Humans are manifestations of Consciousness, just as is everything else in the seen world. Humans have created dissonance in the seen world by seeing themselves as “individuals” and then using that misperception for “individual gain.” Our history has been that many of us first misperceive reality and then live our entire lives out of that misperception, never knowing or examining the underlying misperception. We have generated and perpetuated a collective delusion that we are individuals, unconnected to everything else unless we choose to be. The truth is we may have individual aspects of Consciousness within our orbit and control, but we are always inextricably connected to all that is. Our brains, the largest and most complex nervous system we know of, have been trained over millennia to perpetuate this misperception of individual existence by making the seen world primary over the unseen world. Our heart, the seat of our human consciousness, is where we experience the unseen world. As we have pushed farther and farther into the astounding capabilities of the human brain, we have become infatuated with its abilities and potential. This infatuation with the brain has turned our focus away from the even more astounding capabilities of the human heart. It is as if we are so focused on how big we can build our computer, ignoring the potential of connecting to the internet to access more resources than we could ever hold in our individual hard drives. We fight over a scrap of meat like ravenous dogs, not realizing that there is plenty for all just beyond our awareness.
In response to the cult of individuality, humans have throughout history found ways to get out of their head, escaping the prison of our minds. Ecstasy, literally standing outside oneself, has been a desire for humans since before recorded history. The ability to expand beyond the confines of individual consciousness has been in turn revered and regulated as long as humans have gathered together. When we respond to ecstasy with love, we revere and are inspired by the event or person. When we respond to ecstasy with fear, we stigmatize and eliminate the event or person. Great leaders have the ability to stand outside the world view of the people and culture they serve and provide a perspective that expands the collective consciousness. People who respond with love see the vision, expanding themselves to become more than they previously could imagine. People who see the visionary as dangerous to the current order of things respond in fear and work toward minimizing the message or eliminating the person. Jesus, Muhammad, Joan of Arc, Mohandas Gandhi, John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr. and countless other women and men have created this polarizing effect by seeing and speaking a vision of a better world. Many had their lives shortened by people acting out of fear of the message.
Our human nature seeks to preserve our being. Our spiritual nature seeks to expand our being. Our current level of collective human consciousness has built a world that focuses on preserving our being. The shift of consciousness that is currently underway is moving beyond preservation, embracing expansion. This desire for expansion is found in all of the spiritual discontent today, from questions like “what is my purpose for living?” to “is there more to life than this?” In fact, the accumulation of wealth and power are distorted attempts to answer these questions, misdirecting, through fear instead of love, the energy to live a meaningful life. There is one purpose for human existence: to bring Love into the world. There are innumerable ways to express this purpose. Each human brings a new expression of this purpose through the unique landscape of the potential planted within their human consciousness by Consciousness.