A 5,000-word text on what is happening on Earth right now
Over the past few years, I have increasingly come to feel that we are in the midst of a war for the soul of mankind.
I realize this may sound like an extreme, alarmist, ‘conspiritual,’ or outright bonkers statement.
Yet, the more deeply I connect to my own Heart…
The more I allow my Heart to be purified in the Fires of the Loving Presence of God…
The more I find myself looking out at this world and witnessing so many people living lives of tremendous desecration, disconnection, and violence toward themselves and others. So many souls here are lost, deeply wounded, despairing, confused, sick, addicted, tormented, or dead inside. So many innocent children are being abused, neglected, and traumatized.
This civilization, on the whole, is not being driven by the Heart.
It is not being driven by the Unconditional Love that is our true nature.
Why?
“Forces of Darkness”
I will not claim to have all the answers about this or about anything. Here is my working model:
There are forces—psychological, archetypal, spiritual, magickal, extraterrestrial, and/or extra-dimensional, depending on your interpretation—that do not serve Life, Love, and the full blossoming of humanity & earthly life, but which rather mislead humanity into the direction of forgetfulness, delusion, enslavement, and/or inner death.
The forces of darkness and decay can be unbelievably subtle, clever, and insidious in their trickery. Ultimately they too are great teachers and are of the One Source. Yet pragmatically speaking, many of us are here at this time to transfigure these energies toward the Love Which Transcends And Includes All Dualities.
Most of civilization, most institutions, and even most spiritual, religious, transformational, and psychedelic movements/organizations, are at least partially or largely in the (subtle) grips of forces that do not serve Life, Love, and the flourishing of all beings.
It requires tremendous discernment, wisdom, discipline, and heart-connection to navigate civilization at this juncture without becoming ensnared in the (often subtle and invisible) webs of trickery that are designed to take you away from God, from Love, from your own Heart, Soul, and Highest Good.
Phew, let’s take a breath for a moment. This can be a lot to chew on.
Dark Entities & Dark Magick
To be honest, at this point my view is that the forces of darkness on this planet are not merely psychological or even archetypal in nature…
[Though I do sense there is a kind of transpersonal mirroring/interbeing of ‘internal’ and ‘external’ within (this layer of) reality, meaning that what exists ‘out there’ and what exists ‘in here’ are fascinatingly interdependent / co-arising / non-separable.]
The feeling I have, based on many direct experiences with transpersonal / spiritual / extra-dimensional phenomena, is that there are indeed highly intelligent dark entities of an extraterrestrial and/or extra-dimensional origin influencing this earthly realm at this time. There may also be an even more primal / foundational / superseding ‘anti-Divine’ force (“the devil”) animating these dark entities. Such forces want to keep humanity locked into darkness and forgetfulness, as they seem to somehow benefit or ‘feed’ on suffering-energy aka “emotional ‘loosh.’”
“The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist.”
— Charles Baudelaire
It’s okay if you do not believe this. Bear with me. Ultimately the (meta)physical origin of the darkness of the world is not nearly as important as being the Unconditional Love that we are, so as to assist in transfiguring this darkness.
At the same time, I do feel it is important for people to understand what we are (potentially) dealing with and what we are really up against.
When people write off the darkness in the world as ‘random’ or ‘just human nature’ or merely of a psychological or biological origin, they tend to greatly underestimate the insidious intelligence of this darkness. We are talking about a gargantuan dark-magickal intelligence with almost limitless capacity to sneakily corrupt people, hypnotize people, and twist entire institutions and movements and religions and nations toward its own ends—in ways that are often invisible to the average onlooker.
Once your Heart starts really coming back online and you start to really see the condition of this world we’re living in, it’s greatly sobering, sickening, and even horrifying.
Nothing and no one is immune. Every major sector of society is at least partially or largely co-opted by dark-magickal forces.
I am not immune.
In the past year I discovered that my own work/life was co-opted by dark magick to a larger extent than I would’ve ever believed or admitted previously.
