In this week’s spotlight I want to address the notion of separation as we hear it taught in new age circles today. This teaching generally asserts that separation is an illusion and that we are all one. Further, if we but halted the attention given to duality, duality would cease to exist. In other words, the only evil in the world is in the mind of the perceiver. Change your perception, refuse to acknowledge lower vibrations, hateful energies, and negativity in the world and it will all go away—because it really doesn’t exist anyway except by way of perceptual recognition.
Now think about that for a moment. Could it actually be true? When I think about it, I ask this question: Where would the world be today if during the past 100 years we had practiced this art of non-separation?
Freedom
To me, it seems quite self-evident that freedom is the key to our ability to worship and believe as we choose. Indeed, history is replete with numerous examples of the persecution of those who chose to think and believe differently under regimes where personal liberty and freedom was virtually non-existent. So, if freedom is the key that unlocks the world of individual choice, and therefore true free will, freedom is the yardstick by which the progress of the world should be measured.
We have only to look back on two world wars, armed conflicts in South Korea, Viet Nam, Iraq and Kuwait, Somalia, Bosnia, Haiti, Afghanistan, Syria and so forth to be able to ascertain the power of military intervention in the name of freedom. The question is—would the world be a safer more peaceful place today with more individual freedom for all if the art of non-separation had been practiced, and aggressors had been allowed to accomplish their aims? Sure—there’s little doubt but what the military actions were not as successful at delivering the freedom they might have accomplished, but the question still remains: Had the world turned it’s back and held fast to the notion that evil only exists if you acknowledge it—would it be a safer freer world today?
Well, let’s also add into our mix the changes in South Africa and India. India’s independence was won at the cost of many lives despite its non-violent methods. Apartheid ended only after thousands paid the ultimate price before South Africa enfranchised blacks and other racial groups with true freedom. For that matter, our own black population suffered for decades before their resistance finally succeeded and once again, many paid the ultimate price in winning their freedom.
Noble Notion
So, a simple scan of recent history demonstrates clearly the need to not only recognize evil but to resist it! America, the land of the free, a model of freedom for the entire world, exists only because of resistance—not because of some faulty, albeit noble notion, that we are all one and there is nothing to resist except resistance itself.
Now I must add, the world has made much progress by way of delivering freedom to the human inhabitants of our planet. Technology has made it possible for all of us to communicate across borders and around the world. Technology promises to provide for the poorest among us and perhaps tomorrow, or some tomorrow in the not too distant future, we will be able to recognize the divine right every human being has to be free. However, until then, there are still those atrocities that occur everyday somewhere in the world and I for one believe it is our spiritual duty to act when necessary to protect those freedoms and denial is not an acceptable form of action!
Paradigm Shift
I want the world to be a peaceful place where we all recognize the divinity within life and where every human being has the opportunity to live free of the shackles that prevent life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I pray that one day soon the so-called emergence of a new paradigm in human history will succeed and we will know the oneness of all, but until then I remain convinced that this lofty pursuit will never result from the denial that refuses to see the world as it really is!
I encourage all of you to promote the notion of love as the greatest power in the Universe but to never forget the mama bear that protects her cubs. Sometimes it is incumbent on each of us to step up and protect the freedom we enjoy—for although some may say it is trite, it is nevertheless true: FREEDOM IS NOT FREE!
Thanks for the read,
Eldon Taylor
Provocative Enlightenment
NY Time Bestselling Author of Choices and Illusions
www.eldontaylor.com