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“We all have a unique frequency. Our emotions, feelings have frequencies - in our daily lives we issue out hostility, negativity, jealously, love, compassion - we can't see them, but we feel them. They make up the fabric of the white sheet we throw over the "ghost" of our soul, to make out its shape and form. Hate throws up a thin, malnourished form, while love reveals a healthy figure of a soul.”
— Mickie Kent
Ever since we became self-aware, the mind of humans have always wanted to know what lies beyond the world we live in. Explorers have ventured into the deeps and the heights; of these explorers some are scientists, some are mystics. Each is driven by a different purpose in their search for a unique frequency, but the one thing they all share is the wish to extend their understanding - in the hope it will bring purpose and meaning to human experience and existence.
When we reach out into the unknown, we are reaching out to the invisible forces at work in the universe. Similar to the invisible field of force surrounding two bar magnets, which connects or repels them exerting an influence on matter, these forces are so simple that children play with them, and yet so powerful that entire cities draw electrical energy from their depths.
Scientists have discovered that the force of a magnet is really an extension of its mass. Imagine the magnet as a miniature model of all things, the Sun, our planet, the trees, cells - everything is shaped by magnetic fields. Energy is the construction material for matter. All matter, including cells, flesh, blood, glands, organs, and muscles, requires this primary element in abundance.
It is energy that binds atoms and molecules together. Electromagnetic forces are controlled by it, and the physical body is put together and healed by it - it's the glue that keeps nuclear forces intact and holds the universe together. It is also thought that increasing our belief in something can draw it to us, because out of that belief comes hidden energy. Our belief in our dominance over the world has also drawn many things to us - some of which have been labelled as a curse.
The need to take over, run everybody and everything is a curse - especially when we're not big enough for that power, so we steal it piece by piece. But tainted and spoiled by negative frequencies, some believe it will gradually weaken and sicken those who wish to dominate, until the power we once thought we had will leave us. And so we reach out into the dark, searching for light - for alternatives to the global problems we face.
One alternative to changing our negative frequencies is to attune them to our natural energies, and reconnect with our emotions (or soul) and the community of life - with some suggesting it will require taking on board some of the primitive wisdom we dropped from our ancestors about our place on the Earth. New times call for new perspectives (or the rediscovery of old ones); I provide a few of them below. This is quite a comprehensive post, and you might find that there is a lot of information to take in all at once.
Read as much as you find applicable to you, because ultimately it's about creating a conscious awareness; we all have choices to make if we want change, so it's best to be as informed as possible. Transforming our frequencies by tapping into the power of our consciousness can sound like science fiction, or mystical fantasy, but the theories you'll discover here are for channelling more positive frequencies in a conscious effort to reset the equilibrium of the mind, body and soul, and the balance with the stable ecological relationship we have enjoyed for millions of years.
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“Love the world into change.”
— Mickie Kent
Many people I talk to are uncomfortable with their situation in life - and no matter what they've tried, nothing seems to change. They experience anxiety about the future, and wonder: Am I making the right decisions? Why is my life not working? How come I'm in the same situation after years of trying so hard to change?
Such a time in our lives acts as a centripetal force - like the velodrome track used by Olympic cyclists - one that pushes the rider inwards. And anxiety about our lives is echoed by the current focus on uncertainty in the world around us. In such a shift, we have fallen out of love with our world.
In England as the double-dip economic recession intensifies, and the United Kingdom's trade gap reaches its worst level since comparable records began in 1997, the anticipation for an ease on financial troubles in the near future seem dashed on the rocks - but we continue to navigate through rough waters. The Olympics, like a golden ray through gathering storm clouds ahead, have garnered praise from the world nations and thrilled the host kingdom - even if our economy has yet to reach the full fitness of our Olympians. Its close has left us wondering how we'll fill the void.
British economists believe this is due to the danger of a "psychological break-up" of Europe, which many think will be hard to contain. There is a materialising front line in this area between north and south, for example in Greece, Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel has often been caricatured as a Hitler figure in protests and in the media. And with France heading back into recession, the divide looks to deepen.
But it is more than just the markets. One of the landmarks of the strange new world we've entered since the crash of 2008 is that interest rates on cash are in many cases practically zero. In reality, of course, they're negative, since inflation is steadily eroding the value of any cash you may have saved. Bailing out the banks was necessary to avoid a catastrophic financial meltdown, but this financial repression that ensued has become an undeclared tax on our savings.
Almost two thirds of UK adults think it pays to save, but how many of us are actually managing to do so in the current climate? Whether it's saving for a rainy day or saving for your dream purchase, most of us probably agree that putting some money away in savings is a good thing. But the difficult economic environment has somewhat changed the way we think about and deal with our money. Especially with a lack of funds after bills and expenses, we feel uncertain how are we going to go about doing this in spite of the economic pressures.
Some of us save for a holiday or a new car, or "just in case", but savings are not just about accumulating money. The top two reasons why people save in the current climate are for emergencies and the security of knowing that money is there. It's about feeling safe - as insurance against an uncertain future. Politicians tell you to put aside money for the future, but there seems little point when any money you set aside is certain to lose value over time. And although it's not a government's intention to want people to stop saving - it's the inevitable effect of trying to write off debt by means of inflation (with no guarantee that this will work).
Worse, if your income is rising more slowly than the rate at which money is losing value, you'll be getting slowly poorer, like many people today. A poor income and a negative return on your savings - with pensions affected too - means that if you can't look forward to a time when you can enjoy the fruits of a lifetime's labour, what you have in front of you is a lifetime of chronic uncertainty. When the future seems more than usually uncertain and there's something troubling in the present, it's natural to look to the past.
Two world wars and a great depression stirred governments to build defences against uncertainty - policies of full employment and a welfare state, which enabled people (that had faced imminent death everyday) to live without fearing that their plans might at any time be overturned by an economic downturn or personal misfortune. Now, as a result of the huge debts that have been left over from an artificial boom, these defences are being scaled back.
Rightly, these policies are resented as unfair, and those caught under the debris after the collapse of the free market point to the uncomfortable intimacy between corporations and government. Some experts will point out that big banks, and big business, are the biggest taxpayers - the biggest "clients" of a consumer government - and they have survived because big brother governments are shouldering their losses, while cutting their services to the working taxpayer, because they share the same bed of interests.
And with the average household treated as collateral damage in the government's war against debt, pushing poorer families on the front line, is it any surprise, then, some say that there is a rising insurrection against big business in local communities? The average family not only has less to spend, but wants to spend less making rich companies even richer.
And it seems that the great battlefields of our time will be the streets that surround our own city halls. Too many nations have used these corridors to transform governments into a fortress: a grown-ups table that tells us to sit straight, to quietly chew our (increasingly expensive) food, and ultimately to stay out of trouble (with them). This doting governess which some call the "nanny state" has truly become a plague in the minds of many disgruntled people.
This is all too clearly illustrated by a recent - and very harsh - remark made by one of my friends, after she read a news article about council budget cuts over the past two years over public health could result in an increase in rats and mice in the cities. "The government is helping the rise of vermin in the seats of power and the sewers," she said.
When I commented that she was being harsh in her outlook, for the government bail-out of banks she gave the analogy of a rich man, having eaten free in the top restaurants for years, who when finally faced with the bill for all his free-loading, hands it over to the waiter to pay.
This is the general consensus by a lot of my friends, and none of them have the mindset that money is "the root of all evil". They all know the benefits of generating wealth; and that working hard and being successful adds value to our families and our larger communities. Interestingly, it seems a healthy saving habit isn't necessarily related to whether we have a high income, but more likely to be down to our lifestyle choices.
Whatever your preferred lifestyle or priorities may be, being disciplined about saving could prove important when income is squeezed be it due to pay freezes or inflation. Whilst there has been much talk and advice around ways to save and make more of your money, some believe the world has more than enough money, but we've just spent it unwisely.
At any rate, it seems that the situation has reverted back to a century ago, when society was divided into a majority that is destined to remain pinched and struggling and an oligarchy possessed of vast but fickle wealth. There has been a loss of balance; with a level of risk in generating wealth that only the very rich can afford.
And this means that the relative security that many people enjoyed in the recent past is fading from memory. Even popular movies for this era that speak to this growing sense, globally, are rising in popularity. We like our superhero to be darker, more realistic; we like our spy movies to be more bleak than James Bond. And in this dark outlook, one wonders how anyone can insure against a future where many will be only a pay packet away from the streets.
Some put forward the theory that the economic mess we find ourselves in is simply part of a bigger - darker - picture. They believe that in our worthwhile efforts to progress, succeed and improve, decades of an inhuman focus on economic growth has harmed our future.
It has not only corrupted the security of our futures and our relationships with each other, it has affected our place in nature - the air we breathe and the ground we walk upon has changed as a result of this imbalance and short sightedness. We have wielded huge new forces across the globe, and walked as giants upon the Earth, unaware of the footprints we left behind.
Rather than an upward climb to the top of our potential at the pinnacle of the present, we find ourselves abruptly stopped short, staring down at the deep abyss of our future. And with giant nations buckling under the strain to keep from falling, adherents to this theory say that change must come. But at what cost?
“For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth; to know the worst and provide for it.”
— Patrick Henry
There is strong evidence for the argument that change in the way we view the world is the way forward. Rising carbon emissions show us that to continue as we have done with unchecked consumption is a slippery fall down the abyss. And we sense that the future is calling on us to change.
