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I can't get this idea out of my head. The darkness is coming. The forces of darkness are gathering.
The darkness is here.
Darkness. Mystery. Unknown.
Chaos. Evil. Fear.
There is much in our world today that is frightening, and there are forces at work now that would take us backwards. All one needs to do is look at the news to see a world at unrest. But labeling these forces as darkness troubles me.
Words have power, and if we equate darkness with fear and negativity there are powerful implications to that.
I won't delve into the potential implications of equating darkness with something "bad" as an issue of race mostly because I'm not sure I'm qualified to draw that comparison.
What I will address however, is the fact that if we equate darkness with something bad, then perhaps we are equating mystery and unknown with fear and negativity.
What if the darkness and chaos we are experiencing is transformational? What if it's here to wake us up and to activate people to stop sleeping at the wheel and decide what kind of a future we want?
What if this darkness is being revealed to us so we can see where the hurts are and we can find ways to heal them? Then we can move out of these cycles of win/lose where the paradigm only flips so there always has to be a loser.
Now I'm not naive enough to believe that all that is going on in our world right now is fine and dandy. It clearly isn't. This is not to diminish the forces at play in our world today, nor is it to diminish the feelings of the people directly impacted by these forces. Heck, I'm one of them. I'm seeing first hand what the impacts of these forces are. It's brutal. It's disheartening, it's infuriating, it's shocking.
So none of this is to say that we should just accept the will of those who would not only impede our forward evolution, but actively work to regress. Not at all.
These forces that would take us backwards to a time when "people knew their place" and the white patriarchy ran the show, and whether it worked for anyone else but them was irrelevant. The halcyon times that folks look back on believing that it was better because things were stable and predictable; these forces are fighting a losing battle. Those times are ending and it is inevitable.
And this I say with certainty. Because growth and change will always win. They are part of the natural order.
Conservatism as a movement is concerned with maintaining tradition and order. Or in some cases as we're seeing, taking us backward. Punishing us for believing we could and should expect more, expect growth, expect advancement.
But you know what? That is not the natural order. Nature is ever evolving, ever changing, ever growing. That is an immutable fact.
What they are trying to do is not about darkness. It is about trying to keep things the same because it is easier for them. It is about their fear of the darkness, the mystery, the unknown. Their fear of losing their power.
And yet this is the cycle of nature. We move through the cycles of darkness and light, birth, death and rebirth. It is natural.
Now just because it's natural, doesn't mean it's soft and gentle. Quite the contrary. Anyone who has ever watched a nature documentary knows that nature is not all flowers and fluffy bunnies. It can be cruel and unpredictable and harsh. And a dying creature will lash out with it's last ounce of strength to try and stay alive.
I believe that's what we are currently witnessing in the world.
The old ways are dying, and those that have benefitted from them the most are fighting like hell to keep them alive.
And there are people that are invested in the old ways that are desperately hurting. Many of them have convinced themselves that they are okay, and that others must toughen up and be like them. Life is hard. Every 'man' for themselves. It's a dog eat dog world.
These people are easy to manipulate.
They are afraid to truly examine the hurt they are in and it is so much easier to blame someone else, so they become perfect political tools.
There are too many people out there still that believe that the only way forward is through pain. The kind of pain that is contracted and self punishing. It has to hurt a little.
But there are different kinds of pain. There is the pain of growing and of birthing something new as well. It is painful, but there is a point to it, a purpose. The point is to shed an old belief or way of being, or to create something new. That takes courage and it is difficult. But it is expansive.
The other kind of pain is contracted. It is afraid and shamed. It is protective and armoured. It is prickly and it lashes out. It is self-perpetuating, it will never heal because it is kept in the dark where it festers. This kind of pain causes people to want others to feel the way they feel. It causes people to believe that they, and others, deserve to be treated poorly. This is the kind of pain I believe many people are in today.
It doesn't need to be this way.
To move forward, we have to be courageous and believe that what we are moving towards is better than where we are. Or at the very least, is the next step in our evolution.
I believe that to evolve both as individuals and globally, we have to be both imaginative and courageous. Creativity, courage, and the ability to take a risk are qualities that move us from where we are into new territory.
I wonder if the notion of "fighting the darkness" is perhaps part of the problem. Always fighting. What about birthing? What about we're working to build a new world where no one is left behind?
"Courage, my friends; 'tis not too late to build a better world." - Tommy Douglas