Navigating the Turbulent Waters of Global Change

As we enter this new year, we may find that expectations and hopes based on previous patterns and worldviews are not fulfilled as readily as those open to something new and fresh. Something deeper is shifting through human consciousness empowered in part by the unrelenting challenge of a global virus and the effects of climate change. Our worldview and our way of thinking about things are changing. Many are realising that what we used to consider “normal” will not return and something new is needed – something that better accommodates a new and more expanded understanding of our world and our place and responsibility within it.

Some, still identified with the form and organisation of the old “normal”, are exerting every effort to maintain and empower it. And so, we see diverging world views as some administrations attempt to hold power and to crush dissent with increasingly extreme measures and with attempts to re-capture territory. They are trying to hold back the forward evolution of human consciousness with its changing sense of identity, and relation to place and culture. Many citizens no longer trust their governments. They are thinking for themselves, and their thoughts are quickly translated into action through the support and transparency offered through global internet connections.

Thought is the process whereby intention is focussed onto the substance of the mental plane to create thoughtforms or thoughts. These are the subtle yet powerful constructs that generate and underpin civilisations. The thoughtform of the current, passing civilisation was based on individualism, competition, exploitation, survival of the fittest and hierarchies of personal power and control over material resources. But for a long time now we have been realising how ultimately destructive such thinking (and resultant acting) can be. We are seeing how climate change manifests the global impact of our collective disregard for anything other than our own worldly success and comfort; and the pandemic demonstrates how critically interdependent we are no matter our worldly “status” when new variants emerge through those least protected and supported.

We are learning to think, and to think together in the heart – to think more globally, comprehensively and inclusively – because in the heart we connect through all space, time, and dimension. A new wisdom is emerging as our factual knowledge expands and scientific investigation penetrates new mysteries in both microcosmic and macrocosmic contexts, discovering that they operate on the same divine principles. The last 200 years have seen discoveries and resultant changes in thinking working out through human consciousness. 80 years ago, the Tibetan Master wrote of what has been built on misunderstanding due to ignorance of the “building magnetic aspect of Love”. He then explains the shift whose effects we are now experiencing:

We are—if it could be but realised—in process of re-interpreting and re-arranging what can be called ‘the doctrinal structure underlying the relation between knowledge and wisdom.’ This involves the destruction of old concepts such as the trinity of manifestation, and the assembly of those new and more correct ideas which must inevitably be substituted for the old…” Discipleship in the new Age, vol II, page 403

A new civilisation is being formed in the human heart, where the synthesis of all being is known. While we are still navigating our way through the limitations of the old, a new sense of responsibility, a new way of thinking, and a new more expanded sense of relationship with one another and our world is gradually unfolding into realisation. Individuals and groups around the world are interconnecting and empowering each other and forming a larger sense of community. While old modes of separation, control and oppression may intensify, they cannot ultimately succeed, and must eventually end in a new breakthrough.

What is the source of inner strength that empowers the human heart? Perhaps the growing realisation that we share the One Heart and the One Soul. As the heart opens us to the whole, we become sensitive and attuned to the spiritual dimensions of the Life we share as together we navigate the turbulent waters of global change into a new and expansive sense of being.

And living through these times of global awakening can be likened to traversing river rapids where all the little streams have gathered down the mountains into a global river pouring through fast-track narrows between steep rocky shores on its way towards the ocean of a greater life and livingness. In the turbulence of information and misinformation, understanding and misunderstanding, the current human thoughtform of the world is breaking down and misconceptions are jettisoned, thus creating the opening for a new thoughtform of our world. And so, a new expansive worldview is dawning. It embraces the realms of the soul, the oneness of the Life we share, and the divine intention unfolding and igniting the love and light at the heart of every atom.

In the larger reality, it is pointless to take sides on issues within the world of opposites, to grab at anything for security in our course through the current turbulence. However, it is critical now to decide between the old dense material world and a new lighter dimension where souls may progress in greater light and transparency. It is the vertical decision rather than a horizontal one that carries the soul on its journey towards the creation of a new and better world. The Agni Yoga writings reminds us:

Truly, do not divide the world into north and south, or east and west. But everywhere distinguish between the old world and the New. The old world finds shelter in all parts of Earth. The New World also is born everywhere, but beyond boundaries and conditions.
The old world and the New World are distinguished through consciousness, not by outer evidence. Age and circumstance bear no importance. New banners are often raised by the hands of the old world, still filled with prejudices. But often in solitude beats a heart filled with the radiance of the New World. Thus, unwaveringly, before our eyes, the world divides itself. The new consciousness grows, unskilled, but full of daring. Despite its experience the old thinking loses strength. There is no power that could hold back the tide of the New World. We regret the useless waste of energy of the expiring consciousness. We welcome with a smile the daring of those who realize their right to expand new achievements. Each mistake, if committed for the cause of the New World, becomes a flower of valor. No matter how skillful the effort to embalm the old world, it remains a skeleton of horror.
The old world rejected the Mother of the World, but the New World begins to perceive Her lustrous veil.” Agni Yoga, sloka 55.

Let us accept love as the motive force in the expansion of consciousness. The heart will not be aflame without love; it will not be invincible, nor will it be self-sacrificing. So let us bring gratitude to every receptacle of love, for love lies on the border of the New World, where hatred and intolerance have been abolished. The path of love unfolds with the intensity of cosmic energy. So on this path everyone will find his place in the Cosmos. Not as dried leaves but as lotuses aflame will people find kinship with the Highest World.”  ~ Heart, sloka 243

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