People like to say, “Karma is a b*tch” and when they say, “What goes around, comes around,” they are alluding to some kind of cosmic revenge. I disagree.

Though I’ve felt the desire for revenge, I recognize it as stemming from a very basic emotion. How can we consider that a divinity would want such a thing? Revenge and punishment are opposed to growth. When something is not right, we can choose to work on moving it forward or we can choose to impede that growth.

It seems to me that the personalities that we loosely label “The Far Right” claim that Liberals are more driven by emotion than by pragmatics. I beg to differ. What is pragmatic about behavior that counters growth and solutions?

People are angry about the financial crisis, and that anger is robbing them of the opportunity to grow.

This morning, I had the pleasure of watching Deepak Chopra, who was explaining the opportunities that have been put before us during this crisis; the opportunity to examine our spiritual focus; the opportunity to sort through the overwhelming trappings of prosperity in order to see more clearly those things that truly matter: our relationships, our love, our humanity and commonality…

I was so very moved that I quickly got on a website to learn more about his message. And when I clicked, I found comments left by people complaining about taxes and the redistribution of wealth.

How could they be so distracted from words like these?

“The whole debate over values comes down to the common good. We can differ about what the common good is, but deciding to do nothing, hoarding personal privilege, taking advantage of the weak, voting for the team instead of the truth, and paying lip service to religion while sabotaging the welfare of the poor and underprivileged—all of that is unacceptable now.

One wonders when the sizable section of politicians, bankers, and entrenched elites will wake up and realize the harm they are doing. If they know of any society in history that survived after its core values collapsed, I’d be curious to know its name.”

~ Deepak Chopra

History has begged the question of exactly what was in The Apple that thrust us from Eden? How did the mighty Egyptians lose technology that took us centuries to find again? Why did Rome fall? It seems to me that those have all been attributed to punishment, and, of course, the debates abound over what sins were actually being punished.

Greed is at the root of them. Somewhere along the line, humans became greedy and felt that the only way to grow their power was to wrest that power from others.

So much of our learning has come from those who would corrupt power in such a way, that the truth got lost. The way the Christian churches have vilified women, who in ancient religions were considered an integral part of our divinity, is just one such historic corruption. Examples in our modern world are everywhere and most agree that it is greed that has brought us to this crisis.

And then, there’s the belief that all is just a cycle… a backdrop of love and loss, poverty and prosperity, peace and war in which we live our lives. The big picture keeps turning. In spite of our efforts, the only real control we have is of ourselves, our own lives, the pursuit of our individual callings.

I don’t think that a crisis is a punishment, but an opportunity. The chips are down, my friends, so what really matters? Will you find joy today? Does the absence of material wealth block your way to joy? Are you waiting for ‘everything to get better’ so that you can find peace again?

If that’s the only peace you know, then you’re losing the opportunity to wake up and realize that the kind of peace that relies on such things is like the lure of a false prophet: it’s smoke and mirrors, an illusion that not only gives false comfort, but blurs the vision, so that Truth is all but lost to us.

We are one. That is not some flimsy piece of fancy. It is Truth, whether people want to believe it or not.

Sometimes I wonder if we’re not terrified of the possibility that God is Us and We are God. It’s life itself that creates life. It’s the push and pull of our energy that keeps us in orbit…

People want to look to The Word, but I can’t ignore the fact that our holy books have all been corrupted by human greed—human desire for the consumption of the power of the masses.

So where can we look? What is our guide? It seems to me that if we look to our natural world, we will find patterns and relationships and consequences repeated from the atom through the vast universe.

The balance, the harmony that continues to create and sustain more life, is Truth.

And what of our souls? That’s the God in us. That… invisible, but undeniable force that could never be reduced to molecular structure is Our Miracle.

There was too much “noise” for a while. Everyone was chasing the illusions of material prosperity and lost their way as they got caught up in the race to what was only a decoy.

Only in losing have we been given the opportunity to see more clearly. Prosperity is not a bad thing. I hope for it to be restored, but I’ll learn my most important lessons now so that I can be worthy of that Eden.

I’m searching for love, joy, peace and understanding, and in whatever small ways I can, I want to share those with others. I think it’s important to examine our anger, and give release to our resentments by recognizing them, and then moving past them.

When I hear people complaining about how the government might help distressed homeowners who’ve bitten off more than they can chew, it shows me that those people cannot release their resentment.

It shows me too, that they cannot be thankful for their own prosperity, if they wish ill on others; if they prefer punishment to progress.

The road to healing seems to grow with each of us who treads on it. We can’t pull anyone along behind us, but we can forge a path through the forest that others can willingly follow. The more of us there are, the more likely others are to see it.

~

Editor: Andrea B.

 

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