The Global Conversation

Tag: evolution

  • Societal ills

     “No persons do anything inappropriate, given their model of the world.”

    It is not difficult for any of us to look around and find something we deem wrong with our fellow travelers’ behaviors and beliefs.  Our mind many times cannot wrap itself around the inhumane things people say and do.  Thankfully, this says a whole lot about us — we are getting there.

    Where is it we getting to?  I would like to think that at some point each of us will be more concerned with how the Whole was doing rather than how the Self was doing.  I do think that with each visible transgression we humans perpetrate on each other, more and more people decide to become willing to choose compassion over aggression.

    With the social media era in full swing, we now are exposed to worldly events the instant they happen.  We have multiple sources covering every angle of every story, and the funny thing is, we all interpret these events differently.  This should clearly show us that there is no such thing as Ultimate Reality here in the physical world.  Understanding this great truth should free us to more easily accept those who do not agree with our point of view.

    “Ours is not a better way, ours is merely another way.”

    On September 11th, 2001, many of us here in the U.S. were faced with an extreme contrast to our way of life.  We witnessed the inhumanity of man on our own soil.  Fear, sorrow, anguish, and suffering were felt across this land as well as abroad.  But at the same time, empathy and compassion were expressed as never before.  Many people were shocked out of complacency and stepped right into a state of being most of us do not experience in life: unselfish, unconditional love.

    With the yearly anniversary remembrance behind us, my thoughts have moved to some of the other societal ills that plague man.  These are, of course, my opinion of what “ills” are.

    In the light of recent events in Syria, I have determined that as a collective majority we are fairly comfortable with letting people kill each other in the name of war; we just have certain guidelines as to how it should be done.  I am, however, proud that we were able to, at the very least, postpone correcting unacceptable behavior (the use of chemical weapons) with the use of unacceptable behavior (launching missiles). This tells me that we may be seeing a little more of the light of compassion than we have in previous years.

    Moving to something a little less dramatic, yet nonetheless what I would call a societal shortcoming, we have designer Brian Lichtenberg.  Brian is the man behind the controversial “prescription” t-shirts.  Brian is trying to capitalize on society’s obsession with, and in a lot of cases addiction to, prescription pain medication.  His money-making idea was to create t-shirts like sports jersey’s with the name of a drug such as Adderall, Vicodin, Xanax, to name a few, on the back, with a number below, emulating sports apparel.

    Brian, like many people, is a business man. He is trying to do what we are taught from a very early age is the ultimate goal for a human – make a lot of money.  One of the things we don’t teach is to do so without causing harm wherever possible.  Brian’s creation, although creative, is turning out to be offensive to many and he is now feeling the crunch.  Many have spoken out against him and now the drug-makers themselves are considering suing him to cease and desist.

    While drug use did not go up or down in relation to this event, our collective conscience did experience a shift. Many spoke their minds and found themselves supported by their communities.  Each experience we have of standing in our authentic truth and being supported encourages people to become willing to do so.

    Much like the events in Syria that brought us to the brink of yet another war, Brian Lichtenberg has ushered in a new era of people rising up against what they believe is behavior not becoming of 21st Century humans. His view of the world was narrow, and the masses have stepped into authenticity and said we will not stand by quietly and let you do this.

    The point of this article is to show that we, as individuals, have more power over worldly events than we believe, as well as making the compassionate comparison to how we go about expressing our power.  Man has typically chosen raw power as the first means of expressing our opposition to those thoughts or actions we feel strongly about. It is becoming clear that what Einstein is so famously quoted as saying is true, “You cannot solve a problem with the same thinking that created it.”  The younger generation and the social media outlets are providing a forum for many people to express their ideas, beliefs, and opinions about these worldly events.  This is moving the stick of our evolution at an ever-increasing speed.

