Inspired Action [1]

I am part of a Living Whole that wants the best for me and all others at the same time.

This is the lesson I’ve learned in my sixty years.  It’s the lesson I repeat to myself constantly.

Like a favorite song you hum to yourself all the time.  Or the heart of a story you don’t want to forget.

I am part of a Living Whole that wants the best for me and all others at the same time.

We don’t have to go far or look hard to see this lesson at work.  The sun shines everywhere and on everyone equally.  Water nourishes everything and everyone it touches equally.  The soil nourishes every seed equally.  Air breathes life into all equally.

The lessons we repeat to ourselves, like the songs and stories we identify with, become part of us.  They color our moods and influence how we see things.  They are like a filter on a camera that changes the whole tone of light before it is ever recorded—they form a predisposition toward interpreting our experiences in a certain light.  We are open or closed to things, ready to be excited or irritated by things, primed to encourage or criticize others, already leaning forward or holding back, already wanting to smile or scowl—all before the experience has even begun.

In this sense, the lessons we learn determine ahead of time how we will react to whatever comes our way.

The problem, of course, is that the early lessons of life are learned without our consent.  We are too young and lack the independent sense of self needed to reject lessons that will prove self-defeating later.  In fact, we lack the criteria by which to make such judgments—and even the awareness that such rejection is possible—until we reach a certain level of maturity.  By that time, such lessons have become ingrained, part of our unconscious disposition, habits coloring every thought, emotion, memory, and reaction.

Such habits are the opposite of Inspired Action.  They result in thinking the same thoughts, feeling the same feelings, reliving the same memories, responding with the same reactions, over and over and over.  Rather than inspiring us to new and surprising insights, demeanor, and behavior, they lock us into a rigid and routinized way of interacting with the world.  Rather than sparking our spontaneity and creativity, they make us predictable and, therefore, prone to manipulation.

But not all lessons lead to self-defeating attitudes and behavior.  Those we learn voluntarily and accept consciously can lead to thoughts, emotions, and actions that are better adapted to life and therefore bring us greater happiness and success.

Since habits are kept alive by repeated reinforcement, trying to eliminate them by focusing on them merely reinforces them all the more.  For this reason, they have to be replaced, not eliminated.

We replace old self-defeating habits by focusing our attention on new lessons—lessons that we consciously choose to learn.  By focusing attention on these new lessons, repeating them to ourselves all the time, we find our feelings changing and our reactions to events surprising us.  Like musicians and athletes training to peak performance, we train ourselves through repeated practice to see the world in a different light and participate in it with a greater sense of purpose.

We unlearn self-defeating lessons by holding our attention on new ones that bring us into closer harmony with people, nature, and spirit.  All people, not just those it is convenient or easy to get along with.  All nature, not just those parts it is convenient to care for while ignoring the harm done to the rest.  All spirit, not just the conventional idea of spirit but the living presence of the sacred everywhere at hand.

I am part of a Living Whole that wants the best for me and all others at the same time.

We live in a time when intense competition and self-interest is promoted as the greatest good.  A time when natural resources are not protected by the governments who should be stewarding the land.  A time when religious ideology spreads hatred instead of love and factionalism instead of universality.  Not precisely a time promoting harmony with all people, all nature, and all spirit.

After more than 5,000 years, the Mayan Calendar is coming to an end and starting anew on the Winter Solstice of 2012.  People everywhere know that things cannot continue as they are.  The future doesn’t exist yet.  There are more than six billion of us.  We can create whatever we collectively choose.  We do not have to let governments, religions, corporations, or the media choose for us.  We are a world of peers and we can decide our destiny.  We can learn new lessons.

We can create the Golden Age of Humanity if we choose.

I am part of a Living Whole that wants the best for me and all others at the same time.

Inspired Action transcends self-interest and benefits the whole.  It arises from a sense of trust in the world and reveals itself in acts of generosity.  It is fascinated with how accurately it can discern others’ needs and how well it can benefit others.  It is self-sacrificing in the sense that it places the needs of the whole ahead of self-interest.