My friends often remark how they sleep fitfully. And it is often true that our dreams shake with the distant rumblings of an ominous future, our mind filled with unspoken worries we push to the back of its recesses, like children trying to keep the monsters under the bed. We get into the habit of pushing our heads in the sand; we acclimatise to the daily stress, and try to place hope in those we elect into office to solve the world's problems for us.
And these monsters that peek across the horizon scare more than any fictional horror story: nuclear bombs biding their time, itching to fulfil some madman's purpose, suicide bombers and terrorist acts, chemical warfare poisoning the battlefield; power plant accidents and leaking wastes causing mutations in nature, pesticide sprayed crops and lab foods and the toxins we eat; electromagnetic waves charging the air, depleted natural resources and the fight for the oil that fuels our way of life; global warming, natural disasters, plagues, Ebola, swine flu, and the rise of diseases and cancers that eat away at our bodies and minds. And, some say, there are new monsters are poking their heads over the horizon.
We pour chemicals into our land, our sky, our rivers to rain back down on us; rising infertility rates and ozone depletions, rivers damned and fish stock doomed; huge oceanic dead-zones where the ghost of silent whales scrape over the corpse of coral reefs. The monsters advance and the forest - the lungs of the Earth - collapse under their feet to suffocate indigenous populations and disrupt oxygen cycles, turning the once fertile soil into deserts with the coughing insults of bulldozers. With our inhuman activity there is no place we have left untouched.
It's been said that fate is what happens when innumerable people make innumerable small decisions about other matters that have a collective accumulative effect that nobody intended. We didn't intended to start the greenhouse effect or poison our planet, but with blind assumptions, and a fusion of forces that have disconnected us from the laws of life (where we have been told we can live apart from the rest of the planet without limits, without rules, without laws), has left us and the planet battered and beaten.
In such a scenario, it's not difficult to agree that our good intentions to improve ourselves have paved the road to a hell of human arrogance and greed. With the fairytale of human grandeur we have told ourselves, we have made madness manifest in our world, rather than the enlightened future we had intended. We based our progress on the need to subdue the Earth and have dominion over it. But the idea of dominion in Genesis I'm sure didn't mean that we leave the Earth pillaged and smoking, or that only humans have rights.
No life is more precious than another. No matter what species. And no life is interdependent from the rest. All life is sacred, but instead of celebrating the sacredness of all life, we focused on just the advancement of human life - and our aspirations have threatened the community of life itself. The dominion of our kind hasn't worked out as we assumed it would.
And all the while, experts point out that the climate is changing - angry summers, persistent floods, tempestuous hurricanes, belligerent blizzards and grudging droughts leave their calling cards on our doorstep. They encroach ever nearer - with the poles warming and ice shelves collapsing, sea levels rising and cities slowly sinking - is this a world we want to live in, or to leave for future generations?
Experts say that over the last 150 years we've created a society that runs on the finite resource of oil, where the balance of life is undone by the disruption of food chains and collapse of the ecosystems - we're consuming the planet and poisoning the air and the water. We're heading for destruction, and we're taking the whole planet, trillions upon trillions of lifeforms, with us.
Because it's not just the human race, but billions of other species that share the planet which are endangered by our actions. We're killing off all the lifeforms that gives us life, and we have to remove ourselves from the belief that the world was made for human beings to dominate and deplete as a resource. The world has a value beyond being a utility for us to abuse - we can't do anything (we think) we want, believing there are no limits or repercussions to our actions.
Climate change was once talked about in terms of centuries, then decades, until we are seeing the effects of climate change knock on our doors year after year. Scientists say we've increased the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, trapping heat and raising the temperature of the planet. And it looks like before we run out of fossil fuels to burn, we're going to run out of air to breathe - befouling the atmosphere will make the lack of oil or gas sources irrelevant.
Some believe that what makes the situation even more unsustainable is that all of this is wrapped in a culture of denial - we are strapped in a cultural straitjacket of our own making, and we struggle on, working in jobs and consuming products that do not fulfil, while trying to keep the monsters from under our beds from escaping. We distract ourselves as best we can; we swallow down television, junk food and multiple sex with strangers.
The celebrity pages are filled with the indiscretions of the rich and famous; the most high profile of the year being Kristen Stewart's affair with a married man - causing outrage and ridicule in equal measure. Infidelity is on the rise, because alienated people can't make relationships work. Not when we pop sexual escapades like sleeping tablets to stop us from thinking, while we hope that as we busy ourselves in our deep slumber, our democratically leaders will find some answers to world issues we're too frightened to even think about.
When I had this discussion with my friend over lunch the other day, she responded by asking, "What if those in power can't find the answers, and we can't wake from this nightmare?" And it is a reasonable fear to have: Can we make good to change, before we see the end of the world as we know it, or - worse - the end of our children's futures?
There is a strong scientific consensus that the depletion of fossil fuel energies is a turning point for us, but others believe that the results of burning the stuff has left already left a terrible legacy. With greenhouse gases on the rise, temperatures on the rise, more droughts, more floods, rising the sea levels will all continue to impact the community of life.
There is a biological significance when plants grow our of season, or out of habitat, and we've seen the extinction of species that literally have no place to go as the climate gets warmer. The absorption of carbon by the oceans has also affected rising acidity (and temperature) levels making it harder for plankton - the foundation of the food chain - to form correctly. Phytoplankton produce half of the oxygen we breathe, and when plankton dies more carbon remains in the air, which means more warming.
The more data we collect, the more it seems that the scientific projections we're using now are not overestimating the climatic change over the next few centuries, and they may be underestimating it. That's the essential message. This could be more worse than initially thought.
And global warming doesn't just mean overall warming, it's believed that some places would freeze. Climate can change rapidly, small changes can build to a tipping point where the system can turn abruptly to a new state to negatively impact all living things. For example, scientists believe England could turn into a Norway in terms of drops in temperature. These portions that provide agricultural bounty for its regional populations would be affected, disrupting food chains already affected by the extreme weather, which causes global food prices to rise.
The UK has already seen a resurgence in the increase of the cost of food in 2012, similar to the food crisis of 2008 - which is too close for comfort for many. The nightmare scenarios provided by the expert evidence may seem outlandish, but attacking the structural integrity of the planet - which scientists say will take millions of years to recover from - still means that the thoughtless actions of those in the past have sentenced countless future generations to live in an impoverished world.
Recovery is never a sure thing, and all the science points to us still being on track for an ecological breakdown. So unless we adhere to a secret society conspiracy theory thwarting the good works of a few good people while sedating the rest of us, what we have done so far is not working, and we will have to do something else.
And the worse case scenario is that it might not even matter what we do, we are already over the environmental brink of no return. It's only the logical conclusion to think that destroying where we live will bring about the next order of mass extinction faster than its natural course. It's been said that a chain is as strong as its weakest link, and if we continue to devour the world at the rate we have - with modern civilisation literally eating itself out of house and home - then humans are that weak link.
We have to live on this planet, but if we've outgrown our environment and are pressed for resources, and the planet can no longer sustain us, then it follows that we're driving all species to extinction faster than their natural course - and some scientists believe we will lose at least half of all lifeforms we have now by the next century.
If we act as though we've taken over the planet to crowd everything else out, then there will come a point when the system of life that sustains us will collapse. And we might like to think we're not governed by the rules of nature (thanks in part to the insider knowledge science gives us, and thanks in part to religious beliefs that perpetuate the dominion of Man) - but we are.
The origin of modern humans is a hotly debated topic, but experts in this field claim that our species was evolving in the same way that other species of animals evolved. And there is a growing body of evidence that suggests nature was developing different human prototypes only one of which, our species, was ultimately successful. There was nothing unique about us until we began to make sophisticated stone tools - proving that evolution (where only the fittest survive) does work. Life seeks to expand itself, and we are life.
Humans are not separate from nature, somehow different or special, a master race, the master creation - but neither are we innately flawed, violent, selfish and greedy. We are vessels with a huge capacity of all emotions, in unequal measure, but love is the real measure of a human being - sometimes captured eloquently in a single image. As the photo below shows - a snap of an owner cradling his arthritic dog in the warm waters of a lake in order to lull him to sleep.
The picture of John Unger and his dog Schoep lying in the waters of Lake Superior, speaks on so many levels - not only of the relationship that can be attained between man and beast, or of the love between friends. It can also remind us of a time when we felt safe, loved, and cared for; a much needed staff to lean on in uncertain times.
That the picture quickly went viral, is proof, if any were needed, that we are hungry for examples of good in our world, however slim. Or maybe we're just suckers for stories that melt our hearts, but if we didn't have any faith in our kind, we really would be a victim of our circumstances. Then we run the risk of falling into apathy - and we need to face the truth with hope, rather than bury our heads in the sand in despair, so that our descendants will have a future to face. And to do so we must ask ourselves: Have you ever thought about what's REALLY wrong with the world today?
When our youths turn to murder at ages as early as 14, then it's more than the murder of one life, of which one is too many. But everyone seems to be passing the blame; schoolteachers blame terrible parents. Parents blame the teacher's unions. Citizens blame immigrants, Christians blame Muslims - and gays; the 99% blames the 1% for the world's ills. And the general population is echoing the nature of those in power. Our politicians blame each other. Conservatives blame the liberals. And liberals blame the greedy Right. And yet, the West was an ideological place where people were free to be individuals, to take responsibility for their own lives, and to spend their time however they saw fit, while respecting everyone else's freedoms.
