I was 23 years old when I first visited the USA. I spent four months there, traveling through about 40 states. Since that time I have been back over 45 times.
Today I read a wonderful piece in the Huffington Post by the very insightful Caroline Myss. I have not been paying too much attention to US politics since Obama’s election.
After my first trip to the US my impression was that the rest of the world was going to get to watch the modern day equivalent of the fall of the Roman Empire. Breakdown USA. Why did I think that back then, so many years ago and at so young an age?
The United States of America appeared to me even then to be drowning in excess. That really was my impression. Spoilt. “Trans” arrogant, if that is possible. The kind of attitude which comes after years of being in an elite position, where it is no longer held as anything but deserved. “Forget the hard work, we deserve it just because.” Pure entitlement. And the rest of the world. “Forgive me, but do other people exist? I had no idea.”
I know I may sound anti American, and I am not. I am speaking of my impression of the whole, and not the parts. I really like the USA, hence my 45 plus visits, and have lived there off and on over the years.
Back in 1984 I was like some exotic bird, with my accent and origin.”Ooh..how come you speak such good English?” was a frequent question, “being from Australia?” (We don’t speak English in Australia?) (I did get asked this very same question by a professional person and citizen of the US only about 4 years ago on one of my visits. I was horrified and felt like telling this woman to climb back under her rock, if she wasn’t capable of learning a little about the world out there, beyond her privileged shores.)
Each visit I get off the plane at LAX and feel reduced to a number. No wonder people fight for their minute of fame. And until recently, was treated as was all incoming international passengers, with less regard than a mangy dog by the staff at LAX. (They must have gotten so many complaints over the years that they finally decided to teach the customs and immigration staff to be pleasant to other humans.)
Fast forward to the last few years. Like the rest of the world, I have watched in horror, which was then reduced to incredulous amusement, at the antics of the US political scene. What did it say about a country that they elected a buffoon to lead twice? And free world…if the US citizens think they are free they are under an enormous illusion!
However, I am a big picture girl and it did become apparent that Obama would not have been able to even surface if it wasn’t for the parody of Bush. So thank you Mr. Bush. On the grander scheme of things you did your job perfectly and I really am grateful to you.
Now we have Obama, who I get has massive personal integrity. The man comes from light in a world that is consumed by dark. Bush was not the dark one, he was just profoundly incapable of making a decision on his own, and was surrounded by very dark people.
My heart goes out to Obama. He is the lamb to the slaughter, surrounded by a pack of hungry wolves.
It is no small thing that the teens of the world (and a few of us older folk) are consumed by a story about vampires and wolves.(The Twilight series of books, for those who have not been aware of the massive pop cultural event sweeping the world.) Bloodsuckers and werewolves. The light/good vampires fight against the very nature of their inhumanness, refusing to fall back into the dark ways of sucking the very life out of humans. They have spent centuries curbing their intrinsic desire for more blood, their greed and thirst to kill and destroy so that they may thrive. All around them are the vampires who for centuries have not been able to transcend their primal, base nature.. They revel in their blood lust. Insatiable, cruel, predatory.
And the werewolves, represented in the books as Natures way of creating an antidote to the evil of the human blood lusting vampires. Birthed from deep in the indigenous cultures, and only resurrected when the balance goes wrong. Hmm..sound familiar? Maybe the Twilight Culture senses a larger metaphor lying deep in the romance of this story that has captured the hearts of millions.
The human and the immortal. But not just any immortal. The immortal who overcame his base nature to kill and be immune to the suffering of others.
From afar, where my view of the USA is very different, I sense that Obama has been neutered. Caroline’s article speaks so clearly of this.
So where does that leave us?
This is the bigger question, and the one that inspired me to write this article.
In my dark night of the soul article I wrote about our pathway to change as humans. In my years of experience in health and healing I have observed that the majority of us do not change unless we are brought to our knee’s. That it takes catastrophe, massive illness, disaster…for us to finally, finally be open to change.
Today I really got that this is what will happen in the US and maybe with the rest of the world. We need the disaster. The USA has only one path, and that is to break. It truly does need to fall. And fall deep. The financial crisis, the warm up, is not deep enough. I am not a doom and gloom merchant, and I do actually see this as a very positive situation overall, although the path through this period is like to have a very high cost. Last year I wrote about the shift that has already occurred, and earlier this year I wrote about my own meltdown, stating that I felt that we all had to go through our personal meltdown, and probably a collective meltdown. And that if you haven’t been through your own meltdown yet, buckle up for its coming to you and your neighborhood as sure as day becomes night.
All of us can no longer afford to pretend that big changes are not afoot. All of us need to wake up every cell in our individual and collective body. We need to learn creative integrity, and creative resilience. We need to be able to move with the change, instead of resist or ignore it. Our ability to be creative, flexible, dynamic, conscious, compassionate, informed, collaborative and have the biggest view possible is not an option.
I pray for President Obama. I really get that he is working with truth and light. But he is surrounded by darkness, of the worst kind. Insidious, malevolent, cancerous. Like the dust storms that smothered the East Coast of Australia this last week, the darkness gets into everything, and has been doing so for years, through little atrocities, that have settled silently in the corners of our souls, often beyond the level of our awareness. We have agreed to so many of these little atrocities, bit by bit. Each and every one of us. Our silence is killing us.
If I had a crystal ball, I would see the collapse of the USA, and in its collapse, the near fall of many other countries. If Obama lives through this break down, instigated not by his hand, but by the powerful forces around him, then he may well be one of the people who can lead us through the valley of the shadow of death. But as he is today, he is neutered, impotent.
And on the other side of this break down, we have, as we have had throughout history, the powerful capacity to rise through the ashes. Wiser, happier, rid of the toxic dust of silent agreement to the little atrocities. More whole. More able to live in harmony with nature.
The evil bloodsuckers who have not managed to ride above their base instincts will succumb to the vampires who have left their primal ways behind them, and have agreed to work together with the werewolves called forth by the wisdom of the ancients. And the human and the immortal shall be together in love. Amen.
