One of my all-time favorite quotes is Rumi, “The wound is the place where the light enters.” Nine short words that say so much about humanity and our reason for being.
And yet, it also reveals a rather unpleasant truth about our existence — that we require a wound to invite the light in. Well, we don’t actually need a wound, but that’s how it works.
There is a part of my practice in which I regularly reaffirm my desire and intention for continuous evolution. I speak it in a form of contemplative prayer, asking and inviting for my soul and spirit to continue on its path of healing and growth. Often I speak the prayer when things are good, because I’m aware that at such times I can be lured into complacency, which is when I start thinking I don’t need to keep focusing on growth.
If everything was good (relationships, health, financial, etc.) then what reason would we have to seek healing and growth? Our pain pushes us to go within, or otherwise we numb out through myriad forms of addiction.
So, when we experience the pain of living we feel motivated to do something about it. And if we are successful in our effort to heal through a crisis or condition then we eventually reach a point of stasis in which we feel okay. This is the time when we can be lured into complacency and let go of our desire or intention to grow. But then over time the discomfort returns, and we again seek growth.
This is the nature of it — the wound or discomfort motivates us to grow. Comfort and wellness lure us to ease off. And the cycle repeats.
But this is not bad. It’s just the way of life. The alternative is to distract and inebriate ourselves into a place of merely coping. Many, perhaps most, have chosen this path. Some (a growing number) have chosen growth, which means leaning into the discomfort and then relaxing, repeating the cycle over and over again.
When I was born, Lyndon Johnson was president. In 1969 Nixon was elected, then Ford assumed office, then Carter and Reagan and so on. Johnson a Democrat, Nixon and Ford Republicans, Carter a Democrat, Reagan and Bush senior Republicans, Clinton a Democrat, Bush junior a Republican, Obama a Democrat, Trump a Republican, Biden a Democrat. Traditionally midterm elections swing the opposite direction. It’s back and forth. Crisis pushes us to get involved and seek change. Good times lure us to ease off and accept the status quo. Do you see the pattern?
Politics is merely a reflection of what we individually experience in life. It’s not just a metaphor, it’s a reflection. It’s also a fractal of what we experience internally. It’s been said, “As above, so is below,” a paraphrase of a late eighth century Arabic text. We could also say, “As within, so is without.” Or everything we experience internally we project externally. It can be no other way.
As Einstein said, “We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.”
But zig zagging between conflict and peace, pain and comfort is not merely back and forth or up and down, we are constantly progressing on an upward trajectory by slight increments. Our upward momentum stretches us a little farther each time and our lower movement descends a little less low.
Slavery in the U.S. technically ended with the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863. But the 13th Amendment allowed for it by stating, “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime,” emphasis added. Then the 14th Amendment says, “All persons born or naturalized in the United States . . .” emphasis added. But then there was share cropping and segregation and lynching. Then the Civil Rights Act passed in 1964, just three months prior to my birth incidentally. Today there is more slavery in the world than there was in 1864, but collectively we agree that it is morally wrong.
And let’s not forget that just a few hundred years ago we were burning women at the stake for practicing the healing arts through natural remedies and ceremony. Public hangings were, well, public. We actually came out in droves to watch a person die. We put Indigenous children in boarding schools and beat the crap out of them for speaking their language. Today we lament about how Indigenous languages are dying out.
The point is that we are progressing along an upward trajectory, even though it doesn’t always look like it. This week’s midterm elections show us hope, that democracy is still alive and working to some degree. Our problems are many and serious, but people are waking up and change is upon us. Some 30% of Gen Zrs voted, a sizable increase over prior elections, and they see the world differently. They don’t like book bans or active shooter drills or fearing for their lives daily, and they’re serious about climate change. An increasing number of people rejected the fear-based political advertising and sought to understand the issues and their ramifications.
This is positive upward trajectory change. Our problems are the wound, real change is the light. Without one we don’t have the other. Be in hope my friend, the light is much stronger than the dark.
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