I have been massively clearing my heart and life of these influences for the past ~6 months. My heart feels increasingly more clean and clear than ever, though I’m certainly a work-in-progress. I’m sure there’s plenty more work to do ongoingly to maintain this and purify more deeply. Purification is unending and deeper purification is always possible.
Estimating the Level of Dark-Magickal Influence in Various Segments of Civilization
The other day in my IG story I wrote about dark magick and made some estimates regarding the degree to which various movements and sectors of society are co-opted.
I don’t recommend over-fixating on these roughly approximated percentages, yet I do feel they may be useful to give a clear sense of my feeling about the scope of what we’re dealing with. Here is an edited / lengthened version of what I wrote:
[Note: If I say something is X% “co-opted by dark magick,” I’m saying that X% of it is being greatly influenced / ‘hooked into’ by dark forces, toward outcomes ranging from moderately insidious to downright dastardly/evil/terrifying.]
‘Transhumanism’ is 85-90% co-opted by dark magick.
The porn and sex industry is 98-99% co-opted by dark magick.
What passes as “science” is ~75-80% co-opted by dark magick.
Scientism is 95% co-opted by dark magick.
Academia is 70-80% co-opted by dark magick.
The mass use of alcohol, tobacco, caffeine, and cannabis, is ~70-90% co-opted by dark magick.
Be tremendously discerning and impeccable about where you place your energy and attention.
Social media is 95% co-opted by dark magick. Stop scrolling it. Read wisely-selected books or (Substack) blogs instead.
Ideology is 98% co-opted by dark magick.
Major organized religions—Hinduism, Christianity, Buddhism, Islam, Judaism, Taoism—are ~55-85% co-opted by dark magick. (The Judeo-Christian religions feel more co-opted than the Eastern religions to me.)
Existing governments and militaries are 80-90% co-opted by dark magick.
‘Social justice’ movements are 70-80% co-opted by dark magick.
Big food and big healthcare and big education and big media/entertainment and big finance and big business/advertising and big tech are 80-95% co-opted by dark magick.
Most all institutions and organizations are partially or substantially co-opted.
Again: Be exceptionally discerning.
Your own direct connection to Heart and God will always be the only completely trustworthy source of information / knowing. Yet it requires purification and practice to clear your own channel and recognize your own clear Heart signal.
~70-75% of the spiritualism and New Age movement is co-opted by dark magick. Very few ‘guru’ figures are clear.
~60-65% of the psychedelic movement is co-opted by dark magick.
~80-90% of ‘occultism,’ ‘magick,’ and ‘dark tantra’ is co-opted by dark magick.
“Self-help” and “manifestation” teachings are ~70% co-opted by dark magick.
“Non-duality” / “neo-Advaita” teachings are ~40-55% co-opted by dark magick.
[Direct quotations from great saints, sages, and avatars (Jesus, Buddha, Lao Tzu, Anandamayi Ma, Neem Karoli Baba, etc.) are among the least co-opted materials on Earth, though the popular (organized-religious) translations & interpretations of these quotations are often heavily co-opted by dark magick.]
The ‘coaching industry’ is ~70% co-opted by dark magick.
The ‘Game B’ movement is ~50-60% co-opted by dark magick.
The ‘rationalist’ and ‘effective altruist’ movements are ~70% co-opted by dark magick.
The cryptocurrency movement is presently ~80-85% co-opted by dark magick.
‘Central bank digital currencies’ are ~98-99% co-opted by dark magick.
The ‘metaverse’ is ~90% co-opted by dark magick.
The video game industry is ~85-90% co-opted by dark magick.
That doesn’t mean all these spaces have no value. It just means you have to be extraordinarily discerning and disciplined to dabble skillfully.
This appraisal may sound quite dismal, doom-saying, and dystopian. It’s key to remember that we are still living in a veritable paradise, compared to the worst imaginable scenarios. Yet compared to the most utopian scenarios, we live in a dark realm indeed. (According to Hinduism, we are living in the Kali Yuga, a Dark Age.)
Either way, the task is the same: Clear your channel. Connect to God and your Heart. Be the Love that you are. Sing the song only you can sing. We need you to lead us.
