The Things We Do for A Higher Purpose

There was an author of notable fame some decades ago who wrote several books in the self-help genre. The books were intelligent, easy to read for most seekers of self-knowledge, and balanced in their instruction. I bought two of the books myself. At the height of the author’s fame, I happened to watch an interview of him and was surprised to see that he came across visually as nutty as a pecan orchard. Doctor McCoy from Star Trek would probably say that he didn’t appear to be “operating on all thrusters." Why, I wondered, would such a learned person be so believable in print but not in a person to person interview? Much later I would come to understand why. He was talking about things of a spiritual and universal nature. This kind of information can be very difficult to translate verbally sometimes. It is much easier to convey these things in printed form than it is in spoken words.

There was, many years ago, another author who wrote about astrology and was very good at explaining it well enough for anyone to learn the basic tenets. This author wrote several very well received books on the subject, but in the last few books that the author published there were things that did not make a lot of sense unless you are capable of knowing how the input from spirit is received. As someone who does know, it was easier for me to recognize that some of the information being told there was of a “need to know” nature. The author needed to know it, but that doesn’t equal that everyone else would understand it’s meaning. It is sometimes difficult to distinguish what information can be passed on to others and what should not be when dealing with the higher realms. It doesn’t always come with a warning label and it is up to the receiver to consider it rather like a prescription drug. It is of benefit to you but it could be harmful to someone that it was not prescribed for.

There are some people who are entrusted with higher knowledge who reach a point in their evolution where they have mentally processed too much. Some have difficulty conveying what they know easily and some will find themselves in spiritual crisis until they have time to sort it out. If they are in severe crisis, it may be visible to others. This can be especially true if they have come to a point where they can no longer socialize with people who have not evolved to the same level. When they have moved beyond “small talk” conversations they become irritated and distracted when it is necessary to “come back” from their “level” and focus upon everyday topics that seem irrelevant to them now because they are apt to feel that many surface level subjects solve no problems and may be subjects that only create more problems. This is hard, very hard, to deal with and I believe that the authors that I have written about here had come to that point. There is also the possibility that they were truly losing their marbles. There is a limit to how much storage capacity there is in the human mind. People used to say that we only use about 10% of our brain’s capacity but I do not believe that theory as far as memory is concerned.

There is, in the Harry Potter wizarding world, something called a “Pensieve” where one can store memories or information that is not needed on a daily basis, rather like an external hard drive. You can access and retrieve the information whenever you need to, but only if you are a wizard. Spiritual cognizance is rather like that. Years of universal information has been given to you. To have ready access to all of it all of the time would be a very heavy burden to carry and it would likely rob you of your ability to function well in daily living. To access information that has been placed in “storage” you have to “go within” to retrieve it. Think of how you used to be able to remember telephone numbers with ease when that was something that was helpful to you every day, but with the invention of smart phones the calculation is done for you and you may not even remember the phone numbers of those closest to you now because it isn’t something that is required of you daily. If your brain could retain all of that plus what you know now then I might subscribe to the 10% theory and assume that we just aren’t trying very hard to use what we are capable of. Marbles can be lost. But learning to retrieve them is also possible with a “Pensieve” if you are a wizard, or an ability to access the storage facility of the spirit if you have that connection.

The longer that you live a spiritual existence the more you will find yourself needing to experience things that tend to be very much “outside the box.” If you have a mentor on your journey these things are a little easier to manage. You have someone who has “been there” as far as having to comprehend what seems impossible on the face of it, but the day always comes when there is no mentor and it is just you and your connection to the higher mind. Many, many times the higher mind is very cryptic in what it is telling you. There are also times when you receive information or a warning that comes so far advanced in its lesson that it cannot be verified for years. Then there is the information that comes, seemingly, with a higher price or a sacrifice that you are unwilling to accept. When that happens, mercifully sometimes, it does not come so quickly that you don’t have the time to balance yourself with it or evolve to a point where it isn’t so dreadful as it seems. Until you reach that point you may fight with it day and night. If you are lucky, you can “role play” through the possibilities of what is to come. Think Dungeons & Dragons, except spirit is the dungeon master and you are on the mental quest to see how you will react to the events to come. Initially, you will play out the scenario the way you believe is all that you can manage. Spirit will then show you how you will fall off a cliff trying to play it in your own way. Sometimes the quest is just more than you want to deal with and may throw you off balance in a way that you just cannot stomach. I would say here that “resistance is futile” because whatever spirit is trying to lead you to is not likely to change just because you don’t want to do it. So, you may keep role playing and not believing for quite a while before you get to the point that it feels more manageable.

I hope you get to that point easily but if it takes a long time to get there you may find that others think you have gone nuts if your spiritual role playing trial spills over into your behavior. It does happen. When it does, people usually will jump to the easiest conclusion that they can make. You come across like a weirdo and that is what you get labeled. You can’t blame them, really. They don’t have a clue what is going on in your head, and how many times have you seen movies where someone has schizophrenia, or dementia that is undiagnosed? It is easy for others to think that they already know what is going on, but the higher levels in spirituality do not work like an average day in the life. So, if you are lucky, the people around you are not constant critics of the out of the ordinary but when they are, doing a balancing act is all that you have until your role playing reveals the reality in a way that you have practiced on for god knows how long to manage your next journey. Try to think of it like Noah’s ark in the Bible. Everyone thought he was nuts until the day that the flood came.

