat numb and dysregulated. This leads to more trauma, because when we feel hopeless, indifferent, we “lose heart and meaning,” and we cannot grieve.
“We are born into scar tissue,” Huebl said (old traumas, slavery, racism, genocide), and these are like cuts in our root systems. Our roots connect us with the wisdom of our ancestors. Biodiversity dies both outside and inside us, because we are interrelated with all of life: what is outside is inside, and vice versa. We are “fluid structures” whose nature is flow; trauma immobilizes that flow, we tighten in the freeze response. When that tension is released, a new sense of self can happen. Breath is our best friend, we have breathed through the most profound and painful moments of our lives. Breath starts to dissolve the ice. When heard and cared for, our bodies feel great. If not heard or cared for, we move out of our bodies, don’t feel “safe” there. Can we feel at home in our bodies, connect to the intelligence of all our cells?
Let us ask, he suggests, “How does my lifestyle embed me in the natural world?” Let us consider our systems of food production, consuming, travel, and ask, “Who am I in relation to climate change? Engaged or paralyzed? Where is my agency, contribution, co-creation, in designing the world we want?”
There is wisdom in the biosphere to heal itself and there are healing plants for us, too. Our bodies heal themselves, though trauma gets in the way of healing. “The obstacles are the way, not blocking the path,” since our purpose is to change and become. (Thank you, Thomas Huebl!)