Holding Onto Our Humanity While Evolving Into the Future

Coping with change and letting go of the past is a great challenge for many of us. Most of us are aware that the natural course of creation-life is always toward growth and change. We also realize that humanity is still on an evolutionary path and we have not reached our final destination. Yet, we tend to conveniently ignore these facts and focus instead on whatever security money and power will buy to try to make our lives stable so that we feel safe.

It has become part of the human condition to yearn for a stability and security that will never be possible on a physical level. We live on a sphere that is hurtling through a space that is filled with mind-boggling mysteries.

This is the reason millions of people have hitched their hopes for the future on scientific advances. With today’s nanotechnology – the science of creating devices from single atoms and molecules – the belief is that eventually these high-tech scientific advances will unlock all the mysteries of the universe, solve all our problems and finally bring us security.

My immediate response is to ask how all the high technology we currently enjoy has helped us in creating a kinder, gentler, more peaceful, abundant and safer world for everyone. The answer is that it hasn’t. I also question the wisdom of trusting the future of humanity to nanotechnology. It seems the more high-tech we become the more we distance ourselves from our connection to nature, the Earth and each other and the more likely we are to lose touch with what truly makes us human.

I recently received an e-mail from a colleague with a list of current and expected nanotech developments that are so incredible that just reading the updated information was a stunning wake-up call. If these scientific advances are in our future, this means that in the coming decades – and definitely before the end of this century – life on Earth will no longer bear the slightest resemblance to that which we know now.

While I feel pride and excitement in the fact that science is resolving some of the mysteries of the universe, my concern is that humanity doesn’t yet have the awareness, integrity, vision or good sense to know how to gauge the long-term repercussions of implementing some of these discoveries. There are many instances that bear this out, but one that comes instantly to mind is this: the harnessing of atomic energy and the current global proliferation of nuclear weapons that could destroy the Earth.

Scientific advances and discoveries continue to outpace the conscious awareness of humanity – think cloning – and at a greatly accelerated rate. I wondered how we and our lagging psychology will ever catch up with this futuristic technology. My gut tells me that it will take something dramatic to awaken us to how fast the world is changing and how reluctant we are to acknowledge and prepare ourselves to cope with these awesome changes.

I believe that “something” is happening right now. We are in the throes of an incredible transformational time on Earth, and I believe we need help to successfully meet the evolutionary changes that are coming. This means, to me, that as human beings we need to make a basic change in our thinking as to how life on Earth really works.

Foremost in this is that we have bought into the popular belief that everything in life happens externally. The truth is that it is exactly the opposite. Life happens from within us out. By buying into the misperception we are left fearful and in a victim role, which makes us feel separate, alone and helpless. The only choice we have as passive victims is in how we react to whatever happens to us in life.

I don’t foresee any time in the future when we will be secure in our physical world because any one of a number of things could alter the Earth’s ability to sustain life. But there is another way to feel secure despite what changes the future may bring. Since I believe the awareness we need is always available to us if we’re willing to open to it, this is where I think we are being led.

By turning within and connecting with the eternal and sublime energy within us, which nanotechnology has irrevocably identified as the “basic building block of the universe,” we can reclaim our power and help co-create the future. The great sages and spiritual teachers have been telling us for many centuries that this is the path to creating better lives and a better world.

It does require that we relinquish the role of victims and accept that we are powerful spiritual beings having a human experience, and are willing to take responsibility for our lives and for the future of our planet. When we can do this, and consciously place ourselves in alignment and cooperation with the highest and best within us, we are part of the whole – all the love, peace, power, wisdom, guidance and support there ever was or ever will be.

Then, as conscious and aware human beings we will be able to help humanity transcend this transformational high-tech time of change in a way that is truly loving and humane. In the process, we can help humanity fulfill its destiny while retaining that which truly is one of the great gifts of being human – our low-tech feelings.
_______________________________
Copyright © 2009 Fern Stewart Welch

The author’s books “Tea with Elisabeth,” “You Can Live A Balanced Life In An Unbalanced World” and “The Heart Knows the Way”are available at Amazon.com, other online booksellers, bookstore chains such as Barnes & Noble and Borders – and to the trade from Ingram Book Co., Baker & Taylor and other wholesalers.