The World's A Mess — It's in My Kiss
The sense of impending implosion in the world is palpable. Even in the wake of 911, there was a period when New York City and then the world united to help heal each other's psyches. At the moment, in a politically fractured European Union and Great Britain, in the wake of the Orlando shooting, and yet another terrorist attack.. in Turkey.. Kali Yuga is in full effect.
The Hindu term means 'age of [the demon] Kali' and has been described in scripture as a time of darkness when humanity has lost its way and greed, self-importance and avarice prevail. I've written about this period before in my old blog and am sad to feel compelled to write about it again.
Whatever you believe — atheist/spiritual/religious or Democrat/Republican/Libertarian or Remain/Leave — matters not. The point is, thanks to a perfect storm of events and zeitgeist, no one seems to be getting along. Worse, no one seems to want to. Split by the seemingly diverse phenomena of discrimination, tight categorization (I won't use the term binary because it frankly is annoyingly PC at this point...) and yes political correctness, there seems little wiggle room to just BE.
The human animal is born with the capability to hate — we feel it deep in our guts and spend our lives either suppressing, exploring or transforming that energy. But coupled with the digital landscape of 140 characters summing up complex issues and the cloak of anonymity breeding a mob mentality, things are looking pretty bleak.
I'm not writing this to be negative. In fact, I'm hoping that putting pen to paper as it were will somehow purge me of these dark energies I've been unconsciously absorbing. For as the cliché goes, it's always darkest before the dawn. And in practical terms, sometimes you need to 'bottom out' before you can rebuild from the ashes.
When this darkness started to pick up speed a year or two ago, I bought the Srimad Bhagavatam — a text that is purported to help people through the Kali Yuga. It contains parable of wisdom — fairy tales for enlightenment. This one, which I shall leave you with, underscores how challenging it is to be living in a city and consumed by the plague of technology's constant pull. The monk high up in the Himalayan hills has it easy — a clear mind in the quiet of the clouds isn't really all that clear. It's the constant onslaught of darkness in the density of the city and in the shadow of modernity that challenges each and every one of us.
*Take this word as something nebulous that could mean the vastness of the cosmos or the power of belief (not necessarily an omnipotent bearded man in flowing robes)