A day or two later I wrote this follow-up message:
The other day I shared some words about dark magick. Those words still largely resonate with me, though I would encourage people not to fixate on the various percentages I assigned to various facets of society, in my attempt to denote the extent to which each facet has been co-opted by dark magick. These percentages would differ a lot depending on how I precisely defined the nuances/parameters of “co-opted by dark magick.”
The key point is simply that most of civilization, most institutions, and even most spiritual, transformational, and psychedelic movements, are at least partially or largely in the (subtle) grips of forces that do not serve Life, Love, and the flourishing of all beings. It requires tremendous discernment, wisdom, discipline, and heart-connection to navigate civilization at this juncture without becoming ensnared in the (often subtle and invisible) webs of trickery that are designed to take you away from your own heart, soul, and highest good.
I love you.
Am I committing the Nirvana Fallacy?
The other day a good friend of mine read my essay on ‘The Mass Traumatization of Children’ and sent me an insightful note, essentially cautioning me against committing the ‘Nirvana fallacy.’
The Nirvana fallacy refers to a cognitive bias in which a person continuously compares our earthly reality with an idealized Nirvana-like utopian fantasy, thus making it seem like our current earthly reality is dreadfully dystopian.
My friend pointed out that I might be doing this, and that if I were to compare our current earthly reality with the worst imaginable scenarios, a different picture would emerge.
This is true, and I’m glad he sent me the note. Our earthly reality looks wildly different depending on one’s frame of reference, and it is useful to counter-balance your frame ongoingly. This can help you avoid the trap of getting sucked into a super-ominous reality-tunnel.
So, I want to acknowledge my potential bias on these matters. I have spent a lot of time envisioning ‘New Earth’ utopian scenarios the past few years, and this certainly impacts the way that I look at our present earthly reality. Compared to living in a torture chamber or death-camp, our civilization is pretty miraculously free and functional for billions of us. That’s useful to remember.
At the same time, this is also a very tricky matter. Ideas such as the ‘Nirvana fallacy’ can actually easily be utilized by dark-magickal forces to hypnotize ‘rationalists’ into blinding themselves to the actual heart-and-soul condition of life on Earth.
Just because most of us are not living in an overt death camp or torture chamber, does not mean that vast quantities of people are not in a critical heart-and-soul condition of (inner) torment. Just because the enslavement and torture of great masses of people is accomplished in a covert manner, in the midst of apparent substantial material decadence and ‘freedom,’ does not mean that there is not a life-or-death war going on—a war for the soul of humanity.
The fact of the matter is that billions of people are (severely) unwell. Look around you and really feel the inner condition of the average person in 2023.
It ain’t pretty.
A Note on Non-Judgment
Note: Nothing I have said or will say in this piece is intended as a statement of judgment or condemnation. No matter how you are living your life, my feeling is that you are a poignant poem written by the hand of the Creator. You are beautiful. Your heart is innocent. You are loved beyond measure. Seen from a ‘God’s eye view,’ all that is unfolding is part of the Divine Plan—part of the unfurling tragicomic tapestry of the masterwork of Divine Creation. It is as it is.
And yet, that doesn’t mean all is rosy and peachy on Earth and there’s “nothing to do, no one to be.” This is a common ‘non-dual’ / ‘New Age’ fallacy. Sure, on one level this life is already Divinity, and God is taking care of everything.
On another level, part of how God takes care of everything is by inspiring God’s children to discover their Heart Calling and live that fully and give their lives over to Love/God—especially in a realm that has fallen greatly into forgetfulness and darkness, in which billions of beings are yearning for the healing Light, Grace, and Love of God.
Those last two paragraphs lead nicely into this:
9 Tips on What to Do in Light of Our Situation
So… Who to trust? What to do?
Great question, thanks for asking. : )
As I said above:
Your own direct connection to Heart and God will always be the only completely trustworthy source of information / knowing. Yet it requires purification and practice to clear your own channel and recognize your own clear heart signal.
