Faith
in the Future
by Margo Adair
Excerpt
from Working Inside Out (Soucebooks, 2003)
A VISION
If we can imagine it, we can create it. Trust
is to society what oil is to machinery. Imagine a world that ran on trust.
Imagine a world where we’ve learned how to be honest with ourselves,
and to each other…where the only safe way of being is to be honest.
Imagine a world where respect was sacred, where intuitions, spirituality,
and emotions were all as valued as the intellect.
Imagine a society that was in synchrony with
the cycles of nature, where human life was sustained on renewable sources
of energy as is the rest of nature, where the earth is cherished, and whatever
is taken out is returned. Imagine knowing that there would always be a place
for you, your family, your community, your descendents, and your species—a
place on earth. Imagine how it feels to always belong—belong in a diversified
community, for it is the diversity in nature that gives the web of life its
strength and cohesion. Imagine a time where everyone welcomes diversity in
people because they know that is what gives community its richness, its strength,
its cohesion. Imagine being able to relax into our connectedness—into
a web of mutually supportive relations with each other and with nature.
Imagine a world where responsibilities were
of equal importance to rights, where it was understood that enough was good,
and that more than enough wasn’t, where there was a deep understanding
of the difference between wants and needs, a world where greed, opportunism,
coercion and manipulation were all social crimes, a world where unaccountable
power-over was arrested. Imagine a world where there was collective support
in the overcoming of individual limitations, where mistakes weren’t
hidden but welcomed as opportunities to learn, where there was no reason to
withold information, where honesty was a given. Imagine a world where what
is valued most is not power but nurturance, where the aim has changed from
being in control to caring and being cared for, where the expression of love
is commonplace. Imagine a society that reveres patience rather than efficiency.
Within patience there is respect, a deep trust—a knowing that in its
own time the rosebud will bloom.
Imagine a world where bureaucracy, like the
dinosaur, is extinct. Imagine a world on a human scale where work has regained
its dignity, where work has regained its creativity, where you are part of
the decisions that make a real difference.
People feel healthier when they take pride in
keeping their homes clean and beautiful. Imagine everyone taking that same
pride in making their communities beautiful. Imagine the whole of humanity
honoring the same sense of responsibility for maintaining the earth.
Imagine a world where trust and honesty are
the oil that makes society thrive and evolve—not power and deception,
but cooperation and connection. The very fact that you can imagine these things
makes them real, makes them possible.
You can choose respect, trust, and mutual aid.
You can choose life.
We can let this vision give us the strength
and patience for the struggle that lies before us. If we can imagine it, it
is possible—if we can imagine it, we can begin to make it so.
Keeping the Faith
As you hear the sounds of these words you’ll
go deeper and deeper into the universal realms out of which all life springs,
you’ll feel yourself relaxing into the resilient support of the web
of life. With each word you hear you’ll become increasingly attuned
to the connectedness of life, the mutuality of life. With the sounds of these
words moving through your awareness your consciousness will expand from your
usual individual awareness into cosmic consciousness. Give yourself permission
to enter into your natural state of fluid connectedness, supported, supporting
life, supported, supporting humanity.
Feeling the rhythms of life percolating through
you…the pulse of life, the breath of life, the hum of life.…Knowing
life percolates through all creatures, through all people.…
Sense the universal breath—what we breathe out the plants breathe in,
what the plants breathe out we breathe in. Energy constantly supporting, transforming,
moving—universal breath interweaves all that lives upon the earth.…
Feel the great synchrony of the universe. The
movement of electrons, the movement of planets, all in synchrony.…Let
your tensions be washed away by waves of universality; feel yourself sinking
deeper into the support of life itself.…
Experience the fluidity of life…everything
moving, carried by time…day into night, season to season, year to year.
History is alive.…Each generation gives life to the next, generation
to generation to generation, each generation dreams and struggles for a better
life for the next, history in the making.…
Remember those who passed before who cared, living, breathing beings devoted
to life, dedicated their lives to the struggle for humanity, they live on
in the spirit of humanity.…Summon up the courage of those who passed
before, empowering ourselves, the spirit of humanity lives and breathes in
us now. Let our ancestors rejoice in our rising to the times.…Aroused,
together we take up the call, make history, create the future.…Feel
life percolate through everyone; life regenerates itself. Life endowed us
with life; now we are called upon to preserve life itself.…
Give yourself permission to experience the fullness
of your devotion to life, feel it in the depths of your heart, your soul,
your whole being…allow yourself to care.…Remember the special
moments in your life, times where your heart was warmed. celebrations…shared
joys…shared love…majestic landscapes the wonder of life itself.
Feel your passion for life….
Let your feelings merge with the feelings of
others who have a passion for life…passion ignites passion…ever
widening passion for the protection of life, everyone caring…forming
a great wave of humanity to change the course of history; history is alive
within us…together we have great healing powers, together we transform
ourselves and heal the earth….
When we listen we hear cries…species die
out, whales give up, rain is poisoned and people starve as the greedy keep
taking more and more and more, spilling a path of carcinogens in their wake…babies
are born deformed, great forests are leveled, oceans polluted…and the
earth quakes and spits fire and storms more than ever before.…Listen…..
Remembering the powers, the power of people
united, the power of life itself…healing powers are all around and within
us. Life is about transformation.…Let all the pain, the rage of yours,
of the earth’s, let it transform itself into a great healing force,
a force as fierce as a mother protecting her young…..
Let the power of life surge through you, empowering
you, uplifting you, arousing you…aroused, humanity forms a great moving
wave; passion for life carries us, empowers us to emancipate life itself…to
create a future where the dignity of all life is respected where the life
of every single baby of every kind is honored. Our ancestors rejoice as we
answer the call of history protecting the claim of life itself.…
You have your life to offer, you can make a
difference. The passion, the power of life lives within you too…feel
yourself a part of the great struggle, healing powers move through you. Listen
to your convictions, listen to your instincts…what do you believe in?
What cries out to you?....
Give yourself permission to struggle for what
you believe in. Remember who your allies are…joining together, feel
how much more powerful you are, everyone is, as we’re joined together…with
community strength we can make a difference.…Give yourself permission
to believe that together we can make a difference…that we will make
a difference.…Life always wins in the end, grass grows up through concrete
and reaches for the sky.…Life regenerates itself, life always wins in
the end.…
As we take a stand on the side of life, humanity
pulls through, the spirit of humanity lives on and each generation will continue
to dream and to struggle for the next generation…trusting the future,
keeping the faith.…Let yourself be empowered by life itself.…Let
yourself be inspired by life itself and we’ll heal the future.