When I pitched this focus for Sunday’s Livestream on the Ram Dass Foundation platform, I knew we would be sailing stormy seas from here on. But, of course, I did not know we would be navigating the high-noon showdown of Trump’s cult-driven coup with its far-reaching tentacles wrapped around almost every aspect of American life, from its core power structures into the depth of its disaffected psyche.
The last few days, while shocking, are not surprising. Yet, the speed of so much unmasked, while profoundly unsettling, is oddly gratifying. To have made clear and conscious, for so many, the foundational rot within the American project, alongside this moment of clear choice going ahead, feels cathartic.
The journey through Trump has always been, in significant part, about catalyzing an expose of America’s shadow, and within that gaslit, brutish curriculum, an opportunity to clarify where we stand individually, institutionally, collectively, and because the American empire is still a primary power fulcrum globally.
In 2016, just before that terrible election, I wrote a blog warning titled, “Trump, America’s Ebola Virus,” making the point that he was worse than Ebola, which eats away at flesh. In contrast, Trump was about destroying the very soul of America and radically stymying a world on the cusp of marshalling its collective will to tackle the multiple crises that constitute our planetary emergency.
None of us wanted the curriculum for the last four years. Still, it’s been both unavoidable and inevitable, given the unaddressed, unacknowledged, uncompensated grievous injustices the US founded itself on. That, in brief, would be the Eurocentric, Patriarchal, Racist, Imperial, Colonial project.
While we’re not “out of the woods” yet, by any means, we have collectively dodged a dreadful bullet, which is Trump’s Fascist takedown, and with that, a rapid devolving of the higher dream of humanity to which we are called to more fully realize.
We all know time is ticking down on securing any hope of a sustainable path forward. Still, perhaps, we now also irrevocably see that we cannot embody such a course without a core systemic overhaul and a deconstruction of hierarchical oppression.
In a chaotic, distorted way, those baying, pissing, defecating, dressed in cult garb, ransacking the hallowed Capitol, are trying to access some deeper shared initiatory “truth.” Perhaps, some meaning and placement within the failed American dream, from which they probably never felt included.
However, engaging this malcontent through an inversion of all societal norms, without any ethical or wise guide rails, left them wide open to possession by the unprocessed shadow. A ghostly, cold planet where not only rage and hate stalk but also the great demons of the past who have resurfaced in horrific slogans like “Auschwitz Camp Staff / 6 Million Wasn’t Enough.”
With no real, worked out, integrated inner ethic beyond a tribally based, obsessive narcissism, millions, it seems, have been made vulnerable to occultish manipulation and mass delusion. While complicit themselves, they have been taken advantage of by Trump’s psychopathy, by craven politicians, by those peddling conspiracy fetishes, and by media hate mongers, to name some of the primary players feeding off their loyalty.
All of this has delivered a pseudo-culture that is so abstracted from a more profound sense of real, embodied belonging that what is a soulless vacuity is parading as an all-knowing messiah.
This profound loss of bearings, when instead we need to know we belong to each other in a vastly complex, ensouled world, has left a mass of the population in a psychotic break from reality. Unfortunately, just at a time when we need to face hard truths straight on. Instead, encouraged by sociopaths to surf an absurd, alternative universe, where lies are truth and truth is lies, our shared, liveable world is being pulled apart and fast destroyed.
This cultivation of hate and delusion is profoundly consequential, not only for society but also for friendships, families, communities, and institutions. We have all likely been impacted by a twisted agenda that has successfully sown a seemingly irreconcilable division through the fraying fault lines of our relationships.
As I write this, I’m struck that while 2020 was an initiatory year through the shadow and its curriculum, 2021 is about applying what we have learned. If we’ve discovered anything, it is that we cannot reach for our evolutionary arch without undoing the foundations of white supremacy, misogyny, and extractive, predator, oligarchic Capitalism.
Neither can we project all our power onto a President, political and religious authorities, or take refuge down some conspiratorial rabbit hole without deadly consequences. In other words, we have to grow up, and roll up our collective sleeves, and do whatever it is our heart is calling us to do.
So, then. What is showing up with love got to do with all this?