Above all, trust yourself. Trust your Heart. Trust your deepest knowing. Trust God. Trust Love. God, Love, and your Heart are the same.
Deep down, you know what to do.
I cannot tell you your own truth. That won’t do you any good. You have to find it out and live it for yourself.
What I can do is make a few recommendations for you to take or leave:
- Train. Initiate yourself. Realize the gravity of our situation and train to be a true Warrior of Love. The other day I shared 32 ways to do that.
- Pray. Give thanks. Ask for guidance. Prayer is powerful. For me at this point it usually feels most powerful to pray directly to God or Jesus. For you this may be different. I recommend praying to whatever you consider the highest principle, the Source of Life, the Heart of Love.
- Be Love. As best you can, in whatever forms that takes for you. Open your Heart and be unconditional Love.
- Live your heart’s calling. However this looks for you. It may be more about what you are being in all circumstances, rather than what you are doing. It might entail using your spare time more wisely to work on something that really flows from your Heart. It might mean quitting your job and devoting your life to a project that blossoms from your Heart.
- Be a great family member. Be a great son, daughter, mother, father, brother, sister, cousin, aunt, uncle, niece, nephew, grandfather, grandmother, grandson, granddaughter, etc. Strong, loving, supportive families are one of the greatest defenses against the forces of darkness. (That is why families have gradually been subtly targeted, eroded, and broken apart in our largely-co-opted civilization.)
- Find loving, supportive community / communities to contribute to. This could be your family, your local community, a men’s group, a women’s group, a church, a spiritual community, a local sports or martial arts club, a chess club, a meditation group, an eco-village, an intentional community, etc.
- Be greatly discerning in all areas of life and find people who can give you radically honest, insightful feedback. It’s really key to realize that no sector of life or civilization is immune from the forces of corruption, misguidedness, darkness, and wickedness. I honestly believe this is a sober, accurate statement. Please message me and tell me if you feel I’m wrong. These forces will pop up where you least expect them. It’s crucial to be continuously discerning and to have people around you who can give you the no-bullshit truth if they feel you’re becoming ensnared in something that isn’t really serving you.
- Ponder this statement from the Bible: “Satan disguises himself as an angel of light.” Often times it is the people who overtly frame themselves as some kind of savior, or priest, or ‘light worker,’ or philanthropist, or shaman, or ‘mirror being,’ or teacher, or wizard, or guru, or devoutly religious person, who you most have to watch out for. It’s a minefield out there. I have rarely in my life met anyone who felt (almost) entirely clear of dark hooks and influences. As a rule of thumb, if any leader is not open to constructive feedback and does not have the humility to admit that they are a work-in-progress, run in the opposite direction. Yet even then, there are people who can throw up a very convincing facade of humility and openness to feedback, while still (unknowingly) leading you toward desolation.
- Your Heart knows the way. Again, in the final analysis, your own purified Heart is the only completely trustworthy compass you have. Weigh everything—even advice from the people you love and trust most—against the knowing of your own Heart. Deep down, you know what is good for you. Your Heart will not lead you astray. Purify your Heart ongoingly so you can sense its answers more clearly; you can do this through sincere prayer, speaking truth always, loving-kindness meditation, doing the right thing always (to the best of your abilities), holding yourself to a high standard of integrity, listening to heart-opening music, and cutting toxic media & other toxic addictions, relationships, or influences out of your life.
A Paradox: Even Anti-Divine Forces Ultimately Serve Divinity
There’s a key paradox that I feel is important to dig into before concluding this essay:
Even that which is intent on *not* serving Life and Love…
Ultimately serves Life and Love.
(We could also say: Does the anti-Divine serve Divinity, or not? Answer: Both, neither, far beyond either.)
How is that possible?
Well, it’s like this:
The presence of a countervailing force is actually a huge part of what ends up *activating*, *initiating*, *awakening*, and *inspiring* beings to grow and evolve and rise to be the Love that they truly are.
In every great Epic ever told, the presence of a Villain or Threat is that which *activates* the Hero to tap into previously dormant inner resources and rise to the occasion to be the Heart-Warrior that they truly are.
