Tags
awareness, blame, collective input, common ground, deep thought, dialogue, difference, headlines, Jan Phillips, No Ordinary Time, non-duality, polarization, salvation, separation, speak from the heart, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, wake up
Today is the fifth in our discussion series of No Ordinary Time, the inspiring book of Jan Phillips. We will be talking about the concept of and our desire for non-duality. We have come into and live in a world where things are defined by separation and difference: young or old, meek or bold, joy or pain, wealth or poverty…so many things. We are waking up to the fact that our salvation comes from the ability to go beyond those distinctions to find more than common ground. We must come to unity in our diversity if we are to survive and thrive.
Jan’s text is brilliant in setting out the territory we must traverse in order to find such a solution, all of which is worthy of quoting. I offer just a bit of what she says at sunrise for your consideration and wish you the impetus and stamina to make it a reality for your own life and for the world.
What’s happening in the world is a result of our collective input. The morning headlines are the news that we are making as a whole human family, by what we do and what we fail to do. Each one of us is a co-creator of the culture we are immersed in, and if we want to see change, we can make change by changing ourselves, our thinking and our destructive habits.
Blame is not useful. Polarization is not useful. Bitterness and negativity are not useful. What’s useful in these perilous times is deep thought and dialogue. What’s useful is a willingness to speak from our hearts, to say out loud what we hunger for, what we’re willing to live for, and what it is we can no longer abide. We are attendants at the wake of the old way, and each of us – through our actions, our thoughts, our work and relationships – is midwifing a new world into existence. This is our destiny, our meaning, our purpose, and when we come to our days with this awareness, when we sense the oak in the acorn of our beings, then we will have the energy to move mountains and shift the tides. (p. 126)
May it be so in our time!
The Sophia Center for Spirituality 