But now some feel there's a festering of greed. A desperate grab for money and power, from the highest government officials and senior corporate leaders all the way down to schoolteachers and local community leaders. The ethos seems to have changed from one of personal integrity to all about "getting mine" - the all-out attempt, by any means possible, to get ahead. It's every person for him or herself, no matter what the social cost. "Don't look at us," they say, we didn't make the rules.
Sometimes our greatest enemies are our paranoias and the way we undervalue life. It reminds me of The Iron Giant an animated feature about an enormous, metallic robot sent to Earth from some other planet bent on ruling or otherwise destroying the world. The giant, originally programmed by his alien creators for war and mayhem and was, by all accounts, completely unstoppable. Thanks to the help of a lovable young Earth boy, the iron giant miraculously overcomes his programming, learns the value of human life and settles on a life of protecting and preserving humans, instead of destroying them. We learn that the real enemy is the paranoid United States government officials who, instead of trying to understand and communicate with the giant, stoop to desperate, shady methods and go to extreme lengths to obliterate it, even if it means losing innocent lives in the process.
Thus we require a change of perspective, and of priorities, to bring out the best in us. With the Olympic British team celebrating their most successful Olympics for 100 years, a debate is growing about how best to build on the legacy and inspire the next generation into sport. And like the Olympics, which has given us medals, tears and athletic history - as well as some oddities - there are endeavours that bring out the best in human beings, when we work together with one unified goal, to make something amazing happen that we didn't know we could do. It's a vision quest for the collective mind.
Sometimes, even with those that come last, it's the sheer bloody-mindedness of some competitors that inspires. The good-natured sporting spirit of the British public in supporting all athletes regardless of whether they won gold or not, and applauding effort as well as victory has not gone unnoticed by the world press. Such feats can inspire us to overcome challenges, to fight even harder when pushed into a corner, or to come closer together in times of tension.
A perfect example is American swimmer Lynne Cox's actions to brave the frigid waters of the Bering Strait to swim from the United States to the Soviet Union in the waning days of the Cold War to ease international tensions in the summer of 1987. The Russians greeted her with a welcome party.
United endeavours can also show us what we are capable of when we try - such as the innovative landing on Mars (which cost less than a quarter of the price the United Kingdom is paying for the Olympics). Some would say that such achievements in space exploration are the ultimate expression of what makes us human beings. When we succeed it lifts our spirits and unifies us in our quest to know - where you need to see with a clearer vision unclouded by fear and hate.
All the same, even though we have such a high functioning brain providing us with the ability and intelligence to foresee and prepare for the worst - it doesn't mean we will. There are people actively working for the life of this planet, but they are a still in the minority. The majority might know the problems of deforestation, pollution of rivers, over population and all of the things the planet isn't equipped to handle, but popular culture works everyday to distract, mesmerise and hypnotise with what some term as its illusions - making us focus on what we wear and what we own, rather than the state of the world we live in. So we remain in denial - we use it as a defence mechanism to reject what is too uncomfortable to accept, despite what may be overwhelming evidence, and continue to foul our nest.
Critics say that organised religions work much in the same way; instead of focusing to make a heaven on Earth, they put our focus on a heaven after our time on Earth - if we comply with their rules. But there is no single right way to live, or view, to understand the world. We are all unique, and experience unique journeys in life. We have conscious intention - it's a choice; like the Olympians that put themselves out there, we can decide to succeed or fail.
We can choose to understand that we can't survive as an entity apart from the Earth while we live on it, so killing the planet is not an option if we want to survive. You may not want to survive, and that is fine, too - it's your choice. But if you're in the majority, then you'll take the rest of us with you - before our time.
Is this being too dramatic? Are we destroying the planet, as we have done our primitive past, just to be a little more comfortable for a little while longer? Is the very survival of our species really in question? Or is it really our fault? Could it just be the natural course of things? Countless civilisations before us have collapsed, but what is inevitable at this point?
Believers of the negative human impact theory claim that we should look at things exactly the way they are - to see how alienated we have become from ourselves, from the people around us and from the natural world. If we stopped to listen, what would we hear, when disconnection means the voice of our bodies, our minds and the planet's voice barely registers in our daily lives? This goes back to the situation in our own life - and the increasing unhappiness we feel on a daily basis. If you're like most people, you've probably dipped your toes in the pool of personal growth.
Perhaps you've been to seminars, tried some exercises or read some books. And even if you have experienced some success - it won't be as profound or as lasting as you'd like. We fall back self-proclaimed life coaches to sort out our lives, as though they know something we don't - but if they do, it only seems to work for themselves and a few "clients" who - guess what - have a similar package to sell you.
Read more about money-making gurus.
The money making self-help gurus keep pushing their law of attraction products, but after using them you still feel like you're on a treadmill, running and running but not getting anywhere. Their big over-the-top promises become obsolete. Every succeeding setback is increasingly discouraging because your working hard to improve your life. So, why is nothing working out as you think it should? Why are these self-help gurus products failing you so bad, and giving alternative therapies such a bad name?
The self-help gurus give their own reasons for the disillusionment there products have produced, releasing yet more products to "make up" for what hasn't worked, to make even more money off the inadequacies of their systems. Did you know that 98% of people who read success books, buy success courses, or learn success strategies fail to achieve the success they want? Napoleon Hill, one of the earliest producers of the modern genre of personal-success literature, said that only 2% of those who learned his legendary success principles actually used them to become successful.
Hill put it down to doubt and self-sabotage, but if we're to believe these law of attraction self-help gurus, it turns out a lot of the roadblocks to success come from a gap in our understanding of the full universal law. Take your pick of the examples: First of all they told us the law of attraction was one simple law, now we're told it's not that simple. We need to know 11 more laws; if that doesn't work how about the 16 "sub-laws" we MUST understand before fully expressing our power of attraction and manifestation.
Trying to manifest money, a new home, a life partner, or anything without knowing these latest laws is like trying to make bread without all the ingredients, they say. The self-help gurus tell us that we are already attracting events in our life every single day. The only problem is that because you're unaware of the other laws involved, you're probably attracting things you don't want instead of things you DO want. They explain that you "simply" need to use the sub-laws to change the flow of direction to instantly start attracting the things that you do want.
So, if you don't follow them you'll end up with something, but it won't be what you wanted - but what the self-help gurus mean is that if their promise fail you, it won't be because of their system; your manifestations are not showing up because of your own ignorance. This just perverts the reality that we are the navigator of our lives.
They tell us to follow them on the path they tracked to success, and when we fail, they say it was because we weren't following them properly (or there are more "rules" to learn). But if something works, it will work - failure only proves that their system might work for them, but it doesn't necessarily mean it will work for us. We have to navigate our own lives; others can inspire, but we cannot replace a carbon copy of their lives across our own to trace our own successes.
And yet we spend more money, throwing good after bad, and falling ever deeper into our own personal abyss - we become even more alienated from our communities and our planet. It's not surprising, therefore, the deep grief we are feeling as a planet at the loss of connection. And I wish that now this was the "happy" part, where I could say that there was some magic potion for all our problems, but of course I can't tell you that. We are all beginning to sense that the checks and balances of the universe and the forces of nature will not allow anyone to place it under the harsh yokel of repression for much longer.
Nor may we continue to place nature under the triple yoke of vanity, greed and misguided ambition, unless we wish to seal our fate. Before we become the latest victims of our tyranny; it's time for change. This applies to the larger community, and to the way we treat ourselves in our own lives.
“Here lies the tyrant who would rule the world immortal.”
— Mary Shelly (from her story Frankenstein)
In asking questions about what has gone wrong in our lives, we don't often ask the fundamental question how we got here. If we don't ask the right questions, we won't affect the radical change we want to see in our lives, and in the wider world, to ensure we make it. From my own experience, we need to question assumptions, and talk about how our fears, and how we feel. We can't run from our fears, they're a part of us like our shadow; the only way to make your fears disappear is by facing them. The same is true for challenging our assumptions.
One assumption is that we need to put all our faith in science and reason - because we are in an age when we have lost faith in the power of reason to solve problems. It's not just the collapse of communism followed by upheaval in free market capitalism - both of them systems based on theories that were supposed to be rigorously rational. In everyday life, systems that were designed to be infallible - from the security software we install on our home computers to the mathematical formulae used by hedge funds to trade vast sums of money - have proved to be dangerously unreliable.
As a result of these failures, faith in reason has been dented. The idea that the intellect alone can be our guide in life is weaker than it has been for many years. This shouldn't be read as a criticism of science. I believe in being practical, and not only adhere to scientific principles, but use scientific opinion in my articles - because science helps us understand the way our world works. And, since scientists can help us understand the situation, we assume they are automatically equipped to tell us how to solve things when they go wrong.
But there are forces at work in the world that can't be understood through a microscope. And critics would go further to say that science has also given us an overinflated belief in ourselves with the knowledge it has provided, and which we've used to try and dominate the planet. It makes for terrible reading, but through science we have interfered in life's natural process, messing around with foundation of entire species by breeding them together for our amusement, or to use as warfare. From Hannibal's mighty elephants to Genghis Khan's swift horses, animals have always been used in warfare to fight, and die, right alongside us. But thanks to science, there have even been military attempts to make weapons out of animals.
Thus, we need to question our assumptions. What are the forces that brought us to this point, and what are the forces that keep us stuck here? If you live your life in a fundamentally unsustainable style, then you're not going to manifest the things we want in your life - no matter what the self-help gurus say.
