Create Peace in all the Division

 

              Photo by Loverna Journey on Unsplash

Much like most of you I have friends and family members who cover the spectrum of beliefs and ideologies. Intelligent people I know and respect who think so differently from each other on so many topics: politically, on health, fiscally, socially and more. I watch and hear the confusion people are feeling trying to understand this wide diversity among people close to us.

Look how confusing it is in our world today.

•  We have multiple information outlets with experts of prestigious backgrounds voicing disparate 'truths' on whatever topic you pick, from what drugs are effective, to when to open schools, and whether to trust the safety of wearing masks and more, just on the virus alone!
•  A continuous stream of 'breaking', alarming news.
•  Social media rife with torrents of angry rants, condemnation of others, as well as horrific stories of unimaginable atrocities to people, children and animals.
• Widely diverse news stories showing the information from an unbiased view (where?) all the way to extreme bias.
• An increasing number of conspiracy theorists gaining in popularity among all demographics
• Increasing violence in the streets of large cities and very little coverage of it on mainstream media.

             And no one takes responsibility for this. We hear the cry; it is the evil media's fault; they are the villain here. It is the politician's fault; no, the 'other party's' fault. You can find stories to validate whatever it is you are inclined to believe. Then you can feel justified in your judgments, your opinions, and 'know' you are right and others are wrong. Even the pandemic, of which we are in the middle of, is worse, or not nearly as bad, as the different sources say.

            Let's stop for a moment and look at where our judgments come from. In our modern world we have this gigantic compilation of all the egoic thoughts represented on the internet. Like a global brain, mass consciousness is suspended in the Ethernet, holding all good, bad and indifferent indiscriminately.

             We don't know how to handle all of this information overload. We spent a few million years living in small clans, knowing an infinitesimal bit about the greater world around us. We went on instinct, our guts, and our emotions, observing others near us, understanding what kept us safe, and had to stay focused on finding food and surviving.

            Now most of us don't need to worry about getting enough food, or a safe place to sleep. With our time we can spend it coming up with new ways to live and entertain ourselves day after day after day.

            So, where are we now? We work toward what constitutes a good life and how we want to be, and we gather with those who agree with us, but find many in our sphere don't, and low and behold we find millions of others disagree. Then others sometimes hold back on discussing topics, or quietly separate from us, or they may argue with us, or even get enraged!  

            The truth is we all are creating our own individual worlds from our own consciousness. Our own minds. We absorb—consume is a better word—all the information coming into our senses. We react with a combination of judgments, reactions and ensuing emotions. We base all our assumptions and beliefs on our history. Our ego is like an operating system that has learned about the world since our birth. This is where our judgments come from.

            We couldn't survive without it.

            But almost all of our suffering is caused by the ego. Our thoughts about a situation, and our feeling that we are powerless to fix it, drop a blinder in front of us, blocking a way out of the suffering. We don't see the suffering coming from inside our minds but blame everything outside of us. We become open to explanations served by conspiracy theories.  We reinforce this suffering by talking to our friends about how terrible everything is. We all do this to some extent, and it is so hard not to. Yet it holds us away from our sense of inner peace.

            We can learn to 'see' the deeper reality below all of this created chaos by being anchored in the unchanging, omniscient, omnipresent source; use your own words here: God, The Unmanifest, Source. Let's see how.

            We have another 'mind' besides the ego; that is our higher consciousness. That part of us that nudges and whispers when we stop to look within; when we take a moment to listen, actually connecting to our source. Pause, be mindful, meditate, be present, these are all suggestions to hop beyond the judgmental mind's suffering.

            No matter what is going on in your own world right now—you may be experiencing difficulties or illness—in this moment, you are sitting there reading these words and you are OK. The sun will still rise tomorrow. All that really exists is this moment, right now. Stop burdening yourself with worrying about the whole world. It's futile. Worrying about all the other people who think differently from you won't change anything. Worrying about the newscaster who said something incorrect, the politician who said something awful, the latest numbers on the virus, the violence and natural disasters, will not help anything.

            Create love in your heart. Find a way to seek to understand the hearts of others. That’s all. Then you are moving from ego to love. And as always, the more people who seek love and understanding will change the world.

 

 Kasey at the foot of a Statue of Gandhi in London