    “When people know better, they do better.”  ~ Maya Angelou

    We may be the toddlers of the universe, and all that means is that we are growing up. And it may seem like it was just a short time ago that we would stand, stumble, trip and fall, but now we are starting to walk.  We may not be ready to run and we may still lose our balance, but we are growing up fast.  Each day provides us opportunities to express our authentic self.  Many times we are still going to say and do things that are not in alignment with that, but we are aware. And with each time that we do take a deep breath of courage and stand in our truth, we are empowered to continue to do so.  When we act consciously and collectively, our strength is multiplied.

    With all eyes on our societal shortcomings, we see where we came from.  We express our opposition in healthy ways and remain committed to peace and serenity being the guiding force in our lives. Imagine the world our children and their children will live in with hope and pride.  There is nothing to fear about the future because each new generation is enriched with the mistakes of previous generations for which to decide how they will make their own. So far, it is working perfectly.

    Just another reminder to those wishing to change the direction of your own life or helping another to get out of the rut of addictive behaviors, our Path to Peace recovery retreats are just the place to do that.  JR Westen and myself are taking the messages found within the ”Conversations with God”  Cosmology, along with our combined 53 years of personal recovery from alcohol, drug, and food addictions, and offering these retreats as a means of returning people to their authentic selves.  We understand the difficulty people face with overcoming these challenges in life and offer a simple, compassionate, and effective means of living a happy, joyous and free life. These retreats are not simply a weekend long reprieve from our troubles.  Each attendee will be introduced to past and future participants through our community Facebook page.  In addition, any past participant can attend any future P2P retreat for any donation they wish to make.  You read that right, any donation, from $1 to infinity.  We have seen the lives of people change and remain changed from these retreats.  If this is for you, click here to register.

    (Kevin McCormack, C.A.d ,is a certified addictions professional. He is a recovering addict with 26 years of sobriety. Kevin is a practicing auriculotherapist, life coach, and interventionist specializing in individual and family recovery and also co-facilitates spiritual recovery retreats for the CWG foundation with JR Westen. You can visit his website here for more information. To connect with Kevin, please email him at Kevin@TheGlobalConversation.com)

  • A path to the new world

    What is the message that we need to transmit to future generations of this planet — so that our children and all children to come are Self-loving beings with fully functional Self-Esteem, and capable of creating a joyful and healthy world for themselves?

    Where are we going? 

    The market economy is the modern GODDESS on Earth. This is the underlying message of this civilization to future generations of this planet. In the name of a “healthy economy,” we devastate the planet which is the home of future generations for millennia to come, and our most precious human qualities like compassion and solidarity, because our economy has to “grow” today.

    Huge debts run the global economy and our homes today. The global credit stock doubled from $57 trillion to $109 trillion in just ten years (from 2000 to 2010). It will need to double again to an incredible $210 trillion by 2020 in order to provide the necessary credit-driven growth. It is debt that governs our world.

    Our world—where one billion people, one-seventh of the total  population, now lives in total poverty—annually spends about $1.5 trillion on military expenditures.  As long as the strongest economies of the world enrich their national budgets with exorbitant earnings from its arms exports, there will be wars. And as long as the so-called “civilized world” silently watches the planet’s poorest countries import the latest “how-to-kill-your-neighbor” techniques, instead to spend money on the newest technology and know-how to make a living and become self-sufficient, there will not be peace and prosperity on Earth.

    The golden age of survival. This is the world of our immature ego. After millions of years of evolution, we still stand on the law of the jungle in which there is no value greater and no ideal cherished more than “survival at any cost.” And the more powerful and richer we are as we survive, the better. But as long as we continue just surviving, instead of really living, we will continue to struggle in fear. And as long as we live in fear, the law of the jungle remains our highest ideal. Debt, poverty, and pain pave the way for future generations—instead of happiness, prosperity, and joy.

    As within, so without. No human being with Self-Esteem will cheat, lie, steal, kill, abuse other forms of life, or otherwise harm another, or be indifferent to his/her environment. The shape of our current personal and global affairs directly reflects the actual state of our individual and collective lack of Self-Esteem. If this were not the case, we would all live in harmony and peace.

    The answer to the problems of our civilization lies primarily in our own approach to ourselves. This is where each of us must begin.