Inspired Action arises from a sense that all things, including human beings, are sacred.  It is based on the lesson that all matter is spirit.  It reveals itself in the personal experience of all spirit being immediately present.  It is self-transcending in the sense that it draws us into ever-closer communion with all spirit, all nature, and all people.

The Toltec I Ching incorporates the common lessons of the ancient cultures of Asia and the Americas.  The sum of these lessons embodies a worldview in which humanity stands precariously balanced between nature and spirit—a worldview that forever balances between (1) the guilt of having to take other lives in order to live and (2) the awe of being consciously alive in the maze of matter.  These roots of the indigenous cultures produced a brand of moral ethics based on personal responsibility for (1) genuine sorrow and remorse for taking the lives of plants and animals and, consequently, taking no more than absolutely necessary, and (2) making this life as meaningful and as rewarding as possible by treating everyone and everything honorably and nobly.

With this introduction to the concept of Inspired Action under our belts, let’s consider the worldview in which people can communicate with spirit through the practice of divination.  In ancient Mesoamerica, divination was conducted using the Sacred Calendar, or Tonalpoalli, while in ancient China, it was accomplished through the Oracle of the I Ching.  The logic of that worldview can be seen as we follow the line of reasoning outlined in the book’s Glossary—

Oracle The means by which the One Spirit gives voice to the essence of situations and the trends developing out of them.  The natural, appropriate, and spontaneous response of the One Spirit to an individual’s act of divination.

Divination The art and practice of interpreting signs and symbols to see into the essence of things.

Essence The living presence of the One Spirit manifesting itself in every creation at every moment.  The unchanging background of all change that makes up the underlying harmony of all creation.  The timeless perfection of all things underlying their apparent imperfection.

One Spirit The single immaterial living awareness of the material universe.  The origin and destination of every individual soul and, thereby, the eternal repository of all the memories and experiences of all who ever lived.  The marriage of the masculine creative force and the feminine creative force, whose union of Light and Love creates and sustains all of creation.

Soul The personal aspect of spirit.

Spirit The invisible half of nature.  The living awareness within all matter.

Nature The visible half of spirit.  The single body of the One Spirit.  The living and aware form of the sacred.

Masculine Creative Force The creating half of the One Spirit.  The natural, appropriate, and spontaneous catalyst of all creation, whereby all things are inspired to take form and strive toward continual metamorphosis.  The universal principle of fire, which ignites all it touches and, within the individual, manifests as the masculine half of the spirit warrior.

Feminine Creative Force The sustaining half of the One Spirit.  The natural, appropriate, and spontaneous benevolence of all creation, whereby all things are accorded an equal measure of essential benefit.  The universal principle of water, which nurtures all it touches and, within the individual, manifests as the feminine half of the spirit warrior.

Spirit Warrior A man or woman engaged in consciously defeating the enemy-within.  Women or men consciously training themselves to unite their feminine and masculine halves in order to promote and share in the good fortune of all.

Enemy-Within The conditioned and artificial aspect of every individual’s personality that is acquired unconsciously from their surroundings and must be consciously extinguished through training in order for each to return to their essential nature.  The set of self-defeating behaviors and perceptions that the spirit warrior defeats.

Metamorphosis The natural, appropriate, and spontaneous return to essence, understood as the result of self-liberation, which does not imply liberating the self but, rather, that liberation can only be achieved by oneself.

Benefit The natural, appropriate, and spontaneous response to need.

Need A temporary blockage in the free flow of benefit among all things.

Training Consciously working to eradicate the thinking errors based on self-interest by concentrating on thoughts and feelings based on good will toward all.  Consciously working to quiet the inner monolog and experience each moment of life just as it is, without interpreting it in reference to oneself.

The Toltec I Ching, by Martha Ramirez-Oropeza and William Douglas Horden has just been released by Larson Publications.  It recasts the I Ching in the symbology of the Native Americans of ancient Mexico and includes original illustrations interpreting each of the hexagrams.   Its subtitle, 64 Keys to Inspired Action in the New World hints at its focus on the ethics of the emerging world culture.