In other words, there is no Harry Potter without Voldemort.
Without some kind of dynamic tension between apparently contrary forces, there would be far less “grist for the mill” of self-realization, self-actualization, and soul-evolution.
So, when you really zoom out, you can discover a strange kind of gratitude for the anti-Divine and dark-magickal forces present in our cosmos. You can realize that these forces are actually also “God in disguise,” “Christ in disguise,” “Buddha in disguise,” and have been chosen to play an excruciatingly painful and difficult role in the Grand Drama of Creation. It is not easy to be the “bad guy” who everyone hates, yet it is indeed the “bad guy” who ultimately does a great deal to activate the heroic Heart-Warrior in all of us, and to help our souls evolve.
[Note: This is not for the faint of heart, but if you feel called to explore this idea further and bring Love to the darkest aspects within yourself and all of existence, this song and this song are the two most uncompromising ‘shadow work’ tracks I ever created. If you listen, be sure to listen closely till the end for the full experience.]
Does that mean it doesn’t matter whether we serve the Dark, Light, or anything in-between?
You might wonder: Does that mean that it doesn’t matter whether we decide to serve the Dark or the Light or anything in-between, because it all ultimately serves Divinity anyway?
No, it doesn’t mean that. Such relativism is a common ‘neo-Advaita’ fallacy.
In short: Your Heart knows the way.
When your Heart begins to remember universal Love—the one fabric uniting all of existence—it becomes clear that consciously serving Love is the path forward. To serve Love ultimately goes beyond dualities of Dark and Light. To serve Love is to serve the WHOLE, which transcends and includes both Dark, Light, and the many shades of grey in-between. To serve Love is to practice seeing no enemies in all of Creation, humbly working toward the salvation of *all* beings. To serve Love is to practice universal Forgiveness, and thus to honor God, who does not judge and is only Love.
To truly know Love and turn away from it toward violence, is a grave karmic error, for deep down one will know that, “What I do to another, I do to myself.” To know God and yet to turn away from God, is a betrayal of oneself and of all beings. God does not judge and does not punish, yet there are karmic ramifications built into the fabric of reality.
This karmic meta-structure ultimately serves to guide all beings back to God/Love. As such, to live in falsehood hurts. It hurts all the more as one comes to know God. As such, to know God deeply yet choose to live in darkness, would be one of the most karmically painful experiences, generating great needless suffering for self and others, and preventing the God-knowing being from living their purest truth and serving in their greatest capacity.
This is why, historically, Eastern monks would receive years of purification, ethics, and skillfulness training *before* being initiated into the deeper non-dual secrets of Life. It was understood that honor, heartfulness, humility, and inner nobility matter, and that without this foundation, non-dual insight could destabilize a being and send them spiraling off into relativism or grandiosity.
Again: Your Heart knows the way.
Deep down, we all understand that to know Love and yet to serve something other than Love, is greatly karmically inauspicious.
To consciously know the truth of Interbeing, and yet to live a lie, is simply corrosive to the heart and soul. It dishonors God. Paradoxically, God Himself/Herself may not *ultimately* mind, but the mystery of karma will. The karmic meta-structure of Life is designed to lead back to Love, because Love is the truth of our nature, and thus to knowingly defy this meta-structure is going to “burn like hell.” I doubt many beings have ever attempted this for long, though I imagine it’s possible—for a while. Eventually, all rivers lead to the Ocean, all paths unavoidably lead back to Love.
In the end, Love triumphs. In timelessness, it already has.
If it’s all ultimately Love/God, why even distinguish between anything in the first place?
You might wonder, “If it’s all ultimately Love/God/Interbeing, why draw all these stark distinctions between serving ‘dark magick’ VS serving Love?”
Again, it’s a common ‘neo-Advaita’ fallacy to suggest that one should just “see everything as God” and stop conceiving of dualities or drawing distinctions between anything.