For example, if you spend more than you earn, you're never going to accumulate wealth - and as a result of government policies to reduce debt, even saving money will not mean you are accumulating wealth. This doesn't mean we shouldn't save, and it doesn't mean we shouldn't spend - it means we should do both, consciously. Similarly, are we conscious of what brought us to this point of ecological disaster, globally?
Some would say, before we can find a solution, we need to know what caused the problem. Many suggest the moment humanity started on its downward trend was when we started a totalitarian agricultural lifestyle, and attached to ourselves the belief that the whole world somehow belonged to solely to us to use as we liked.
In comparison to the hunter/gatherer (or caveman) lifestyle, experts say agriculture depends on (a greater level) of disturbance to the Earth, making it fundamentally unsustainable. Critics claim has fuelled population overgrowth; we grow more food and the population increases, and so we grow more food. It's a race that can't be won.
With the discovery of agriculture, we adapted to grow the food in our way indirectly creating a poor diet for the natural systems inside our bodies (as opposed to our hunter/gatherer ancestors where nature grew our food in its way natural to our bodily systems). The evidence suggests that in all the locations where agriculture first began, in Asia, in the Middle East, in the Americas, early agricultural peoples were not better off than their hunter predecessors. Across all cultures the agricultural people were stunted, with bad teeth (because of a diet high in carbohydrates and sugar).
Agriculture also allowed for permanent settlement (not needing to go where the food source was), which brought with it large wealth and inequity. Experts point to the buildings of non-agricultural societies where the structures were all of similar height, but agricultural societies were distinctive - made distinguishable by a few large master houses attached to granaries with a larger number of smaller houses for the workers - suggesting that this type of inequity began almost immediately with the arrival of agriculture.
As a result, people became more sedentary, had more children, focused on the expansion of stocks and the accumulation of things - giving rise to the culture of cities, civilisations and empires, and their wars. You can see where this argument is going - civilisation is the "evil" that has generated this unsustainable burden on the environment.
In history, civilisation has been defined a way of life characterised by the growth of cities - which is defined as a collection of people in large enough number to require the importation of resources. Some experts call it a human ecosystem that grossly exceeds the carrying capacity of its local environment. And the requirement of resources means getting them from somewhere else, from someone else, by whatever means is necessary.
Often that means as a trade, but that requires transport, and that requires energy, which must come from somewhere, and which will eventually run out. Trade requires willing partners, but people don't always want to trade - and when trade breaks down what remains is war. Oil, which is needed to keep cities running, has often taken the war from the bidding of trade floors to the battlefield. Many critics of America's Middle Eastern policy say this has been the driving force of American foreign politics for the latter half of the last century. Moreover, the growing volume of international trade also helps to spread pests and pathogens at the risk to local plant life.
It tugs uncomfortably at our reasoning mind to blame "civilisation" and label it as "evil" - after all we are stuck with it, and what is the alternative? Simply returning back to a caveman existence is impractical and against evolution itself. We need to continue to improve, but we must do it in ways that do not endanger the future of the planet. Like everything else in our evolutionary history, it has to do with survival.
Take for example our memory - scientists now think that the brain actually never forgets anything. The problem is accessing the information. Unlike the indexed memory access of a computer, it's thought the brain needs an emotional stimulus (smell, visual) to unlock its memory. People think that the reason we are so good at remembering places, locations, stories is survival: how to find a place with food, and then more importantly, how to find the way back home was a necessary skill in the stone age.
Remembering is actually pretty simple when compared to the computing power it takes to coordinate hitting a ball mid air with a bat, but it just shows the power of the brain. Our brains are really all that sets us apart from other species, and they consume a huge amount of energy. Interestingly, some scientists also say that we have a big brain thanks to gluttony, and specifically high fat and high calorie food.
While many criticise our gluttony for getting us into trouble, adherents to the gluttony theory believe that the kind of energy our brain requires could only be provided by fat from animal flesh. Experts believe that it was this diet which kept us going as a brainy species, and we used this increasing brain power mainly to find new, creative ways to eat - i.e., fatty meat contributed to the creation of the first tools, and strengthened tribal bonds. Early humanity built its whole operation around eating.
The theory goes that most of the planet's more intelligent animals are, like humans, essentially scavengers. And not only is a certain amount of intelligence and long-term memory required to remember which foods are a tasty treat (and which are not) and where to find them, but what vaulted humans above and beyond competing animals like rats, to the point that we built the cities and they crawl through our sewers, is that we discovered ways to glutton ourselves on the richest, fattiest foods nature had on offer. We used tools to crack open animal bones and skulls to get to the greasy bone marrow and brains for sustenance, and this early diet, it's argued, boosted our brain power.
Scientists also think that just as remembering serves a purpose, so, too, does forgetting for our survival. Some think that forgetting is important for our mental well being, because remembering everything can be very stressful and distracting. It's also an interesting insight into our learning process.
Once we learn something, the brain tries to put things in auto-pilot mode as soon as possible (e.g., driving a car). This laziness is attributed to the fact that once there, it does not consume a lot of energy, and does not cause distraction to do other tasks. Sometimes people experience that this lack of consciousness as a natural energy saving device of the brain can hinder learning.
The cure to this is to move yourself outside the comfort zone, start trying, and most important of all make sure you are exposed to a direct feedback loop to tell your brain what worked, and what did not. It's about being mindful of your learning, and becoming consciously aware of things.
But what is the point of memorising anything with the advent of abundant digital storage thanks to new technologies? We can become even more lazy, and save more brain energy, and run the risk of losing what we don't use. In such a scenario, some argue that creativity will be future memory. You need to be able to provide sufficient hooks to stick new ideas, new insights to, and to find innovative solutions. And if we want to discover viable alternatives, we have to ask the tough questions, and question those deeply ingrained assumptions we have been programmed with since a very early age.
Although it feels to us that large settlements and agriculture is the natural way for us to live, some experts believe that these basic fundamental changes in our ancient origins helped to create the problems humanity faces today. Palm trees once grew on Antarctica; when forests would preceded us, now deserts dog our heels. Experts say we are closer to ecological breakdown than we have ever been; if we want to save the life of the planet, they say, what we've been doing hasn't been working - so we have to do something else if we want to evolve and survive.
It's easy to see how when our native human intelligence and creativity was combined with the defining impulses of large settlements, we started to progress rapidly. Human beings only truly started to thrive once we developed agriculture, as it allowed us to settle down and start multiplying to a higher degree. Some researchers claim, too, that alcohol consumption also played a large part and without it there's a good chance modern civilisation would never have happened.
This is why when you look back at Sumer - the very first actual civilisation in human history - you find they used half of their grain for beer. Beer was what drew you to city life. While one farmer out on his own could grow enough grain to feed himself and his family, to grow enough grain so that you have excess to brew beer with take a lot of people working together. It was something you just couldn't get as a roaming solitary nomad.
For ancient man, beer was nothing short of a wonderful promise of what civilised human life could be, distilled into liquid form - (some researchers even claim we have a genetic predisposition to low amounts of alcohol) - and although some criticise the negative impact a grain-based diet has had on our health, others tout the benefits of whole food grains eaten as close to the original states.
Previous generations thought agriculture could be the natural process of our evolution - and the cementing of our dominance over the planet. We devoured its resources, battled each other for precedence, and yet we haven't seemed to evolved further than our caveman ancestors.
Some would say we're even more barbaric - and a good deal less healthy. So, we use more and more sophisticated technology to try and put off the inevitable - which is the recognition of our physical limits, and that ultimately we'll have to abide by the laws of nature. Using the powers of technology taught us by science meant we could temporarily break through these limits, laws and rules - but it was these that kept the community of life in balance for millions of years.
Finding new ways to understanding
Science has given us a way of understanding the Earth, in such a way as to enable us to use the planet for our own gain. Some experts say that this use of the planet is the challenge and fatal aspect of science. Science gives us the power, but it doesn't explain how to use that power. And we have wielded its secrets indiscriminately.
We can do great good with science, like we can we greater wealth, but the history of civilisation has been written in blood, not simply for ideologies, but because people have wanted things - wanted to take things.
It's said we have machines that control the weather, but if the conspiracy theorists are to believed, it's used to affect an already disturbed climate to cause destruction. The biggest drive for technological and medical innovation has largely been war; the latest being animal-like robots being designed for covert military operations. But we don't have to enter the realm of science fiction - Albert Einstein's theories could have been used to bring water to the deserts or feed starving millions, but it was used to destroy countless thousands of human beings instead with atomic technologies.
Some would say it's about time we learnt to share the Earth's resources - not just with each other, but all living things - and to realise that we need to unshackle our minds from tribal dogmas, otherwise we're going to find that we haven't ventured far outside of the cave than our hunter ancestors. We've just amassed bigger, and more dangerous, toys - if not used to take things, to push through our own views on truth and morality. If the end is just, then so, too, are the means, we say, even if it's by whatever means are necessary.
But we can no longer claim ownership of morality as a universal constant, when the morality we get out from organised religion is clearly relative - especially when it talks about stoning women and harming children for talking back. Moreover, a system requiring something to be true does not make it true outside of the arbitrary system.
And it is clear that under the illusion we had a carte blanche over the power to control and dominate the planet, we have made a grand mess of things. And this belief on the power to control and dominate our planet is based on some faulty assumptions on the limits of science.
