Coping With Lunatic Leaders—This World's Like a Spiritual Elementary School

Our world seems like a pretty crazy place these days, with everything changing so fast—and particularly with all the lunatic leaders grabbing headlines. As population grows, it's inevitable that life is changing a little everyday, but when it comes to the sanity of many of the world's leaders (or often the apparent lack of it), some things may never change. If you think our global leaders are crazy now, imagine witnessing the fall of the Roman Empire and the antics of very disturbed people like Caligula or Nero (God bless 'em), the scourge of Ivan the Terrible, or the atrocities of Hitler's Holocaust.

There's one simple cause for this phenomenon that applies to all of human experience: that human expression originates from a wide spectrum of awareness—its beauties are enhanced by the degree of spirituality with which life is lived, its sufferings are exacerbated by the lack of that spiritual connection by some humans to what we might call Divine Consciousness.

Our most pressing difficulties arise from the fact that as more people appear on the planet, there are more people who delusionally associate themselves strictly with material aspects of living, and feel that they live separate lives—independent of all other life, and our shared Consciousness. They're trapped in the delusional primacy of our limited human intellects, and fall prey to the constraints of their egos and their unconscious desires for gratification and "control."

The result is that the spiritually sickest individuals are more driven (than spiritually-balanced folks) to act out their delusions of control and selfish gratification in order to ameliorate the personal sufferings of their karma—the cause and effect of their past and present life-actions. So we find it's often profoundly dis-eased people that are pathologically driven to gain positions of political power, because it's so much more important for them to try to control Life—to gratify the dictates of their self-centered delusions. The tragic lack of Consciousness in a minority of humans is what exacerbates all suffering in the world, and prevents the spontaneous realization of the kind of Paradise the Earth started out as—and is meant to be.

This relatively small minority is the cause of the self-destruction that has always plagued humanity, and is likely to continue to do so. I won't detail all their excesses (you probably know already), let's just say it has to do with hoarding resources, starting wars, exploiting Nature (and people), rigging elections, etc., etc. The world is often "led" by terminally self-centered sociopaths, and unfortunately, we have always been brought along on their lunatic ride.

The good news is that the ever-overwhelming majority of human beings never experience these lunatic impulses; so there are two very promising realities being created by the rising, shared Consciousness spreading into the world. The first lay in the forms of natural spiritual evolution evident in the level of environmental awareness—the growth of compassionate self-realization practices, such as yoga and meditation; the expanded understanding of the sentience of all the Earth's life and inherent magic of its quantum physical nature; the intuitive movement toward clean energy; and the instantaneous connections of technology.

The second reality is also a result of growing population—there are simply more highly spiritually-evolved souls present in this world everyday. These unstoppable evolutionary changes bode very well for the future of humanity on Earth, it's just that we must also suffer the destructive growing pains of the spiritually disconnected.

The bad news is that these people will never go away. This unconscious minority has always been amongst us, and always will be—that's the nature of human life, cycling through existence on Earth. Their persistence comes from the penetrating sense of fear they trade in, and in the seductive promise that there is a material solution to suffering, when real solutions are actually found in our spiritual nature.

The good news is that they aren't really the world's leaders—they're material impostors. The true leaders quietly, intuitively embody spiritual solutions. In terms of the profound evolution of all living things, every community's inevitable growing alignment with Divine Consciousness comes about not as a result of the fearful manipulations of misdirected charismatic demagogues, but as an energetic shift in the direction of a simple majority of the species—towards survival and spiritual evolution. The school, the flock, the majority of people, simply heads toward the light.

It wouldn't be wrong to imagine this world as a metaphoric elementary school, with grades one through six attending simultaneously, except in humanity's expression, everyone are "adults." The truth is (as always), a minority of particularly power-hungry, unconscious students aren't adults at all, they're spiritual children, acting out their unformed nature, responding to baseless fears and provocations. They answer a reactive urge to control things, and become destructive when they are forced to confront the fact: You can't control the Universe. That's not what's really going on here.

The sixth grade and the second grade are all here together, but no sixth-grader can change the karmic trajectory of any other student, they can only point them toward the light, by demonstrating the spiritually-liberating, growth-inducing principles of kindness, honesty, humility, compassion, forgiveness, and selfless service.

They can only—we can only (as we always have and always will)—try our very best to hold this persistently nasty mess together with Love, until the great flood of Divine Consciousness changes the world. 

That is why we're here—to realize the transformative power of Love.

The book: How to Survive Life (and Death), A Guide To Happiness In This World and Beyond is now available everywhere, but ask for it it at your local bookstore! How to Get to Heaven (Without Really Dying) is due out early 2018, from Llewellyn Worldwide.

