In 1871, novelist Lewis Carroll wrote the sequel to his 1865 classic, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, called Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There. In it he described an alternate universe, where things are contrary to the real world.
The Covid-19 pandemic is a potent opportunity to use it as a kind of mirror, to see things from an alternative perspective for what might be hiding in plain sight.
After following all of the directives to wash hands frequently, stay inside and keep a social distance when around others, how else may we use this time for greater knowledge and growth as individuals and as a global community?
As I have been trained to do, in order to orient myself to the highest vibration possible and keep my outlook at optimal levels, I start with some foundational metaphysical tenets. (These are the principles by which I guide my life. You must search for the ones that guide yours and see how they help you survive and thrive under the pressure of current events.)
- Everything is energy. The universe is energetically ever-expanding and ever-creative. That creativity is evident in the constantly transforming force of nature: birth, growth, death, dissolution into the wholeness of life to be reborn again in some way.
- Thought energy is the basis of everything in our matter-based world. Our outward state of being is a reflection of our inner state – individually and collectively. Not in a way of blame or guilt, but as awareness of cause and effect. We are reaping a harvest from seeds planted long ago. What we harvest in the future will grow from seeds planted now.
- Our emotions are guides to the true nature and tenor of our inner state.
Recently, during my morning practice, I searched my feelings in regard to my income. Like millions of us, my sources of income are threatened and curtailed. As I questioned how my family would survive the coming months I counted out our resources. We have been prudent enough to have saved some money, and privileged that we are able to work from home and receive some income, for now.
I prided myself on how well we could tighten our expenditures, if need be. How small we could make our spending footprint and still afford food, shelter and connectivity with the outside world. In these precarious times, that is a necessary skill.
But something about the tenor of my pride in my adaptability caused me to look deeper, because within that pride I detected fear, a sense of lack, deprivation and victimhood.
In an ever-expanding universe, why is it easier for me to envision contracting rather than magnifying? In the duality of yin and yang, ebb and flow, why does it feel more comfortable to shrink rather than increase? Safer to feel small rather than full-sized…or even vast?
And not just in my finances. I also detect that tendency toward retrenchment in my loving relationships, in my work, in what it means to me to be successful, fully and creatively expressed, in the possibility of real happiness, in my sense of essential worthiness.
Yes, the coronavirus looking glass has revealed how ill-prepared we are for this pandemic, even with all of the warnings our scientists, statisticians, storytellers and futurists have provided for years.
Our health care systems, economic infrastructure, global supply chains and societal classism are some of the big glaring mirrors of our communal weaknesses and lack of readiness. We have been selfish, short-sighted, greedy, unfair, immature and unbalanced in our treatment of each other, our place in nature and the uses of the resources of our planet. Some of us are withering into pockets of blame, racism, paranoia and despair, stockpiling food, supplies, weapons and ammunition for a dark vision of apocalyptical days to come.
But many of us, particularly those in health care, emergency services, public safety, delivery and other essential services are rising to the occasion with bravery, dedication, resourcefulness, steadfastness and generosity of spirit. Others are expanding methods of virtual, fiscal, governmental, artistic and scientific connectivity in ways that will forever transform life after the pandemic. We are reshaping how we interact as a planetary society, a collective life force.
So how might I lean into this universal swing toward expansion in my own life? Now that I see it, how will I surrender to the flow of life and let It carry me toward wholeness, instead of fighting the losing battle of my trying to carry It? In other words, how might I give more, envision more, love more?
It starts with using the mirror of these times as a gift of self-awareness, facing it squarely with compassion for my failings, hope for the future and as a present-moment call to action.
As a singular unit in our shared humanity, when I turn my focus toward what I know to be true, the essential and unchanging, I align my individual awareness to universal Awareness. I remain open to what comes next.
For the only place of power is the Present and the point of arrival is always Now.