That is actually a tricky situation to be in because everything in spirituality is interpretation, and your explanations for your behavior likely won’t hold water for many people, especially when you are likely to be evolving as you go along, and you might not feel like explaining anything. You may not have full knowledge of an outcome. Before we knew about the Coronavirus I was told that there was a very real possibility that we could get severe pneumonia and we would need to stop going to places where there would be lots of people and not go places where items might be touched by many others such as a thrift shop or an antique store. It would also be dangerous to be in a school or a place of employment with a lot of employees. The next month this prediction would be horribly true, but few things will slap you with a right now total truth in what you perceive as this did. An impending accident can be perceived quickly but other warnings can come over time and what you initially are told may seem cut and dry but when it actually manifests it could come to fruition in a mind-blowingly different form from what you have been seeing and when that happens you will be incredibly glad if you didn’t share your impressions with anyone too early because talking about an ongoing spiritual event can well and truly make you look like you have lost your mind. Many things are not a dire situation like Covid was but because what you do is not well understood by the average citizen you cannot afford to risk your credibility early on. It can be tough to know when to open your mouth and when not to but a spiritual life isn’t for everyone. You just will be making judgement calls that are beyond an everyday life. If you couldn’t do it, you wouldn’t have it, but that doesn’t mean it is going to be a breeze.

In the 1957 film The Delicate Delinquent, actor Jerry Lewis has a neighbor named Mr. Crow. (see the video below) Mr. Crow looks like an eccentric scientist of the harmless sort, but who would believe that he has actually invented a frog ship that will be a future necessity? No one. Even I would have trouble believing it unless the earth was actually about to be destroyed and spirit said, “save the frogs!” Highly unlikely, maybe, but I didn’t expect to see humanity go off the deep end, or climate change to wreak the havoc that it is for our planet right now, or to watch our government officials do their damnedest to destroy everyone who isn’t a Christian white male in this country. So, as impossible as a spiritual prediction might look on the face of it, you really cannot discount them even if the possibility seems remote. It is up to you to save your knowledge for a time because few people are going to be as accommodating and philosophical as Jerry Lewis was in the movie.

If you are given more than you believe that you can handle in this life from trying to live in a truly spiritual way, I hope that you find yourself in an environment as kind as Mr. Crow did or the two authors that I spoke about here. They may come across as weird or bizarre until we can see exactly where they are coming from. People went to their death during the height of the pandemic still denying that there was such a thing. They might have been saved if they had just allowed for the possibility that the danger could be real. Know that most people will see things the wrong way from the get go, but when the time comes that we can see things clearly, there may be room for a frog ship in there somewhere, however remote that might seem at first.

Civil Disobedience

The Netflix film The Trial of The Chicago 7 should be required viewing for anyone who believes that public protest is the way to promote change in America. The movie is a tragic retelling of what happened at the 1968 protest of the Vietnam War that took place during the Democratic Convention that was held in Chicago. The so-called Chicago 7 were arrested and put on trial for their efforts the next year and subjected to what amounted to a kangaroo court trial after the new Republican administration took office in 1969 when the new President and Attorney General decided to dig the criminal charges out of mothballs and prosecute the protesters and send a message to anyone of likeminded ideals that America was going to shut you down for having the audacity to disagree with its policies. That we have the legal right to assemble and protest what we feel is wrong in the world is a right that can be squashed at any time by our leaders whenever they feel like doing the squashing.  What the Chicago 7 wanted to stop was a war that had already killed many thousands of Americans and would continue to kill many thousands more before the troops were brought home in the 1970s. I don’t blame them for trying to stop the war. They had every right to want to live.

There are few if any protestors today that are objecting to the Russia-Ukraine war that is going on now because there aren’t any Americans over there doing the fighting but as a result of this war many Americans are becoming destitute because we are supporting it financially and capitalism is taking advantage of the conflict. There are more deaths here every single day than are occurring in the war because people have lost their minds and their hope and are taking their fear and frustration out on others who are not responsible for their trauma. We are seeing some protests here for the injustice and inequality that we are experiencing but people who have lived to remember how past protests were carried out were proactive in setting up a legal system that would be able to call a halt to the unrest in most cases before it could get too far out of hand. That is, unless they approve of the unrest, and the protests over inequality are being ignored and stamped out lightning fast by a system that wants to hear no flack about it. So, with all of the deck stacked against us in the corporate, legal, and political factions most of us are incapable of making any headway in our attempts to right the wrongs against us. So, without political representation large enough to bring down the creators of rampant inequality we will see our attempts to stand alone against the Goliath inequality machine that holds a wrecking ball over our heads result in even tighter restraints and in far too many cases the deaths of those who would dare try to stop the purveyors of the destruction of what may be left of democracy. When you see the abject failure of protestors such as the Chicago 7 in the film, you know that it is only a change of thinking in the minds of those in power that will be able to turn the suffering around. But how can we do it? What will it take to redirect the energy that is being used to destroy the people? Only a major loss of some sort has the power to turn the situation around or there will have to be a new understanding of how detrimental their policies really are.