Life, Death, and Baby Boomers––an Excerpt

"I'm not afraid to die, I just don't want to be there when it happens."

                                                                    

                                              Woody Allen 

When I mentioned the quote earlier that Life doesn't happen to you, it happens for you, I think that without a doubt the same is true for death. Death doesn't happen to you, it happens for you (unless you are eaten by a crocodile; that could not possibly be for you). We're all part of a much bigger set of ongoing considerations––the big picture I'm asking you to see as the context of your life. 

In particular, we need to escape that one self-centered cultural definition that's leading us so far astray––that death is our obliteration. The sad, absolute cessation of Life. The final chord of a sonata that starts wonderfully well, but ends in a dirge. That idea that we only have "one go-round," "one shot at it," and then "the party's over." There's a selfishness (a "sinfulness") in that definition that prevents us from living well, from showing up for each other with the proper compassionate presence. It's a self-centeredness that insists we should be getting something we want out of it all and each other when, instead, we could be forming true partnerships with one another––an understanding global fellowship of shared human experience––and creating a sane stewardship of life here on Earth. When we can get ourselves over this delusional assumption of self-importance, we can create a much less "sinful," more evolutionarily responsible, way of living.

If we know we're missing the mark with the cultural definition of death––one that leads to the fear of losing what we want to hang on to and the "I've gotta get mine before it's all over" approach––then what is a more realistic definition? What's the proper direction in which to aim our lives? Well, Shakespeare's always good for a few spiritual bull's-eyes, like this one: Death is a consummation most devoutly to be wished! So we can see death as a lifelong goal that we struggle to attain––one that we want to meet with preparation, with humility and honor, and with open-hearted promise. It is our matriculation of sorts.

Speaking from my own experience, death is an expansion into transcendent being, for crying out loud. We need to restore death to it's rightful place as a sacred ritual of passage. Let's get kind of Egyptian with it again. Don't mourn me; send me off with an open heart and a song!  This party is definitely not over.

It's absolutely essential that we show up for each other with this positive, life-affirming definition of death as a continuation of always being present. Contrary to what Woody Allen might request, you must never take a raincheck for anyone's dying. (That's the only "must" in the book.) While we supposedly have much busier lives than ever, that's just an illusion caused by technology. The really important parts of our lives are still what's really important. Put the business aside. What technology is best suited for is efficiently arranging our lives around those important people and occasions, so that we can maintain close contact with the loved ones involved in all of our momentous life events––making the appropriate reservations, booking the trip, and being there; contributing whatever you possibly can; showing up in a way that honors Life's real connections of the heart; bringing Love right up to the surface, front and center where it belongs. Again, it's not about me; it's about we.

Notice how when we're "coming to the end" of our time in this life with someone we love or for ourselves, just how precious and how special that remaining time together suddenly is. How intensely focused our love and appreciation for each other becomes in those few moments that are left. We need to try to treat each other that way all the time, and grow spiritually together in that kind of Love. We need to recognize the eternal in each other, always. That's what's really important here; everything else is a distant second place. These may be lofty ideals, granted, but pursuing them throughout our lives is time well spent, and leads to a sense of fulfillment that can never be matched in any other way.

From the time we reach that more adult perception we start to come upon as teenagers, to the time we lay ourselves down, our essential spirit remains generally young and energetic––especially in pursuing our passion for Life. It's just our bodies that atrophy, that break down and require costly repairs––or that just quit running. Our spirits, our eternal selves, always feel youthful. They're always ready to keep growing upward and onward, and so they do. That essential part of us can only collapse under the weight of selfish self-centeredness and that oppressively off-the-mark definition of death––and the negative effect it can have on the last third of our lives––when we permit those attitudes to define us as limited.

  

The truth is that we always have that unflappable, limitless hope that comes along with youth. Just scratch the surface and, like Love, it's always there. We've also got all that blind faith that we don't hardly notice enough even to take for granted when we're young. And, although it seems somehow harder to come by as we age,  there's also more evidence of that faith as we grow older. Hope, and faith are real working spiritual mechanisms that are always alive, and always will be in all of our lives.  And if you just add grace to those two, then you've got my three favorite names for girls.

Read about this and much more in: How to Get to Heaven (Without Really Dying), Wisdom From a Near-Death Survivor  from Llewellyn Worldwide available direct on this page or online. The first book: How to Survive Life (and Death), A Guide To Happiness In This World and Beyond is available the same ways – but ask for it it at your local bookstore!