By all means, practice seeing everything as non-separate from God, but also realize that…
In order to navigate skillfully on this earthly plane—which in this age is characterized by great contrast, duality, density, and forgetfulness—we need to be honest about the reality that there are tremendously powerful forces here attempting to hypnotize/seduce us toward destruction.
Yes, these forces are ultimately non-separate and are part of a Grander Harmony that utilizes dynamic tension between (apparently) antagonistic forces to propel a process of cosmic evolution toward Love.
But, it is nonetheless a sacred duty of a Warrior of Love to avoid the path of destruction and darkness, thereby sparing self and others of much unnecessary suffering, and thereby freeing up the Warrior of Love to serve and celebrate Life wholeheartedly in a realm/time when it is needed most.
Jesus Christ’s “narrow path” metaphor is highly apt in this age, on this earthly plane:
“Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the path that leads to life, and only a few find it.”
Traps, sinkholes, and quicksand pits are everywhere these days on Earth. Dark-magickal forces literally constantly try to bombard you with advertisements and flashy supernormal stimuli to seduce you into a life of hollow hedonism, addiction, and consumerism. There are a million ways to sew the seeds of your own destruction.
Love, discernment, courage, generosity, playfulness, discipline, innocence, uprightness, family/community, non-judgment, spiritual Heart-connection, purification, gratitude, and honor: These are the qualities and values that lead to the “narrow path” back Home to Life, Love, and God.
The Heart knows the way.
Jesus Christ, Warrior of Love
The Future of Earth: An Unexpectedly Optimistic Prognosis
So, back to Earth. You might wonder…
What’s the prognosis?
What’s the outlook on all this darkness on Earth?
What does the future hold?
Well, the Hindu ‘Yuga cycles’ model says the Kali Yuga began ~5,000 years ago, and that we still have ~200,000+ years of the ‘Dark age’ ahead. 😅😬
Other ‘New Age’ and indigenous models and prophecies claim that an emerging ‘Golden Age’ will (potentially) arrive much sooner, within the next decades or centuries.
I don’t put too much stock in these models at this point, though I find them interesting to consider.
My sense is that mankind has been substantially in the grips of dark magick for a long time, probably at least a few thousand years (~since the emergence of land ownership, slavery, and large-scale war, perhaps), and I have little sense of when this darkness might lift or be transfigured en masse.
I do often get the sense that we are presently in the midst of a great planetary purge, in which influxes of powerful cosmic energy are pushing our collective darkness to the surface to be seen and perhaps healed/released.
It feels to me like there are wildly different directions this whole thing could flow in the coming decades and centuries. Everything from collective self-destruction, global collapse, totalitarian global surveillance state, ‘mixed bag of full-spectrum flavors,’ and “the more beautiful world our hearts know is possible,” seem to be on the table.
For years, I have also sensed that there are many (extra-dimensional) beings, intelligences, angels, saints, and forces assisting humanity at this juncture, and that it is therefore unlikely that we will see the super-worst-case scenarios come to pass.
Above all, my feeling is that the future is in God’s hands.
Though certainly it would be unwise to use that observation as a justification for apathy.
Even if we are not in control, our Loving Creativity can make a massive difference. That’s another key paradox.
For me, a most crucial realization is that no matter what happens, it’s *all* included in God’s plan. It’s all woven into the Divine Tapestry. Nothing is outside of the accounting of Divine Intelligence.
This is my Heart’s truth, rooted in immediate intuitive sensing and many astonishing experiences of God’s unfathomable majesty.
Life is not random.
You can trust the Ride.
God loves a crazy-epic story, and so do we.
An eternity of ‘Kumbaya’ eye-gazing and hugging circles wouldn’t be nearly as legendary as this tragicomic, infinite-dimensional, hyper-Shakespearean mega-novel of Creation.
The sheer creative genius and poetry of it is staggering.
What could be more riveting than incarnating on a planet in the grips of a millennia-old dark-magickal hypnosis, and having the opportunity to remember, embody, and radiate God’s Loving Grace in that environment?
The preciousness of that gift is beyond all reckoning.
You’re breathing.
You’re alive.
With boundless opportunity to love and serve.