When the people protested in centuries past, they had much less to lose than we do now. Yes, you were probably more likely to lose your life then or your freedom. You would probably be thrown into prison maybe for the rest of your life doing hard labor, but the consequences for standing up against tyranny were mostly cut and dry. It was pretty much you will prevail or you won’t, but doing nothing about the inequality that existed was a sure bet that no one in the ruling class was going to advocate for you and no laws were ever going to be enacted to change your circumstance. Revolt was your only option. In the here and now we have come to believe that there is always a possibility that change could happen. Our elected officials who refuse to actually represent us could logically be voted out after their terms end. We might be able to elect a candidate who understands the needs of the people within a few years. There is still a hope in the minds of many people that this can happen. But our representatives are aware of that fact, too, and they have spent many decades working furiously to tip the scales in their favor by using underhanded tactics to take as much of our voting power away from us as they can, and they have been successful too much of the time. There is much talk about their having cheated us out of truly free and fair elections but there seemingly isn’t the will or the ability to actually stop it. Though we are still fairly confident that it can be done we don’t seem to be able to accomplish that. Historically, people knew darn well that things would not change without new people in charge. So, with the gerrymandering of districts and voter suppression and the voter intimidation that occurs it is amazing that we still believe that anything helpful can come out of an election here. They didn’t believe it back in 1968 and for us to believe it in 2023 is pretty darn amazing since people are more narcissistic and selfish now than ever before.

Let us count the ways in which we lose without actually losing our lives in today’s world. When basic living necessities are enormously expensive and even impossible for many to obtain you would think that the first people to take a stand against tyranny would be the homeless, the working homeless, and the working poor. They have already lost what so many of us are afraid of losing without uttering one word in dissent over a capitalist system that made their situation possible. It is said that many of our homeless here are mentally ill and/or drug addicted. I think that assessment is likely true, but I used to work in a homeless shelter and I have seen that most of them are just regular people who found themselves in some unfortunate circumstances that could have happened to any of us given the same situation. So why aren’t these people standing up and being vocal about what caused them to have fallen and made it impossible for them to get up again? It is anguish and embarrassment that they found themselves in their predicament. It is also a society that is quick to blame and quick to stomp on you to make sure that you can’t get back up. Your life is bad enough without calling more attention to yourself and risking the laughter and abuse that too many people feel entitled to subject you to if you were to dare point the finger at the elitist society that created the circumstances that makes poverty in a very wealthy society possible. Kicking people when they are down is a favorite pastime of those who are arrogantly sure that they are too damn good to ever have to endure such a fate.

So, who among us has the ability to shake up the system and wake up the ignorant to the realization that the fear, the violence, the crime, and the loss of democracy and a true sense of community here exists because of a lack of maturity and a lack of responsibility on the part of too many of us? It is a cinch that they won’t listen to the poor, and the poor are afraid and already pretty sure that their voices count for nothing. Is it possible that those in power would have to become the poor to have any real understanding? I have seen politicians tell their stories of growing up poor or having parents who fell upon hard times like a badge of honor and try to remind everyone that you just have to work hard and get a good education to make it. Once again telling us that it is our own fault that we aren’t living the good life that anyone who isn’t lazy can achieve in America, and pretending that you are responsible yourself for never having enough to satisfy the demands of capitalism. Who will be able to erase that ignorant origin where this kind of thought process comes from? Do you believe that a university education can fix that? I don’t think so when it is our business, legal, and medical schools who are teaching capitalism and obscene profit aspirations. Where will a different mindset be found? If it isn’t already in your heart, you are unlikely to ever find it. And for those people who do not possess that kind of heart the only hope is a government that will legislate it. And if we don’t have the intestinal fortitude to demand and create that kind of legislation then expect the extinction of at least ¾ of the population within the next five to ten years. There just isn’t any other way that can evolve from where we now stand. Everyone wants to keep their freedom but refuses to acknowledge that the ability to belittle and terrorize others for their differences is not freedom, it is irresponsibility and ignorance held on to as a leftover from childhood when if parents and older people didn’t teach you restraint and show you a better way to get along in this world you would destroy it and then wonder how it became destroyed.

How is it possible that this video is even more relevant 39 years later than it was in 1984?

I will not mention any more spoilers from The Trial of The Chicago 7 here but I will tell you that if you can stomach the abusive treatment of the defendants during their trial you will not wonder why the people who stage a protest rarely have a better outcome than these people did. It is because of a system that fears the loss of the superiority that they feel they are entitled to. And it is those very people who believe that they earned their entitlement who are the ones who must see to it that entitlement to live without the fear of illness and death and basic human dignity is afforded to everyone and should never be contingent on the whims of others whose judgements can be horribly wrong when they are based on an illusion of power and grandiosity which has to be proven to an admiring world constantly, many times at the cost of the lives of others. To assume that your station in life grants you that right is to be challenged on that assumption by those who will not willingly lay down their own lives for you, and should not ever have to hit back with violence to get you to understand that.