I know that’s a tough one to consider. We desired this economic crisis? Is there any truth at all to this?
I see that the world around me has become mired in materialistic quests that yield just what people set out to attain, and yet they are left more miserable and lacking than before. I see that the media plays a part in the convincing of each person that people are incomplete unless they meet the standards set by a society (which is in fact the media’s definition) that is so far removed from reality it’s quite alarming. I see that people mindlessly buy into what they see on magazine covers, what they watch on television, and what they believe is the reality of people all around them. I believe the truth is that most are playing parts based on what they believe others are doing instead of what’s actually going on.
Americans’ belief that we must have more is what has led us to this current crisis. Our souls—the buried-deep parts of each of us that long to be recognized, respected, revered—are speaking right now. It is time we listen.
The soul is the essence of who each of us is. It is the part of us that is connected with whatever we believe is divine. Whichever deity fits your particular lifestyle, that’s who your soul is connected with. If you are without a deity, it’s the highest you, you can be.
Life bombards us daily with excess. The excesses do not appeal to the soul but to the ego. The ego is the humanness of ourselves that includes at least three parts: the personality we have created based on our own beliefs about life, whatever groups we identify with, and our current roles in life (occupation, position in family, etc.).
The soul, on the other hand, is that still part that resides deep inside that nudges us from time to time to explore other options, to examine our relationships, or to create something. It totally is disconnected from the ego. What happens is that people lose touch with the soul and forget what the voice sounds like. Instead, they begin to hear the voice of the commercials, see the headlines of the pop magazines or the news, and feel like society’s standards are accurately displayed through the media. This places each person in a position to perpetuate the myths of perfection through jobs, appearances, relationships and the like. Unfortunately, this further silences the voice of the soul.
Does this cause the soul to pack up its intent and move away?
No.
The soul rears its head to tell us to make changes. And what is the soul connected to? It is connected to the divine, the infinite, the invisible forces of the universe and that connection is always there. And does the divine ever cause us harm? No. Is the divine always acting from a place of love for us without condemnation? Yes. And if our souls are connected (and they are) then our souls can cause no harm but only love.
The soul speaks often but we won’t listen. The soul needs to be heard, but we feel we haven’t the time for “soul searching” because we all have life to live and no time for anything that takes away from our quest for more things or higher paying jobs.
Wrong.
The soul is the highest part of each person and it knows what should happen and the way we all should live. It will create the space, the opportunity, time and time again for us to make changes, to recalibrate ourselves so that our human selves can live in more synchronicity with our souls. And when we live from that soul level, we truly feel happiness.
And this is how we have created this current economic crisis, how we desired for it to happen.
We got so caught up in getting bigger houses, more stuff. We have shoveled material things into a bottomless void. We hoped to clog up the bottom with our stuff but we found out that no matter how much stuff we put in, there’s always a leak: a desire for more.
Our souls began to whisper to us that the excesses are unessential but we didn’t listen. Our collective conscience kept telling us to buy more, spend more, get bigger, newer, more improved gadgets, and all the while the soul is shrinking back but never giving up, urging us to reconsider. Our souls said to us, “These things could afford some opportunities for joy but they are things. Joy comes from inside.”
Our souls, working from our highest selves, our greatest good, as connections to what we believe is the divine, had to do something to get our attention. Our egos created the mess, and now our souls are just beginning to be heard.
With loss of jobs comes a return to some basic survival issues. We begin to evaluate what is superfluous in our lives. We look at what corners we can cut, what “excess” we truly do not need, and we realize we have been expending a lot of energy toward places and things that didn’t hold our highest selves in reverence. Many have stepped back and said that there is nothing they can do and are waiting on some outside mythical force to come along and save the day. But for many (and in fact, anyone who is willing to admit the truth), this particular crisis has become not a crisis at all but a blessing.
We have a responsibility to own in our current economy. It is time we stop blaming the lending companies and the government. It is time we take responsibility for our part in buying into this whole mess. It is time we realize that our unthinking is what got us here. It is time we own our truths.
We are the ones who have allowed ourselves to be persuaded by what society shows us to be important. We have lost our own morals and values, traded them for some media-defined set instead. We watch what is supposed to be entertainment on television or at the movies and we allow ourselves and our family to be duped into buying into their version of right and wrong.
And for many, we condemn the television as a result of lack of morals but watch it anyway.
It’s nothing we can blame anyone else for anymore. It’s time to own our part and move forward, not backward from here.
When people’s lives and livelihoods are threatened, they instinctively go back to the most basic modes of survival. This is the unevolved way of our animal instincts. Fight for food, protect the young, and run away if we know we cannot win. But we have moved so far past this in this lifetime. We cannot digress to the caveman-with-big-stick-waiting-by-the-door-to-ambush-the-next-trespasser way of thinking. We must hold on to that which has evolved within our human spirit and remain connected to others and to the divine in order to pull ourselves from the pits.
Our responsibility in all of this is ours. We, collectively as a society, have done this to ourselves. We may not have said, “Oh, I want to lose my job.” But we needed to examine our lives. Some of us are only doing this for the first time in our lives. And others are re-evaluating yet again what is important; what needs to stay which is serving us well, and what things are taking away from our joy or causing us discomfort. In examining our lives, we find that our souls have nudged us from time to time to make changes and we have often failed to listen. We find that there were things about that job we just lost that had kept us down, held us back, or just stifled something about us. We find we have been freed of some of the shackles that held us. We secretly celebrate the taste of that freedom before we announce to the world just how unlucky we are in being suddenly unemployed. And then what do we do?
Do we begin immediately counting our blessings, reconnecting with our families, having open and honest conversations with those around us, sharing the pain and fear of change? No, our egos tell us otherwise. Our egos tell us to blame, point fingers, and wait for handouts.
The universe (your God or whatever your belief system) does not work in negative ways. The universe is good. Your responsibility in this is, in fact, to begin with gratitude. You must announce the wonderful blessings that you do receive in your life. You must announce to the world all the things that you have to be grateful for as you begin a search for new life. This is when the universe will begin to support you.
No need to turn it all over to the universe because then nothing happens. You must move yourself and your energy forward in order to begin the process. You must search within your soul to understand who you truly are and then begin to clean out the parts that lie within the ego that simply aren’t you. And it’s time to start now.
The universe is benevolent and only works in support of the true you, your highest self, the soul.
The economic troubles that surround us today are hints from the universe, from God, and from the soul that it is time for us to go deeper and make a shift away from what we have allowed to become the standards and toward a higher purpose. It is time for us to take responsibility for the growth and evolution of our souls. It is time for us to devote time and energy to understand our connections, the coincidences in life, and the invisible currents that lead us to our situations we find ourselves in. It is time to become more aware of the behind-the-scenes activities that always serve to make us better people. It is time for us to realize we did, in fact, desire this economic crisis so that we could re-evaluate our lives and make changes for the better.
We must start today.
