OUR DAY OF RECKONING? THAT WOULD BE EVERY DAY!
Photo by Agnieszka Taggart
“Our loyalties must transcend our race, our tribe, our class, and our nation; and this means we must develop a world perspective. … We must either learn to live together as brothers or we are all going to perish together as fools.”
—Martin Luther King Jr.
I've long appreciated this statement from Dr. King. I think it was a couple of elections ago when I first came across it. At the time, the rhetoric among candidates had grown personal and ugly. When arguing policy issues is no longer enough (and that's on us, folks!), they often resort to unsubstantiated attacks, defaming one another's character. I found myself wondering, whatever happened to decency? Then I remembered: power—or the pursuit of it—can be a violent game.
I have lived long enough, several decades, to witness cultural shifts over time. The 2000s are nothing like the 1950s. Culture and society march ahead, and it's up to us to keep up. But here's the rub: progress strains our attention spans. In politics, media, entertainment, even business, the game has changed. To capture our eyes and ears, the strategy is simple—stir things up, rile people, scare them. It works. Fear diverts attention from what truly matters because when we're afraid, our thinking becomes dulled and ineffective.
Yet, amidst all this noise, one thing remains unchanged: our inherent connection—to each other and to everything around us. We are not isolated individuals, not standalone models. The ancients understood this deeply. Author Marlo Morgan reflects on the Australian Aboriginal understanding of the universe:
“Our people live in oneness with the earth, all its creatures, and each other … every physical thing on planet Earth comes from the One Divine Source, and all are made from identical fragments of energy. We are all one with creation.”
That One Divine Source, as I see it, is the Cosmic Universe—the fragments of energy, the different levels of vibration, the Unified Field that constitutes matter and non-matter. It's not the identity-bound God we argue over, debating whose God is “right.” The ancients were in tune with this truth, and anthropologists echo it today. We could even say everything has a soul—you, me, plants, rocks. That's the connectivity of all things. But that's another conversation... or maybe not entirely.
Isn't it mind-boggling? Those we often label as “primitive” had a clearer grasp of reality than we do. Our disconnection from this awareness, from our place within the fabric of everything, is the result of manipulation—through chaos, misdirection, and fear. And remember, fear suppresses clear, effective thinking. It makes us... well, less effective.
We are not lost. We're simply on a sliding scale of effectiveness. While I was researching recently, I stumbled upon this piece from Werner Erhard, dating back to the old est days:
"Responsibility begins with the willingness to take the stand that one is cause in the matter of one’s life. It is a declaration, not an assertion; that is, it is a context from which one chooses to live.
Responsibility is not burden, fault, praise, blame, credit, shame, or guilt. In responsibility, there is no evaluation of good or bad, right or wrong.
There is simply what’s so, and the stand you choose to take on what’s so.
Being responsible starts with the willingness to deal with a situation from the view of life that you are the generator of what you do, what you have, and what you are.
That is not the truth. It is a place to stand. No one can make you responsible, nor can you impose responsibility on another.
It is a grace you give yourself—an empowering context that leaves you with a say in the matter of life.
What I think he's saying, from the early '70s, is this: You and I have a choice. The challenge is, how do we recover even a fraction of the awareness our distant ancestors had—that we are ALL connected to everything? If you truly believed and lived that reality, how would your life look different?
When we look out at the world around us, it's the world of our own personal creation. It's what we've chosen, often unknowingly, shaped by the distractions and noise that surround us.
As Dr. King said, “...We must either learn to live together as brothers or we are all going to perish together as fools.”
May 2025 be the tipping point of waking up, and may you find yourself on the front lines.
Cheers and blessings,
Craig
Fundamental of the Week #13: FIND A WAY
Look for how we can do it rather than explaining why it can’t be done. Take personal responsibility. Be innovative, assertive, and take initiative.
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