The advancement of science and future technologies have greatly eased and enhanced our way of life. Archaeology has moved to space, while science has begun a love affair with social media, with Flickr helping scientists discover a new species of insect. And Google continues to make significant search announcements, the over-brains behind Google Maps regularly get together with non-profit organisations to make maps that help those groups further their mission and hopefully make the world a more convenient place to live. And surely Google as an employer is the template of a possible (better) future?
The amazing benefits Google workers get has become legendary to say the least. Their top-notch employee benefits, extend far beyond great health coverage and a great work environment (bring your own décor, free gourmet food, product give-aways), which also includes cutting edge benefits for their LGBT employees and partners. It's reported that Google even gives death benefits to its highly regarded employees.
In an interview with Forbes, Google's Chief People Officer Laszlo Bock revealed this never-before-heard-of perk of working for the search giant: If you are a Google employee and happen to meet your end, your spouse or domestic partner will continue to receive 50% of your salary for an entire decade. Not only that, but there's no tenure requirement to be eligible for this perk. It doesn't matter how long you've been working for the company, you'll receive the same death benefit as everyone else. That's a big commitment to Google's 34,000-odd employees.
Thus, here is a good example of how innovation should be a template for how all employers treat their workers in the future. It's a utopia, agreed, but Google has shown it is possible. Likewise, we shouldn't discard civilisation, or our cities, or our gadgets for the progress we have made in our current evolution. We just have to change our assumptions about them - and so re-imagine them in a way that is also eco-conscious. But there are those who are calling for us to reject technological advancements altogether, and to revert back to a more simple way of living.
Despite the general consensus that technologies themselves are neutral - i.e., it all depends on how we use them, they can be used for good or ill depending on the intelligence of the user to exploit bugs in the system - there are some that believe that certain technologies have inherent positive and negative capabilities. Adherents to this Luddite-like theory that claims some technology is inherently "evil", cite that, while nations are not using solar panelled warheads, neither are people putting nuclear panels on their roofs to heat their water.
But isn't that over simplifying things? Nuclear technology can generate clean energy for our homes, it was human minds that decided to attach to to warheads. And solar energy is just as suitable for laser type weapons that can burn, and kill. What is true, however, is that an over-proliferation of gadgetry may not be so good for our health. For instance, many believe that wireless gadgets and smartphones, and electromagnetic waves, have a negative impact on our brains and our bodies - and can even affect gene expression.
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| Electromagnetic waves from a phone's antenna can penetrate the brain several centimetres deep. Paul Wootton/Popsci |
To challenge another assumption: The crisis is not one of technology, but of meaning and purpose. You can't survive in the long run if you don't follow the laws of life. In this sense, as we settled into agriculture and civilisation, we fenced ourselves off from the world. Everything inside the fence became everything we needed to survive, while everything outside the fence became threatening and wild. We believed there was no limit to the power science had given us to control the destiny of the planet - when what we were really doing was affecting our own destiny within it.
Building fences, first of wood, brick and stone to advance to erecting technological fences, meant a disconnection from the world, from other people and other creatures. This helped alter our relationships - where they become a relationship based on "use". We forged relationships based on what we could get from the other - in terms of trade, or status, or things. And in strengthening these advantageous ties, we ended up devouring the planet. Now, critics say that the planet Earth is telling us "you used me".
Adherents to the theory that the human footprint on the Earth is the cause for most of the climate change, believe that human beings can either integrate themselves with the ecosystem, or we can act as an invasive species - as we have been doing for the past few centuries. Thanks to our growing intellect into higher faculties, humans may have superiority over every animal life, but with that comes a greater responsibility to uphold the equality of every living thing, no matter how great or small. If we don't, the paradigm of superiority means the enslavement of someone - and one day, that could be us.
It seems that we have forgotten who we are, and that three million years of human existence before us has been rendered meaningless - when we could re-learn a lot from the primitive wisdom of the ancients about our relationship with nature. Thus it strikes some as critical that we must remember who we really are. We have these great brains, with their great capacity for innovation and adaptation, but we have become trapped inside false assumptions that block and dumb our brains, like the electromagnetic waves with which our wireless technologies fill the very air we breathe. But it doesn't have to be this way.
Reconnect and find your balance
We can learn to work in synergy with the technologies of today, and with the needs of nature, to bring back much needed equilibrium into our lives. What, you ask, is synergy? The word comes from the Greek "sunergia" - the interaction of two or more cooperative agents or forces in a way that makes their combined effect greater than the sum of their individual effects.
Obviously our society is wired in such a way that it would be impractical to completely avoid using smartphones or being hooked up to the internet, for example, but we can start with small, practical steps. We can limit our time with gadgets, lessen our dependency upon them, and put them on emergency mode only when we take a much needed vacation.
We can also make use of our time to reconnect with ourselves, and with others, and with the world around us. Invariably when we take time out, we feel ourselves lighten - which demonstrates how our being requires a complete overhaul, climbing out of the cluttered reality of life into the beautiful world of the spirit. It is time to unclog our minds from assumptions, and unplug our brains from 24/7 technologies that act as a barrier to real human interaction.
Connections that happen not through a screen, but in the physical world is what will help us regain balance - because humans need physical connection. Screen time can also take you away from yourself, but once you reconnect with yourself and tap into your own unique frequency, then you'll be able to begin to understand why your life is manifesting so differently than you visualise. You'll discover how to remove the roadblocks in your way, and make it a joy to create your ideal life. And one of the keys to turning your personal and financial situation comes through this process of discarding assumptions.
You have the power to create your life, but you will need to go through a process of "clearing out" old opinions and beliefs. This process makes you ready to accept the full abundance available to you. And the biggest change will come when you focused on clearing out DOUBT. Doubt creeps in and sabotages your ability to attract by filling your mind with conflicting thoughts. It's believed that your signals to the universe are "intercepted" and squashed by your doubts.
Even when you know what to do, and even if you have great passion, there are many ways you can unconsciously sabotage yourself. You may quit if you have a setback. You may procrastinate. You may unconsciously make bad decisions, or attract people who take you off-track, instead of attracting people who will help you. You may have beliefs about success, yourself, other people, money - or something else that unconsciously sabotage you.
It's not surprising if in this current climate of uncertainty we are filled with more than a little doubt. Turning your mindset towards positive thought that leads to positive, inspired action and strong affirmations will help you let go of old assumptions and your doubt. When the doubt is gone, the changes come fast. And with the world in the state it's in, we are ready for changes to happen NOW.
Bounce back with affirmations.
Another solution for self-sabotage, to help calm internal battles which so often mimic the battles raging out in the wider world, is meditation. It's a powerful way to get rid of these unconscious, self-sabotaging demons. Meditation might be hard for some, but it is an elegant solution, and with practise you can make it an integral part of your life. Replace a few moments of gadget time to devote to yourself. Meditation gives you the awareness to see what you're doing to sabotage yourself (plus, other huge mental, emotional, and physical benefits).
Read about the power of meditation.
Scientific studies show that meditation is one of the best things you can do for your brain. It improves mental health and resolves emotional problems, ends self-sabotage, increases will power, ends procrastination, dramatically lowers stress, improves physical health and increases longevity and is believed to increase happiness, inner peace, and the ability to succeed.
Some hold fast to the assumption that meditation is difficult to learn. Or that it's often boring, or that it takes a long time to master. It could take a while or more before you begin getting the benefits, and so most people quit long before that point. But if you're one of the 98% of people that Hill spoke about, then occurrences where you seem to be your own worst enemy is probably already happening to you. (And, this is why, critics say, the famous "Law of Attraction" often doesn't seem to work.)
Meditation also focuses you to step into the "now", instantly dissolves negativity and raises your vibration levels, which it's believed aids you to only attract what you desire most. With meditation you put your mind in the moment, to enter a state where the past and the future didn't exist. In the moment, there ARE no problems. Your energy and emotions turn universally positive, and you connect with your "infinite attraction point".
When you are in the "now" everything you manifest is automatically aligned with your desires. As you practise meditation, you'll discover it becomes as natural as breathing. To get all the benefits of meditation quickly and easily, I designed a 90 day mind healing programme for myself (which I use alongside modern technology). As my readers know, studying success in relationships, and how our minds work, is one of my passions in life. Since my journey begun I have read, listened to, and studied countless books and information on my interests.
I have also written an amount designed at show people their possible potential, and from my experience, meditation works. If you'd like to use meditation to get rid of unconscious sabotage so you can reach your goals, or just want to create mental peace and clarity of mind to help you deal with the world around you, then try it today. It won't cost you anything, but your time.
So many of us sell our services to others, we feel like we've taken a mortgage out on our lives, but nobody wants debt, bills, stress, a job that leaves you unfulfilled (or perhaps no job at all) - lives marred by strained relationships, a lack of passion or creativity. But most people spend a lot of time THINKING about them. And if we are to believe the law of attraction - what you think about, you attract. So the theory goes, if you look around and see a lot of what you don't want in your life, you're experiencing "negative attraction". If your desires haven't manifested for you yet (or it's happening slower than you want) it's believe to be because of negative attraction.
This, too, is indicative of our society: When you spend a lot of time thinking about your problems, you don't solve them, you attract more of them. When you spend time thinking about solutions, then you'll discover that solutions will be ready to present themselves. The law of attraction (combined with inspired action) makes it possible for you to turn things around, to find love, to lose weight, to attract abundance, to create a new life rich beyond imagining - no matter where you are now.
So, how do you stop thinking about your problems and start attracting your desires? The answer in part is to remove limiting beliefs that have been subconsciously programmed into us as children.