I aim to explore this a little in this Livestream. I’d also like to inquire whether our spiritual practice equips us for the task ahead or enables a massive bypass and an abdication from this decade’s great work.
To pick up the proverbial snake at the wrong end is to deliver a poisoned chalice at a moment when instead, the portal is open for us to take our power back, from wherever we’ve projected it, and marshal ourselves for the task ahead.
SIGN ON HERE
https://www.ramdass.org/event/showing-up-with-love-for-whatever-comes-next-with-thanissara/
Wow, so clear and incisive.
LikeLike
Thanks Rosalie.. all blessings. 🙂
LikeLike
Have a blessed 2021.
I can’t believe that 70 million americans would still choose Trump for president.
I have never wintnessed before a more despicable narcissit in my life.
Take care and be safe.
Much love to you and Mary.
LikeLike
Hi Paul,
Sorry, a bit late getting back, and now we’re nearly at the end of 2021! Yes, the Trump effect in the US is profoundly dangerous and toxic and is still in play.. massive shadow dynamics from such violent history.. Yes, and he is absolutely, as you say, despicable. Hope you’re doing OK there in NUD, so glad the town got saved by you all in the recent riots.. well done! Hope to get back one of these days, soon! Take care Paul and thanks for all your great Mountain Echo work, we’re moving towards reopening at DG, slowly but surely! lots of love. 🙂
LikeLike
Thank goodness, for your voice, Thanissara.
As a young girl over 60 years ago, coming into presence growing up with psychosis in the family and community at large, rather than remain a victim-damaged identity constantly wrestling w my own reactivity, my own sanity as a child and young adult, caught in a snare of entrenchments, I sought a trail of heart- minded voices echoing realness in the desert. Traveling to India and Nepal in 1972, I literally prayed that I be guided to the light of consciousness here and now, through living beings devoted to embodying, loving and serving Truth. Gradually I came to understand the terror we suffer when causing egregious harms, knowingly and unknowingly. And that awareness with the powers of loving insight were transformational agents, skills of protection and grace for everyone and everything. I understand today that psychosis is humanity’s shadow. This needs recognizing-observance, attention with acceptance as you have written. Great compassion is actionable, and cannot be abandoned. We must go to the depths of psychosis without letting it take us down with it! Just as a relative needs our tough loving care, directives, and treatments, as we walk alongside, observant and present with, an inexhaustible essential grace May carry us to meet our given tasks.
Thus our dedications to healing our profound shadow as a people, is the deepest calling of our times. I support your leadership, Thanissara w my Dana and undying gratitude.
Namo! Love, Valeta
LikeLike
Thank you so much Valeta. So glad you managed to navigate growing up in a time, same as me, where the deep traumas and fracturing within family systems were repressed and mis-understood. We both were able to access some profound teachers and practices through the long lineage of awakening from the mother country of India, much gratitude to all who hold and held such a profound transmission.
Yes, going to the depths of the what is carried in the shadow, and our collective break from reality is a very demanding shamanic piece of work, but those who can navigate such territories bring great transformations.. I offer my small contribution in ways that I can, and I honour your support of us as we continue to travel through these times of dismemberment and reorientation. Sending much love and appreciation for all your support. 🙂
LikeLike
Aum, opening the portal, gratitude and greetings from England, may the ‘Righteous and Just Ruler’ emerge in all our hearts this year, according to the dharmma-silana of Asoka. In solidarity with you Thanissara I offer this expression (The Edict Project sung by TM Krishna) https://www.youtube.com/watch?reload=9&v=cwffR1MoISU from over the water, and hope I may night-vigil with you at tomorrow’s sessions. Aum Shanti, Shanti, Shanti Max
LikeLike
Thank you so much Max, much love from K and me.. look forward to seeing you again one of these fine days. 🙂
LikeLike
Dearest Thanissara,
Thank you, as ever, for finding the words to say it. Your writing explains, confirms, validates and is remarkably empowering.
These horrors are real and so is the strength of the heart.
With Such Love,
Nancie
LikeLike
Thank you so much Nancie.. yes, so glad the writing empowers and that you have such strength in your heart. May that continue ongoing, for you, for us all. much love. 🙂
LikeLike