    When I look at our world today, I am still overwhelmed when there is another bomb exploding in a bus or town square, another escalation of war, another aerial bombardment “in the name of democracy”, another pollution disaster, another political or financial corruption scandal, another child murder, another school killing . . . and another . . . another act of destruction happening somewhere on Earth. It is as if the shockwaves of destruction are growing faster and faster, hitting us harder and harder.

    And yet I cannot help noticing that in all the confusion and chaos lies a certain sense of purpose, and with all the economic, political, and civil turmoil taking place in various parts of our planet, I detect an increased awareness, a rise of consciousness, a cleansing process underway, which will lead us to a new world of peace and tranquility.

    It is in these turbulent times that each of us bears full responsibility for the decisions we make everyday—as we choose between love and fear, Self-Esteem and Self-denial, between sheer survival at the expense of all other forms of life on the one side and meaningful and fulfilling life in the interest of all on the other.

    Now is the time to ask the fundamental question: What do I really believe in? Now is the right moment to follow the Spark of Light within and use our spiritual powers to help co-create our New World.

    “Your cure is in you,
    but you do not see;
    Your sickness is from you,
    but you do not feel;
    You allege that you are a small star,
    while you contain the whole cosmos.”

    ~ Sidi Mohammad Al Jamal – Sufi Master

    (Vladimir Bayer lives in Prague where he work as translator/consultant/writer. He is also the author of “From Darkness to Light: A Path to The New World.”)

    (If you would like to contribute an article you have authored to the Guest Column, please submit it to our Managing Editor, Lisa McCormack, for possible publication in this space. Not all submissions can be published, due to the number of submissions and sometimes because of other content considerations, but all are encouraged. Send submissions to Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com. Please label the topic: “Guest Column.”)

  • Tree of Life

    Everything taking place within the realm of our experience is subject to the application of our thoughts, perspectives, and beliefs…which is why you will either deeply appreciate Director Terrence Malick’s movie “Tree of Life” or you will leave feeling bewildered.

    This 139-minute film has very little dialogue except for the occasional voice-over narration asking enigmatic questions to God like, “Where were You?  Where do You live?  Are You watching me?  I want to know what You are.  I want to see what You see.”  This movie does not tell you what to think, or how to think, but rather it provides the movie-goer an opportunity to think about and actually participate in some of life’s most perplexing and unanswered questions about evolution, God, death, heaven, human connection, the end of the world — and to become a collaborator in its meaning.

    The movie centers around a troubled family in Waco, Texas, in the 1950s where three pre-teen boys are living with their strict authoritarian father (played by Brad Pitt) and gentle loving mother (played by Jessica Chastain), each parent symbolizing a different perspective about the “way” through life…the way of nature or the way of grace.  She is ethereal, a loving presence, angelic; he is a businessman and a traditionalist who is prone to anger.

    Awe-inspiring and dramatic cinematography contrasts ideologies of “spirituality” and “survival of the fittest” within the world of this young family’s triumphs, conflicts, and day-to-day life experiences, connecting them with the birth, evolution, and eventual demise of the universe.  Predominantly placed in the film is a breathtaking 15-minute video sequence containing stunning footage of the “Big Bang,” the creation of the earth and the earth’s first organism, the age of the dinosaurs, concluding with the destruction of the earth by a large meteor.

    Writing a review for a controversial movie that is so wide open to interpretation is a challenge without sharing what the film personally meant to me.  So I would recommend that if you want to experience a movie that will make you say “Wow!”  “What?”  “Hmm,”  “Aww,” “No Way,” “Oh, I get it,” “Wait, I’m confused,” and “Amazing” all at the same time, that you check out “Tree of Life.”

    “Tree of Life” can be found on Netflix and is available on video from most movie rental sources.

    (Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation.  She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team at www.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com.)

    (If there is a book, movie, music CD, etc. that you would like to recommend to our worldwide audience, please submit it to our Managing Editor, Lisa McCormack, for possible publication in this space. Not all submissions can be published, due to the number of submissions and sometimes because of other content considerations, but all are encouraged. Send submissions to Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com. Please label the topic: “Review”)