Human childhoods are unique in that we're born with a massive brain and active vestigial bodies, that grow slowly and don't really change significantly until puberty. While most animals put all their energy towards quickly growing adult-like bodies, we instead spend our early years strengthening the pathways in our brains and absorbing information.
Our species' unique ability to pass information and knowledge from one generation to the next is due to the fact that humans essentially spend 20 years (or more) in the nest before being asked to function as an adult - an absurdly long time in the animal kingdom. If your mind is focused on your problems, on what's not working - if you spend time feeling bad about yourself, about your life, angry towards others, then what you'll attract will be in alignment with those thoughts and feelings.
Click here to rewire your mindset for success!
It could handicap your manifesting exercises without realising it, or you could be trying too hard to make it happen. The secrets to vibrational alignment and the true to key to getting what you want, as well as the crucial ingredient to manifesting success, is to be positive, and act-to-become. Acting to become is said to be very effective for change, and a method known to the ancients. The theory goes if you want to be wealthy, then act as of you are. Acknowledge your financial worries, but don't let them consume - push your energies towards solutions, instead. This is the real "secret sauce" that will actually change your brain's neural pathways - and thus changing your life along with them.
Meditations and affirmations for change are not "old-school" as some self-help gurus will claim, as they promise new products and different ways of selling the same system - which they say failed you in the first place - for whatever reason. And if we listened to our intuition, we'd know that the problem is these self-help gurus lie with the truth. Look in the mirror everyday if you need a quick reminder of how powerful you really are in shaping you own destiny. It is down to us.
The only key ingredient you need, the only revolutionary tool for living your ideal is not another product that will cause disillusionment, but a positive mindset, and the motivation to take action.Whether this be with the use of vision boards or music, the only way to have and do these things is to first believe they are possible thereby setting in motion the universal laws that will turn these dreams into reality.
The law of attraction experts as well as people who have achieved their goals and dreams using conscious energetic principles all agree on one thing: Visualization is the most important practice for reprogramming your subconscious mind to actually believe your dreams are possible. Revolutionise your life and reprogram your subconscious mind through the maximum potency practice of conscious visualisation. When you visualise, then you materialise. If you've been there in the mind, you'll go there in the body, they say.
I say that all this may help you achieve your goals, but you must first tune in to the unique frequency of YOUR life. You need to discover your passions first, before you can really know what you want. Sometimes understanding takes time - and some experts believe that we shouldn't be so hooked on trying to integrate and understand it all the first time through. They suggest to initially let the calming effect of meditation and realignment wash over you. Let yourself feel it. If it's going to work, it will work - and then understanding will come. For some of us it may work the other way, too, do what works best for you.
When we have a clear assessment of where we are, and a clear vision of where we want to go, a powerful creative intention arises. If you lack this in your life (as our society seems to currently lack) then it means you have neither - and with a mindset of subservience/domination you're not likely to get it.
Acting out of a belief of superiority, entitlement, and invincibility - as every narcissist knows - can be addictive. Addiction means continually seeking more of what it is we don't really want. And therefore the addiction never fully satisfies. Such feelings are cocaine; they make you feel like you can conquer the world. Yet such feelings can bounce back on you to leave you feeling down.
Our human bodies are formed by the Earth, and want and require a real relationship to the world, to the water wind and soil, to the animals, plants and fellow humans that comprise the community into which we were born. Without it we cannot ground ourselves in the beauty of life. We won't respect its sacredness. Some experts believe this dissociation can be seen in the rise of mental illness - the fragmentation in the world today is said to be mirrored in these severe psychological disorders. In many cases psychosis represents the final stage in a downward spiral of alienation and rejection. The first signs of schizophrenia are often apparent during the teenage years, as are eating disorders, and self harm issues are also rising amongst the young.
It seldom appears in well-balanced teenagers with a good diet, not into drugs, with a stable family background and plenty of friends. It begins when our parents place us in front of mesmerising TV screens as a quick fix to keep us quiet; when electronic instruments babysit us we learn to ignore the ache of real connection. And it is as children that we are trained by television for a more disconnected lifestyle. Conspiracy theorists claim the images on the screen are flickered at a certain rate, and that our brainwaves change when we watch the small screen. It's believed that from a beta (alert) state, our brains are hypnotised into an alpha (more suggestible) state - creating a "mind fog" that brings us into a dreamlike state.
Some also suggest that television and motion pictures can influence our thinking with subliminal images, and fill us with incorrect information, because too often we treat the drama we see as reality. As with July's Denver shootings during a Batman movie - where it turned out the killer owned a Batman mask and called himself after one of the villains in the film - an increase of such shootings seems to tie in with the rise of mental illness, where it becomes more difficult to separate fact from fiction. The rising problems in mental health and the surge of such motion pictures seems to be a cocktail bomb waiting to explode. But are the increasing number of problematic young adults just misfits, with the inability or unwillingness to live sanely amongst their fellow human beings?
Others will suggest that it's not violent movies that trigger massacres, because what we see on the screen can't influence people to do anything, and yet we see this cycle play itself out (especially in America where entertainment media has a strong hold) again and again. We involve ourselves in the private lives of celebrities too much, get distracted by distorting dramas too often, live vicariously through our TVs while ignoring our real lives to our detriment and to the detriment of others.
Read about the fear on our screens.
Consider this: After Steven Spielberg's Jaws was released, we nearly drove sharks to extinction with feverish hunting, to the point that their populations may never recover. They call it the "Jaws" effect. Every single person who watched the film knew that it was fiction, and that those characters were just actors. They probably knew that, in real life, there isn't a shark big enough to eat your boat. But, when the scientist character in the film agreed that killing the shark was the only way to prevent dead tourists, we assumed that part was true - and came to believe that the only good sharks were dead ones.
Although some might say that was in the 70s, and we are more enlightened now, this type of effect is not a one-off. After Top Gun, Navy aviator recruitment sky-rocketed by as much as 500 percent, the number of kids taking martial arts classes exploded after The Karate Kid, the popularity of the CSI TV shows has resulted in a glut of students going into forensic sciences. Even science fiction films have nothing to do with the science, they're getting at us through the fiction. Now imagine what more negative films may have done - and can do. How many have been left feeling they want to hit someone after watching a particularly violent film, or depressed after a downbeat drama?
Naturally there are many more examples where this influence doesn't materialise, but it doesn't mean we can ignoring all of the ones where it does - it's actually all the more surprising it does happen, because a violent movie is working against a lifetime of society pounding the opposite messages into your brain.
However, some say the point isn't to pin violence on movies - it's about the power of the story. It's a fundamental part of how human culture came about. We used to tell them around camp-fires before written language even existed, handing down folk tales from one generation to another. All fiction is based on some truth. They were created as a way to teach you how to behave. In the retelling the story gets added to and embroidered upon so that the word "myth" these days comes to mean "a lie that needs to be debunked", but in ancient tribal times, oral traditional myths were created as more efficient versions of the "truth". You remember something better and you're more interested when the information that needs to be past down to the next generation is wrapped in a story. This is why stories were invented, so it's said, to shape your brain in a certain way.
Nowadays, myths don't help the "truth" to survive, they perpetuate different agendas. These are the agendas of the writer, or the film companies. It doesn't mean they are necessarily intentional or conspiratorial - some are the tricks of the writing fiction trade to make you feel a certain way for a character (ever wondered why most superheroes are orphans?) - they could just be techniques to push our emotional buttons so we root for the main protagonist.
Some stories will also be inherently racist; such criticism has been directed as J. R. R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings as directed by Peter Jackson (where the characters are good or bad according to their race - hobbits are good, orcs are bad). This is a valid point, but it's also unfair, because Tolkien clearly didn't sit down to push an agenda of racism in the world in order to firmly establish white dominance (i.e., the master race of the elves). He was just writing what he knew. This isn't about conspiracy theories, it's just the way the medium of stories work. One way to render it harmless is to be informed about it, and be conscious of it when watching television drama and films. Covert propaganda doesn't work if you know it is propaganda you're being subjected to (unless it speaks to your own beliefs).
Still, being raised and educated in a pop culture means that fictional stories shape our world. The legends of gods once told around flickering fires, are now the superheroes we see on the flickering screen. Our brains are built to try to process everything we see as a story. We want all of our information packaged this way (what we mostly, and wrongly know about the law will usually come from the dramatic license used cop shows) - it's the way data has been fed to us for the last thousand generations, it's how you've been absorbing it since the first time your parents read you a bedtime story (or sat you in front of a screen). And every story needs to have two elements: a defined set of good guys and bad guys, and a neat structure with a beginning, middle and end.
But life isn't like that. When we fight a war it might be easy to demonise one side against the other, but how about the war against disease? Cancer doesn't have any of that - there's no one person we can blame for cancer, and "winning the war" against it is actually a series of tiny incremental advancements that may never result in "victory". Global warming is even worse, because there it looks like the villain is us.
So as a society, our entire process for figuring out and solving problems involves clumsily trying to make a story out of them. When we follow a complicated subject like politics, we need that distinct hero and villain, so we'll ignore the shortcomings of our party and amplify the flaws of the opposition, to make them fit that image we have from the story in our brains. When we hear about a war, it's almost impossible to think of it in terms of multiple factions all acting in self-interest - we need one side we can root for, usually under the guise of the underdog young rebels overthrowing the evil old empire (i.e., America's War of Independence).
