Troubled Inner World - Troubled Outer World

     “Trauma is the invisible force that shapes our lives. It shapes the way we live, the way we love and the way we make sense of the world. It is the root of our deepest wounds.” Gabor Maté MD

     "New data shows atmospheric carbon dioxide levels have reached their highest level in over 4 million years. Scientists with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration measured CO2 levels averaging 419 parts per million in May — about 50% higher than pre-industrial levels.
     This comes as Amnesty International is blasting the Group of 7 world leaders for failing to meet the challenge posed by the climate crisis. Amnesty said in a statement, 'The unambitious climate plans submitted by G7 members represent a violation of the human rights of billions of people. These are not administrative failures, they are a devastating, mass-scale assault on human rights.'
     Meanwhile, June temperature records continue to break in many parts of the world. Five countries in the Middle East have topped 50 degrees Celsius this week — or more than 122 degrees Fahrenheit. And much of the U.S. continues to bake in extreme heat, with weekend highs in parts of South Dakota and Minnesota topping 100 degrees." www.democracynow.org

     "The problem is that people rise to leadership in our society by a tendency toward extroversion, which means a tendency to ignore what is going on inside themselves. Leaders rise to power in our society by operating very competently and effectively in the external world, sometimes at the cost of internal awareness...*
     I’ve looked at some training programs for leaders. I’m discouraged by how often they focus on the development of skills to manipulate the external world rather than the skills necessary to go inward and make the inner journey.” Parker J. Palmer

    *"... often resulting from a profound lack of empathy, likely due to unresolved trauma in their own lives that leads them to be out of touch with the needs of others and the often painful or frightening realities of the world around them." Joel & Michelle Levey WisdomAtWork.com

     Some say that we're now accelerating towards irreversible mass extinction. And yet, world leaders continue to be far more interested in holding onto power, the GNP, national pride, etc. Let's hope we all wake up sooner than later!
     “A ‘flip’ is a life-changing moment, often catalyzed by some extreme event, in which a person enters an altered state of consciousness and subsequently reverses or flips his or her metaphysical perspective.” Jeffrey Kripal PhD

     Instead of complete extinction, may we ALL 'flip' - have a human-race-wide near-death experience (NDE).
     A psychiatrist who's researched NDEs for 40 years observed that after an NDE, people "often come back with a sense of the golden rule as being what it’s all about – not as a goal they should aim for (as the rest of us do), but one they realize is the law of the universe - like gravity - that what you do to someone else, you do to yourself as well.”
     Bruce Greyson. “After. A Doctor Explores What Near-Death Experiences Reveal about Life and Beyond.” St. Martin’s, 2021.

“All the joy the world contains
Has come through wishing happiness for others;
All the misery the world contains
Has come through wanting pleasure for oneself.” 

Shantideva