Reflections on Light and Shadows and the Possiblities of a Transformed World

Tonight I posted a very powerful article about the politics of fear ... and more. These kinds of articles can push buttons and triggers and any one of us can be vulnerable to reacting because there are experiences in our nation and our world and our own hearts that are very hard to deeply absorb. Because if we - especially white Americans - truly take in the essence of what is spoken to regarding, for instance, the American shadow, then we are left face to face... with ourselves.  
 

Donald Trump truly does embody many of the characteristics and principles that have defined the United States for centuries. This is the shadow side of America, the way we have been exceptional - but not in ways that we often have the courage to actually see, own, heal, and transform. Yet, without seeing the problem, solutions are not possible. We will simply stay in our adolescence rather than evolve individually and as a species into our greater wholeness, wisdom, and true nature.
 

Again and again, I personally do my best to shy away from  the polarities of left/right, etc. While it is true that this particular article - "The Politics of Fear: Why Donald Trump Is No Laughing Matter" (http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/32393-the-politics-of-fear-why-donald-trump-is-no-laughing-matter) - speaks about the Republican Party, there is much more that is illuminated. If we have the courage to peel back the layer underneath the surface of personalities, finger pointing, and other distractions, then the opportunity arises to begin to open to the humility and bravery and curiosity and desire to ... know the truth. Which I have found takes so much courage and caring. It is not easy to look - truly LOOK - and begin to grasp the horrors of what is happening today in our names and what has been done in the names of our ancestors. 
 

The empathic failures of our species is overwhelmingly tragic beyond the power of any words to describe.
 

So it is easier instead to glorify the Founding Fathers. To look at poverty and blame the impoverished. To wage war "to protect our freedoms." To split ourselves up into good and bad, patriotic or liberal/communist/fascist/Muslim, saved or unsaved, and on and on. This appears more bearable than peering into the fog of our ignorance and seeing dark places illuminated. Dark places such as the genocide of indigenous peoples, the building of the American Empire on the backs of slaves, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the racism that persists to this day, the fact that my grandmothers were born at a time when women could not vote, mass incarceration,  the death "penalty," the millions who die each year in America for lack of health insurance, 1 in 4 American children living in poverty, 20,000 homeless veterans out on the streets, brutal resource wars in the name of "protecting the homeland," obscene upward redistribution of wealth, how our changing climate is killing off so many and so much and may kill us all because we have not had the collective courage or will to see and care enough to act.

I know something about narcissism. Thirty years ago, in the early years of my recovery and awakening, I came face to face with narcissistic traits within myself and my distorted belief systems that needed to be embraced, healed, transformed. I also got my Ph.D. - or so it feels - in understanding and knowledge of Narcissistic Personality Disorder through healing from growing up with a mother who therapists reflected to me was a "10" on a scale of 1 to 10. (This was before my mother got treatment for her illness.) Trump, no doubt, is also a 10. But he is not the only one.

And let's not get distracted. There is a huge opportunity here to take a good, hard, strong and courageous look at ourselves. Yes, ourselves. Because we could not be faced with the profound and urgent crises plaguing our country and the world if narcissism did not run rampant in more than Donald Trump and the Republican Party. Truly, this man is a mirror. And also an opportunity for each and every one of us to look in the mirror - and look deeply - and see just where we fall on this continuum. Where? 

After all, the cultural reality is that most of us in America - especially if we are white - are marinated and indoctrinated into stories which immerse us in the dark seas of narcissism. These stories tell us that we are exceptional. We are better than everyone else. We are entitled. We deserve the way of life we have because we have "earned" it, and we are simply worth it. Those who are not like ourselves are not deserving of compassion. If others are suffering, it is their fault. They are lazy, they are stupid, they belong to this race or that gender, they are not patriotic or real Americans, they are not Christian and are therefore worthy of God's and our disdain, etc. Other countries just hate us for our freedoms and therefore we are called upon to send our children to kill their children. They are heroes. But we have to turn away and not look at things like why in the world are so many soldiers and veterans killing themselves. Approximately 22 vets committed suicide today. And they will again tomorrow. And on and on.

Most of us, certainly myself included, have fallen somewhere on this continuum of making ourselves better than someone else. And so our attacks are justified. Or our silence is okay. Those other people out there just get what they deserve. And to hell with anything or anyone who invites me or you or any of us to peek under the curtain of our stories, the ones we are sure are true, or not true. Because we want to believe what we believe. And not face our fears. And what is happening that is impacting our lives and that of other beings. It is hard to see just how human we all are. And allow our hearts to open and break and discover how much we have in common and how much we need each other. We need each other.

Amy Goodman, bless her courageous heart, asks -- "Who among us has any conception of the dimensions of shame that will befall us and our children when one day the veil has fallen from our eyes and the most horrible of crimes...reach the light of day??"

What I have been learning over the past many years now is that the degree that I am asleep and unaware is the degree that I will cause harm to myself and others. I can't help it. This is just what we do when we cut ourselves off from our wholeness, from the essence of who we most deeply are. And we all fall somewhere on that continuum which holds consciousness on one end and ignorance on the other. This is not a judgment. We are simply all human. We all fall somewhere on this continuum and, no matter where we are, no one is better than someone else. We are simply more or less asleep or awake. I know how it is to experience both being very disassociated and unaware and to also be rooted in a path of heart. I have learned through my own personal journey, and being witness to countless others, that to the degree that we have built those walls around our hearts is the degree that we may have become seemingly comfortably numb. There is the appearance of safety, security, ground under our feet, and a managed image and belief system that give the illusion that this is easier than facing our fears and our suffering. And that of others.

There are so many things we can turn to instead of going inward, instead of making intimate friends with ourselves and our friends and our communities and other beings. We buy that new item we don't need or we buy into the latest propaganda. We savor in knowing that we are among the saved. We have a drink, smoke some weed, go have an affair, shop till we drop, blame others, turn on the TV, we pick fights and rail against those Others, we shut down, shut up, shut  out. We live out the rules we learned in our families, our churches, our schools, and/or our culture - don't talk, don't trust, don't feel, don't be.

My vision is something very different. It is one in which we are reaching out our hands to help each other light a candle and see what we see, feel what we feel, know what we know, and step by step move into the territory of our hearts, our wisdom, and the deep, beautiful, and abiding wholeness of who we most authentically are. Because each and every one of us is so much larger than our wounds. And we can help ourselves and one another to embrace our individual and collective shadows, to heal and learn the gifts of the alchemist, and to awaken. We can do this instead of all the collective insanity.

I don't just write this for anyone who might stumble across my blog. I write this for myself, too. And for my beautiful baby grandson. And for all the children and grandchildren everywhere. I write from my heart for all beings. Because I am scared. And I know that these times ask of me and you and all of us to be brave. And to care. And to sober up and wake up and open our eyes. To be that brave. And to work as best as we can, day by day, moment by moment, to set down that which would distract and divide us or cause us to become mired in hopelessness and despair. We need each other. We do. And we are all in this together.

May we be mindful of the ripples we send out into the world and allow access to our own hearts. May we increasingly be the peace and love, the courage and compassion, the growing wisdom and wholeness that is yearned for and so deeply needed. To transform our world, we are first asked to transform ourselves.

Bless us all ~ Molly

 Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers 

within yourself that you have built against it. ~ Rumi