That's why, some experts say, we're still trying to figure out who "caused" the economic collapse - we search through a cabal of conspiracies, rather than accept the much more plausible reality that a flawed system with millions of investors and consumers broke down because of a steadfast refusal to think five minutes into the future. Look at the last few wars again - we can't get past the idea that terrorism will end if we just kill the bad guys. Why? Because that's the way it works in the movies. In Star Wars, when the Emperor died, all evil died with him - it's the same in Tolkien's magnum opus, the Ring trilogy.
You can find this in your personal life, too. If something goes wrong at the office, somebody has to get blamed. When you take on some personal project (a new job, losing weight), you expect the same three-act structure that you'd see in a movie (see problem, take it on, experience your darkest moment, eventually triumph), and you get depressed when it doesn't happen (that "triumph" part often never shows up). Why are people always so obsessed with the apocalypse? Because every story has an ending, and the idea that the human "story" can just drag on forever, aimlessly, never progressing toward any particular goal, is just unimaginable. We can't process it. Some even say that with our irresponsible actions towards nature, we are subconsciously aiming for it - similar to how we self-sabotage our own lives.
And our expectations of what these real world stories look like, and how they should play out, are programmed into us by pop culture. But, movies matter. TV shows matter. Novels matter. They shape the lens through which you see the world. We need to be consciously aware that they do matter, that they can influence us and push our buttons, because ignorance is what makes it so dangerous.
We watch movies for escapism, so we can turn off our brain and let our guard down. But while our guard is down, we're letting those images plug directly into that part of your brain that creates your mythology. It's just something to keep in mind, that, if you think about it, it's an awesome responsibility on the part of the storyteller.
And looking at the other side of the coin, some of these storytellers respect that responsibility, which have resulted in some great films, with inspirational messages. Often you hear the adage, "It is just a film". Well, now we know that isn't exactly true, but on rarest of rare occasions, like a great piece literature, painting, poetry, or speech, a film has the capacity to change the way you feel and think for the better and consciously. It opens your eyes.
It's the biggest compliment anyone can pay to a film. For example, the motion picture Requiem for a Dream is not only a shocking record of drug addiction, but touches upon the individual's relationship with television viewing - where one of the lead female characters is fascinated with an infomercial for a weight loss programme. But for me personally, on a positive note, I rank Groundhog Day as one of the movies that has the capacity to change an individual - for the better.
One of the absolute great films of the 90s, but more than just a film for me - at first glance, it's not what you would expect from a life-changing piece of film. It's a comedy, with one of the best performances ever by Bill Murray. The plot revolves around Murray, a weather man who he discovers that he is reliving the same day over and over again. First he uses this to his advantage, then comes the realisation that he is doomed to spend the rest of eternity in the same place, seeing the same people do the same thing every day.
It's casual comedic tone can deceive, but it's a film with a strong philosophical undertone. This is a quality that separates the film from rest of the movies with similar intent. It tells you what it intends to on your terms. It deals with the questions that bother us for a better part of our lives i.e. meaning of life, purpose of life, existentialism, death, god - but never preaches, nor propels any propaganda. The agenda is you.
The great thing about Groundhog Day is that it's endlessly rewatchable - it only gets better every time you see it. Part of the reason is that it's completely open to interpretation; numerous essays have been written about the meaning of the film, and some Buddhists have adopted it as a modern symbol of their religion.
Part of what makes it great is that the film doesn't bother with why he's trapped in this endless loop of the same 24 hours. It doesn't matter; what matters is that this one man gets what many of us wish we had - endless chances to fix his mistakes. And when he finally figures out what he's doing wrong, the loop stops.
And by the end of it, you know that something has changed, something you didn't see coming has happened. And then you watch it again only to realise the moment of epiphany that eluded you the first time. Every time I am down, or losing perspective this is the film that eases everything and makes me ask a simple question, "What is important?".
In addition, it would be unfair to claim there are no positive images or role models on the small screen, either. A prime example is the late 80s and 90s American sitcom The Cosby Show. With its all black cast, it was the most-watched family show in the country for four years our of its seven year run, which meant it broke through segregation to air in the homes of middle America.
Although many praise it for showing positive images of black people at a time when there was still apartheid in South Africa (where it was just as popular), a large amount of people also criticise it for not dealing with racism - and portraying an unreal world - giving the racists an excuse to believe that racism against black people did not exist, they just didn't work hard enough. But Bill Cosby and his costar, Phylicia Rashad, are models of success in show business comedy, not, as are their husband and wife characters in show, in medicine or law.
Treating the details of its fiction as evidence about the world, although is symptomatic of its success as a realist text, is actually a misrepresentation of the real world of its day. Notwithstanding that the show may have presented blacks with dignity, there was very little connection between the social status of black Americans and the fabricated images of black people that Americans consumed each week on The Cosby Show and what was happening on the streets of America.
Case in point, the series finale aired during the race-related 1992 Los Angeles riots, with Cosby quoted in media at the time pleading for peace, for people to stop rioting and watch the show instead. Some even argue that the audience identification with the show's idealised world could even have been the cause of more racism, because it didn't educate, it just entertained - it was escapism from the problems of the real world. Yet Americans in the 90s seemed all too willing to take The Cosby Show and its wealthy characters as one sign among many that racism had declined. Such was the power of television drama to help impregnate a more subtle kind of racism.
Even Google, whose public image is one of a great and tolerant benefactor, has been accused of such subtle racism during the Olympic Games due to its themed Doodles. Google has committed themselves to providing us with a new Olympic-themed Doodle every day during the games, but it was the first Doodle, the hurdling one, that sparked a controversy. It drew claims of subtle racism from people on social media who said that the black athlete was running on a surface that too closely resembled a watermelon.
The watermelon stereotype is the White American belief that it is one of the foods black people like best. The stereotype goes back at least 200 years to slave times. It amazes me how we can take a seemingly innocent, harmless difference (with no statistical basis), such as liking watermelon – what in the world is wrong with liking watermelon? – and use it to put down black people and laugh at them, to make them seem like mindless creatures.
But whether or not you believe that Google's Doodle was an intentional joke, a coincidence that was blown out of proportion, or an example of an eager public waiting to jump on anything (no matter how far-fetched), there's no denying that these (and other) technological fixes do work, however temporarily, we will rarely question our dependence on them or how they affect us. After all, an alcoholic doesn't stop, a drug user doesn't stop - until a point is reached where it doesn't work any more. However, by then it is too late. With personality disorders on the rise in cities we have built up like cages wired to security cams, traumatised by disconnection and abuse, minds raised in captivity become so institutionalised that few of can see the prison bars. But all know their cell numbers. We don't know where we are, or where we're going, but we see the world spinning by, and we know our number is up.
It's the alienation - so alien to human nature - that has become a concrete block on our feet and minds, restricting action and thought - and hope - to keep us as animals in a cage. But are we really in such a dire straits, that there is nothing left to do, but pad our cells and make our prisons as comfortable as possible as we watch for the end? Or is this just the assumption of a victim mentality?
Likewise for victims who stay in abusive relationships; they stay because of their negative programming, the assumptions they are shackled to, hold them tight. It is all they know, and they assume there is no escape. They identify more as a victim than a person. Some harsher critics of today's society would take the analogy further; society itself has become an abusive relationship. And everything set up in an abusive relationship is set up to protect the abuser, and by the same token, everything within our culture of greed is set up to protect the rich and those born with status. Some have criticised the London Olympics for having created "road lanes for the rich".
Athletes have missed their events at past Olympics, but not this year: London has designated special lanes in the city not just for athletes, but for Olympics officials, people working for sponsoring companies and, so it's said, anyone else rich enough to buy their way in. Even ambulances have not been allowed access to the VIP lanes - which have given rise to jams and infuriated some drivers in London, have been branded "Zil lanes". The nickname comes from the infamous traffic lanes in Moscow reserved for the most senior officials of the Soviet Union travelling in their black Zil limousines.
Fundamentally, our culture is unfair. Passion, focus and persistence will make anything happen, and no one said it isn't hard. The unfair reality is that is it often harder for women, because we live in a patriarchal society. There is a widespread belief - based on myth rather than evidence - that women are naturally better at parenthood, which gives men a licence to focus on their work and women a licence to give it up. In England, even childcare arrangements are skewed between the sexes so that it makes sense economically and socially for the man to keep working and the woman not.
Women are judged much more on their looks rather than their brains, turning them into ornaments who are not taken seriously. These stereotypes are rife among men and women, locking people into roles that they believe are expected of them, preventing them from pursuing their potentials as individuals.
Due to the hierarchy nature of our societies, we come to believe that all relationships are based on hierarchy and power, rather than seeing them as mutual relationships. Olympic rowers have the right idea. There is no podium when the rowers get their medals, and gold, silver and bronze medallists all stand on the level ground. It comes from a long standing core value in rowing that rowers have tremendous respect for their competitors, but it's also practical, too. Sometimes with as many as 27 rowers in a team, you can't get them all on a podium. But all practicalities aside, if rather than enter into mutual relationships with the other living things on the planet, we treat them as resources to be exploited, then it shouldn't come as a surprise when we see each other as such. And if we identify more with material things, rather than living things, how can we call that advancement?
Tap in to your own unique frequency
“Be bold and mighty forces will come to your aid.”
— Basil King
Some experts believe we have lost a whole range of human understanding. Before there ever was science, humans understood the universe and how to relate to it - which was thrown off base when science gave us the power to interfere with the universe. We have to understand that we are part of the living community, not masters of the living community, we are just another species with the power to destroy that community. When we decide to use it arbitrarily - we destroy ourselves. If we don't figure out what our place in the universe is, we won't have a place in the universe.
