Conscious Community

by Carrie Chesney

The world is a puzzling place. If there’s one thing I know, it’s that. Humans are not content with simplicity in the face of complexity. To seem intelligent, one must have a silver tongue and a charming smile; but in truth, this is where reality hides, a mass of quivering fear and stubbornness all rolled up in egocentrism.

We, as humans, have the ability and the drive to delve deeper into the things that interest, intrigue and fascinate us. In the new movie Intolerable Cruelty, George Clooney spits at the haughty and clever Catherine Zeta Jones, with a cartoon-like quality, “You fascinate me.” However, it often seems that the only things people actually want to delve very far into are the very things that have no depth: money, beauty, and power. People can talk for days about how to maintain their trim-looking waist, how to invest money, and how they are truly the dominant, all-knowing force in their relationships, as well as their own lives.

Perhaps this is just a side effect from living in a western industrialized country, where the focus lies on the things that can create comfort and security in life. It seems like everyone wants a spouse, a white picket fence and 2.5 children. No one has truly learned to create his or her own model of how to live.

People wonder why divorce rates have gone up, why more people are going to counseling, and why the stress rate in America is sky high. No one has stopped to look around at the double standard that IS the United States of America. We’ll allow you to speak your mind, but you must conform to our standards. We’ll allow you to own weapons, but you aren’t allowed to use them. We want to be a loving, altruistic nation, and yet we go and stick our hands in other nations’ business with violent intent.

We don’t want eating disorders and teenage pregnancy, but we’ll still flood every single advertisement, TV show, and teen magazine with half-naked, thin, beautiful women. We don’t want you to be overweight, and yet, there’s a fast-food place on every corner, with weight-loss gurus lurking in the background waiting for the money to come flooding in. In reality, maybe if Americans, when they thought of going to a fast-food place, instead took those meals and sent them to a country where people were starving, we’d still be thin, and they might actually be well fed.

So with all these incongruities, where’s the truth in it all? Where’s that underlying depth that will keep us happy and intrigued? For those who play the game of life, it might very well be in who can keep up the “strategery” (thanks G.W.) involved in clutching onto those aforementioned securities that the whole of humanity, or at least the majority of Americans, strive for.

Many, however, can’t seem to find solace or happiness in that, and as they grow older, they begin to wonder where their life has gone. Just as we are told fairy tales as children, eventually, we learn the truth that love is not often won by being a princess or a prince. This fairy tale of a successful life is often exposed for exactly what it truly is: work, hardship and loneliness. The cynicism that pervades our society is no accident. The rate of depression and suicide is also no accident. People achieve their goals only to find a sense of emptiness that comes with it.

So I’m sure you’re thinking, “If our society is so superficial and people are so shallow, where are we supposed to find this depth and happiness?” Well, that is for you to decide. Your own sense of curiosity and fascination should guide you to where you want to go. Take one day to just be free of the societal norms that would normally dictate your life and do something fun, worthwhile, and meaningful. Do something that you know will create a lasting impression, not only for yourself, but for others as well. Find the true meaning of love and life, even if it lasts for just a split second.

Most importantly, look into something you might never have looked into before, whether it be a person, a subject, a place, or something else. Often, it’s not what’s on the surface that makes the difference; it’s what’s inside. People are far too hesitant to find out the reality that lies under the surface of something big and scary, or cute and fluffy, or intelligent and cold. No matter what the characteristic, the outward projection is often taken and written off as the sole reason for not doing something or not getting to know someone. Do something you’d never do. After that, form your opinions, form your perceptions, and form your life.

Too many people go through life without learning a thing from what goes on around them or even from the events that happen in their own lives. Some people walk through life like robots, sucking energy from others, analyzing and evaluating and collecting, but never experiencing or feeling. They do a great job of looking at the situation, but never comprehend the effect. Life, no matter how much we want it to be, is not static and unchanging. Once we obtain the security and the coveted things that our society seems to worship, we forget that these things can easily be lost, the value can easily be forgotten, and the novelty wears off. Our happiness, our lifeblood, must be found in other ways, in other places.

So, figure out where your truth is. Find out what fascinates, intrigues, and entices you. Delve deeper with each passing moment. Don’t let yourself get stuck in a plan that is not feeding as much energy into you as you are into it. See through the surface that separates you from the truth. Don’t let your mind become complacent. Always explore with a lighter, childlike quality and you will learn that happiness exists in more nooks and crannies of life than you might ever have imagined.

This month, the list of people we hope to assist through the combined spirit-power of our community members has grown.

* White light and love for... *

• Rainbow’s mother, who is frail and ill with cancer.



• Libra_Sun’s aunt, who is hospitalized with cancer.



• Douglas’ grandmother (WriteOn’s grandmother-in-law), who has a cancer diagnosis and believes her time of passing is near.



• Moonflower’s husband (BlueDove’s dad), who faces serious medical tests.



• Woodchiro’s daughter (Veneo’s stepdaughter), Krista, who is dealing with the aftermath of an incident of victimization by an adult.



• Searching’s friend and pastor, Mother Kathleen, who recently went through surgery and is having a painful recovery.



• WriteOn’s friend and pastor, Father John, who is elderly and undergoing open-heart surgery.



• Dong-Yue Zhang, a 9-year-old who goes by the name Cecilia, who went missing from her home in a north Toronto neighbourhood.



• Terri Schindler Schiavo, whose life hangs in the balance as her husband fights for her “right to die.”



• Moonflower’s e-mail friend, Ann, and her three grandchildren. The children have recently been taken away from their drug-using mother and put in foster care. Their father hopes to win custody of the children.

That’s it for this month. If any of you have any comments, questions, or white light requests, either PM me (enchantress299) or e-mail me at metamorphosis@consciousevolution.com.