What a miraculous inheritance.
I try to sincerely thank God for it every day.
Often several times per day.
Sometimes dozens of times per day.
I pray, give thanks, praise, count my blessings.
Even/especially when life feels rough.
Prayerful gratitude: That’s the simple medicine that puts everything in its proper perspective.
In the final analysis, the prognosis couldn’t be better.
We are held.
We are loved beyond measure.
We are cradled in the loving arms of the Lord.
No matter what happens, this is true.
In our essence, we are the Ever Innocent Heart of God.
We are Love itself.
All else will fade.
“Everything is impermanent, except the love of God.”
The Love that we are, will not fade.
That Love is not of this world.
It is what this world is made of, but it is not of this world.
It is untouchable, pristine, forever unsullied.
It is your birthright.
And it glows now in the depths of your own Heart, whether as a faint ember or a roaring bonfire.
That indestructible Sun of Love is always there.
Even when it’s covered by the clouds of confusion and wounding, even when we forget it…
It burns on.
Patiently waiting for us to remember.
And we will remember, as sure as our bodies will return to dust.
Every one of us will one day return Home.
And remember that we were always Home.
There is no permanent hell.
Hell is just another phase of the rollercoaster.
Another line in the unending poem.
Hell is a purification, in which all that is rotten in us comes up to be burned away.
Thanks to the darkness of hell, we recognize the luminosity of Heaven.
Without the cage, there is no liberation.
Without the trial, there is no redemption.
Without the cross, there is no salvation.
The contrast reveals the light.
Without the contrast, Love cannot see itself in the mirror.
And when Love does begin to see itself in that mirror…
And to hold every single demon, angel, and angel-demon in its Cozy Warm Glow…
Then, and only then, does the greatest riddle begin to reveal itself…
As we come to see that it is all Love.
It is all Home.
It is all God.
It is all Grace.
It is all Heaven.
Not the sort of Heaven we might have imagined or planned on or hoped for…
Heaven is far more beyond and mysterious than our ideas of it.
The Sun of Eternal Love-Grace-Peace burns brightly as the timeless Substratum at the Heart of Heaven…
Yet all the (dark) clouds of ‘Samsara’ are included too. And the masterwork is all the more magnificent because of it. Nothing is negated.
In all its patchwork, rag-tag, ramshackle, technicolor, many-textured, bottomless, blissful-terrible poetry…
It is all the Kingdom of God.
“The kingdom of Heaven is spread upon the earth but men do not see it.”
It is all One.
You can’t have any of it without all of it.
And we wouldn’t want it any other way.
The most heartbreaking, irreplaceable treasure.
Life.
God.
Love.
The Great Mystery.
Dancing with itself, softly, violently, softly, violently…
Closing its Heart only to crack it wide open, again and again and again…
For eternity.
For all time and timelessness.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Trust the Ride.
Thank all of it.
Love all of it.
Savor the poetry.
See no enemies.
Be a light in the darkness.
Sing the song only you can sing.
Lead people back Home to Love.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Epilogue
So…
Welcome to Life. : )
Specifically, Life on Earth in 2023.
Apparently your soul signed up for a wildly gnarly ‘Kali Yuga surf lesson.’
Thank you for being here.
Thank you for walking the path.
I sincerely hope that this piece of writing has been valuable for you, and has helped you see our situation more clearly.
Please note that this is just one working model of How Things Are, from the mind of a single funky earth-monkey.
Take what is useful, let go of what’s not, and let me know your thoughts. I’d love to hear where my blindspots are.
After contemplating such heavy, intricate ideas, I always find it valuable to spend some time returning to the blank simplicity of pure Non-Knowing. This can reconnect you to the living presence of Astonishing Mystery that is all around us, and from there you can see which of these ideas your Heart feels called to carry forward.
You are beautiful.
Thank you.
Love,
Jordan
About Jordan Bates
Jordan Bates is a Lover of God, healer, mentor of leaders, writer, and music maker. The best way to keep up with his work is to join nearly 7,000 people who read his Substack newsletter.