It's time to be both open and humble. There are huge forces at work in the world, both seen and unseen, it's time to ask for help, ask the ancestors, ask the gods, ask your God, your inner voice - and then listen for a response. Listen to the voices of soil and stone, skin and soul - the world will tells us what it knows, if only we will be still and listen. What adds value to your life? What does a life well lived look like? We need to look at what it is we really want, and see if the society we've created is giving us that - and if it's not, then we must ask what might give us that.
Meditate on your life and then speak - show up in your own life and be bold; it's time to act with great intention - join with like-minded people, craft connections, inspire minds, share skills, move from agriculture to permaculture and grow your own food (if you wish), rescue and preserve a piece of land, and learn about medicinal herbs. Find your passion and do it - it's time.
It's time to talk about the world's situation; we're all in this together - we are not alone. We can rebuild with conscious intent an alternative to extinction, we humans once knew how to live on this planet and the good news is that some of us still do. It can be done. The truth is not always easy, or safe - sometimes it lies right outside our comfort zones, and we have to smash the bubbles we have cocooned ourselves in to reach it.
Denial takes tremendous energy, and if you have to work really hard not to acknowledge your unhappiness, you're not going to have the power to do anything else, let alone look deeply into the situation of your life and the world. Wouldn't you prefer to channel your feelings into a more positive direction? There is too much negativity in this world - and we can start to change things just a tiny bit by starting with ourselves.
We can preserve the primitive wisdom of the past and merge it with our own to safeguard the life of the world, of a future, whose blank pages might be pressed by a greater destiny, but on which we will write. We have a choice of what words to use, a choice of how we write the future. It's our choice as to how we face the challenge. We can meet it with consciousness integrity and a sense of purpose that is our birthright. A mature member of the community of life, standing tall, standing unified, doing our best to protect and serve this world which we love.
All challenges are difficult. One does not discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time. And it's difficult to change even with this knowledge, because the historical forces mentioned are still in play, and because we live in economies that continue to feed off growth. Sometimes it can feel as though we must grow or die - which is a catch-22 situation when you live on an elliptical planet with finite resources. There's only so much stuff you can chew and spit out.
Moreover, if we're assaulted by a corporately controlled media that keep us from thinking things, and simply wanting things, then we're never going to continue to spit and chew. People tend to think they have a choice about what information they take from television, but it's almost science fiction in its implications - because the images that are feed through the tubes into our brains daily don't come out. And as people's real lives become more and more unsatisfying, then the appeal of the glorified images on the screen become all the more powerful. Again this doesn't mean we should ignore television - it means we should watch it consciously.
Question what you see; question your own assumptions. It was once said that rational people will go quietly and meekly into a gas chamber if only you allow them to believe it's a bathroom. And when educational establishments numb our critical thinking skills instead of developing them, then we are like lambs to the slaughter pulled towards a future no government is able to clearly define, if they are too busy trying to hold back the inevitable for as long as they can.
But living in such a bubble causes even more disconnection from the real world of animals, plants and water and natural resources that produces everything with any meaning in this planet. In such a way are the seeds sown for a future generation that won't have human communities that connect and deal with each other directly. The more technologically advanced our cities become, the more opportunity for people to become merely interchangeable parts of some big machine - where you can pull one person out, and stick another person in their place.
But if it is so bad, why then do find it so hard to change our lifestyles? The experts say that people disconnected from what they most need - i.e., human interaction - and as life becomes a conveyor belt, where everything comes to our doorstep - we become more infantile. Since we changed our relationship with the land, and the way in which we distribute resources, we have allowed our characteristics and potential to be mediated by the larger society, and the hierarchies of our civilisations. We are less and less able to think for ourselves, to provide for ourselves, and we develop more of a herd mentality, where we would rather take our cues from self-help gurus and authority figures around us - rather than figure things out for ourselves.
When your food comes from supermarkets that ship food from thousands of miles away, and your water comes straight out from the tap, you will defend the system that brings them to you (even if built on institutions of domination) because the assumption is you life depends on it - and you don't think of the consequences. But people who think this way are wholly disconnected from the real world, people who have forgotten who they once were. If everything we see, hear, feel, smell and taste is mediated by other humans and machines, it affects our consciousness, and can gives us an inflated (or deflated) sense of our own importance. It skews our perceptions. It always reminds me of those obese people in the future animation Wall-E, where all they do is sit back in their spaceship, completely without purpose wandering aimlessly in space, and waiting for the waste-collecting robots they've built to clean up the Earth.
Those of us who live in the real world, however, know that we can't leave our mess for someone else to clear up. We have to clean up after ourselves, and in doing so, inspire others that the planet as worth saving. Any solution will have to be written together - each doing their bit, with the rest of the community of life - on the pages of the living world.
We all have a part to play in the wider community of life. What matters is life itself - and the greatest thing about life is not having a purpose, its finding a purpose. You don't have to be a fantastical superhero to save the world, you just have to be a part of it. The same thing is applicable if you want to instigate change in your life.
You have to be connected to reality. So, too, if you are searching for a real relationship, isolation is not the answer; you need to have contact with others if you want to find the love of your life. By grounding yourself in reality, and in the "now" you are tapping into your unique frequency. You don't exist in the past, or the future, you must consciously exist in your present to be able to affect your future.
Our lifestyle is unsustainable, and experts say the consequences of breaking the fundamental laws of life are now apparent. Will we allow our dominant culture in its present state, built on a foundation of faulty assumptions, continue on until it destroys everything? Or can it be reformed? Or should it be discarded completely so something new can form in its place? There is a Chinese proverb that goes something like, if we don't change our direction, we are likely to wind up where we're headed. No one can hold back the future - it's coming whether we like it or not, all we can do is seek to change it.
Humans have a history with living much more in touch with the natural world, with the planet - that's much more sustainable, spiritual, much more unified - and that's who we really are. It's a more mature mindset of our interdependence with and responsibility to the community of life at large. Stepping into this culture of maturity we will take our rightful place in the community of life. And we will fall back in love with the world. We can do this, but only if we choose to.
This time of collapse is an opportunity to come back to ourselves, and to show maturity in a crisis. To do so, it's suggested that the adolescent arrogance of invincibility and entitlement and belief of superiority over all living things must be replaced with the primitive wisdom of the ancients in regard to the nature. We will need to question our deepest and most fundamental assumptions, and that will require we to close the book on our current world view and step into a new story.
There are many ways our culture must change. But ultimately, it is the change from within us - our courage to be true to ourselves and follow our primary priorities and passions - that will drive progress. If having it all is realising our passions and having self-belief, then for change to come we must first change our minds.
And there is a new change in the air - a turning away from domination and turning toward a culture that is life sustaining and life renewing. Will we be successful? Who knows whether it will ultimately be a story told by our descendants looking back on this present time as a warning of excess, or whether we will walk as heroes in the history pages of the unborn? Will we be reviled for our destructive ways, or will we be lovingly remembered as the generation that managed to turn the tide at the eleventh hour in a wounded episode in human existence?
And as we attempt to wrap the bandages, will our descendants say that this was the moment where we stepped back from the abyss, and found a way to live in harmony with the Earth's community of living souls? Our descendants are watching us. It's time to be thoughtful, to come closer together to study the world's situation for solutions. It is up to us. It may not ultimately be enough, but we get to choose which path we take.
We get to choose - who are we going to be? Are we simply consumers and shoppers? Does our identity lie in Nielsen numbers and box office receipts and the latest domestic product? Are we on this Earth to sell cheap things to each other, yell at our children to keep quiet as they watch television, while we speed around in cars and fall asleep in front of the tube?
Of course not - we humans are much more than the sum of simple materials. Some would say denying the connection and meaning that nourishes us means we've grown short and stunted in this shallow soil of consumerism. But if that is true, now is the time to revitalise and ground our being.
Choose your own adventure, but choose. Feel your feelings. Our feelings are the swiftest path back to our forgotten selves. The entire community of life on the planet is being threatened - where will you take your stand? Over the past few weeks of the Olympic Games, we have seen triumph and heartbreak - and a generosity of spirit - on a daily basis, as athletes struggle to achieve their dream of a medal under global scrutiny. And those who put themselves out there know all too well that there will come a day when the risk to remain tight in a bud will be more painful that the risk it takes to blossom. Draw a line in the ground and stand firm - drive your picket pen and say enough is enough, and I'm not going to retreat any more. Go for gold in your life, and shine in the world. Be part of it.
We need to understand that the grandeur of the human is not in controlling Earth, but in being integral with the Earth. It's a simple concept - one the peoples indigenous to the Americas believed: If you spit on the Mother Earth, you spit on yourself. Thus it's time to lay down our weapons in this insane war against the world. we need to surrender control of the world and move back into a mutual relationship with it.
In place of growth in resources, we can attain unlimited growth in relationship and experience, in self-awareness and spirit, in love in community and connection, growth in purpose and meaning, growth in vision. We'll be more connected to more power than we ever dreamt possible in any fetish over domination - power with not power over our planet.
And when we step back into the community of life, we will find out what has always been true - all of life is on our side, on the same frequency as us, tuned in to the one power that seems to transcend space and time, life and death. It is a deeply human power which holds us safe and together when all other forces seem to combine to tear us apart. We call it the power of love.
Yours in love,
