The horoscope told me, that’s how I knew. That’s when the questions began, about everything. It was in that moment when realization caught my breath and I got light headed. Deep inside, I reasoned that such things were just props to make us feel like somehow we had control. Then images of the future came and went; I saw how choices led to certain imminent effects. It was as if that one moment had opened up a different way of seeing the things around me; the people I know and my life. I discovered others who were having similar experiences. It was like some esoteric force of nature was channeled through that one moment and changed everything I thought I understood about life.
Technology is strange. I remember as a boy wondering when all the flying cars and teleportation gadgets were going to be available to us. I remember thinking about who these people were that would create such things and how it would be introduced to the public. I thought that we were not ready for such things. As every little nuance came to market, people were like kids in a candy store. Apples were given away, cellular phones like Star Trek flipped up everywhere, outer space became our backyard, talking stuffed animals went home, and people could literally change and manipulate their own body parts. But this was just the beginning. It was an introduction to spark our consumer imagination, priming the future direction of our society like something straight out of the Iron Mountain. But the question remained, who were these people? Were their interests benign?
One side effect to the unveiling of technology was society’s impatience. The idea that we would have to wait for such advancements, certainly designed to better our lives, was pushing at the seams of our collective experience. Intuitively, we looked to our government with suspicion. Surely, they had to be the “who” behind these developments. Conspiracies took shape and old theories began to come forth about alternate motives by those that controlled the technology. Fear took a new shape from the old. At least with the old fears, we knew what was to be feared. It was the Soviet Union or Vietnam or the Nazis. With technology, the fear became based on something invisible and obscure. It was a feeling of uncertainty and the potential of what life might really be like should the full scope of the imagination of our own technologies be released. It was the realization of Pandora’s Box like the last level in a video game.
What the advent of technology did do was make people believe they needed more. Over the past forty years or more, while waiting for something miraculous to come, there was a shift that took place. As technology lagged, the quest for an advanced life turned inward, no longer seeking something more from outside them. A different set of values began to unfold. This was exactly what the people behind the technology did not want and did not expect. It was also exactly what inspired and moved people to action, as well as, distraction.
Technology escalated gradually almost to the point of going unnoticed. Integration became seamless and people trained without realizing it. A quiet conflict spawned an internal struggle for those that woke up before becoming too deeply embedded in the façade.
Still, it came.
An onslaught of technology has been released like a relentless plague. While slow at first, the escalation has been exponential to the point where people have been swept up into a new norm without realizing it. The wireless networks, artificial intelligence, satellite surveillance, unmanned drones, social media, and energy have affected countless other areas of our lives. Consumer segregation like our politics became more pronounced. The economic inequalities have sorted our society as technology has been pushed through us.
Today, awareness and understanding of place comes into view. The spiritual quest, prompted in part through religious warfare and the technology used have changed the priorities. There is this inner dialogue that resides in all of us. The collective reasoning about the direction we are headed as a country, and as a species, do further pronounce the distinctions of our humanity. But maybe it’s still just a feeling that some of us share on an intuitive level? Regardless, it is not all about our politics or our religion, though many would fall into those traps as that continues to remain as the main mode of our culture, which is fear-based. No, it is about those who began to wake up and those who would succumb to the technological controls of our society – or at least the belief in greedy consumerism and short sighted entitlements. This progression could be mapped from generation to generation. However, despite co-existing, there is a stronger rift that is noticed, pulling inward into our consciousness with the inner voice that knows something more profound is taking shape just below the surface of who we are even though the complexities of our own social infra-structures do continue to influence like the weather.
Pockets of people migrate based on culture and economic forces and then some are simply seeking peace in their lives where the priority does not rest on money alone. A home base is vitally important as a connecting point where baselines are made so that our lives can be safely performed. The relationship with technology, while a constant, must not consume us to the point that we are completely complacent. On the other hand, who gives a verb? Certainly, without technology, these words would be bound to pencil lead and dumped in a dusty drawer.
Even now, I am aware of the obtuse nature of these thoughts. While so much of our lives are based on economics and war, it is the relationships we share that enlighten. Having joy is a choice. Love is a matter of honesty and understanding of our individual needs – needs that are more than slaying the dragon to reach the next level or the primal necessities that bind us to the human condition. We are not powerless. With having a self awareness we have enlightenment. Moreover, it is necessary to acknowledge that while we are on our esoteric trips and trying to manifest our ideals about family, friends, money, and spirituality, or whatever, there still remains a war being waged on all fronts for many people’s lives.
This is the paradox and things have gotten somewhat out of control despite an inner peace (or quest for it), which could be used against us. It does point back to our politics and the strange form that our society has taken. Food, for example, and all the awareness perpetuated about Monsanto through our social Medias, must be reconciled. War designed to bring a second coming through religious fervor is not acceptable. A police state of population control is a mere sign of broader things to come when resources are no longer able to compete against the greed of those controlling interests. While dire the sense of the nature of these things, it is only in part due to the counter-efforts that mass media has had in its role to cause a shift away from our own pursuits of peace to be fully controlled as a commodity. This is the symbiotic relationship with our system where the grand experiment has been carried out to fully manage a human species by preying on its fascination for sparkly shiny things.
All of this came in a split moment that could not be ignored even though many have complained from the start only to be dismissed as drug induced hippies touting bazaar conspiracies. Still others lean on the idea that God will simply appear through his son Jesus Christ to save the day. This part of the equation is where religion disrupts the spiritual energy between people by using language to misdirect and interpret things out of context thereby causing confusion among those that migrated on the inward path. The problem is that most have been taught that God, like our government, is something outside of ourselves, when in fact, we are all like God and share in the spiritual essence of the source. Too many people have complicated these matters and distorted the true nature of things. Much of the conspiracy ideas are simply measures of propaganda and our actions, when it comes to the tangible expression of how we vote (for example), are a reflection of our values that must be preserved against the apathy that controlling forces of oppression would have us know.
The exchange among us is critical. Talking heads continue to talk about the need for discussion while major planetary circumstances unfold dwarfing any technology we ever thought we were prepared for. Enlightenment is not merely the ability to levitate, hovering above it all. No. It is being love and doing something because it is not passive. It is a higher state and choices are important as decisions for our own lives do affect our community and beyond. While it is easy to get overwhelmed, living with clear intention is paramount to developing inner calm and transcendence, while at the same time, remaining grounded and tuned in to our surroundings.
Too many new age fluffy proclamations miss the point while all bound up with ego. I do it too, sometimes.
At the end of the day, this diatribe is not even necessary because everyone already knows it or senses it, at least. This is the shift into new norms and the evolution of our not-so-human experience. For your part, it is time to tune into your spiritual peace and ground yourself in love. The examples of our fabled hero, Jesus Christ, would have it no other way.