Last week I wrote: “During the
campaign, while Hillary and her many messengers spoke TO fear and spoke ABOUT
fear, Trump and his minions spoke the language OF fear, anger and hatred. That resonated in a visceral way with
the “left-behind” that none of us comprehended. It solidified the promise of
votes for him, regardless of his vitriolic campaign and message.” I
have had several questions from subscribers asking, “What now?” or “What do I
do now?” or Is there anything you can say to help me put this into the framework
of my spiritual growth?” I will respond to these issues from the perspectives
of AA wisdom, an understanding of history, as well as from A Course in Miracles
(ACIM).
Let me state that in my opinion the
issue is not simply Donald Trump. He is merely the newest (and most prominent?)
face of the Alt-Right and Conservative movement over the past decade. He began
in the Alt-Right atmosphere with his Birtherism conspiracies. He has maintained
this affinity for these conspiracy-laden and truth-be-damned preachers to their
millions of followers. Keep that in mind.
Let me paint a verbal image for
you. Sometimes to treat a boil you have to lance it. Often, as well, you have
to allow the boil to get large enough to lance. Maybe that’s where we are –
waiting for Trump and the Republicans to complete their plans for America: a desire
to repeat George W. Bush’s economic, tax, regulatory and military agendas based
on valued conservative principles (which caused our financial meltdown in
2008); voter restriction laws; a roll-back of social policies (especially a
woman’s right to make her own health care decisions in the area of reproductive
biology); LGBTQ rights; draconian Gerrymandering to ensure election victories;
and moving the philosophy of education from “teaching how to think” to “teaching what
to think.”
All of this, including Trump,
are the issues that bubbled up in this election.
To take AA seriously and truly
desire to stop drinking, all of us have had to hit our bottoms. Epitomized in
the description of the difference between religion and spirituality: “Religion is for those who are afraid of
going to Hell. Spirituality is for those – like us – who have already been to
Hell and don’t want to go back.” In short, we have to hit bottom before we
can begin the climb back to sobriety and sanity. One of the promises that comes
true when working AA’s Steps in total honesty is that we will become aware
that, no matter how far down the scale we have fallen, we will discover that it
allows us to share that experience and hope to help someone else.
So, perhaps, we are hitting
bottom, we can lance the boil, and we can begin to heal. However and more
specifically, what is it we can do and what must we watch out for? We must
accept what is happening - which means
to be aware of what’s going on without fear; staying informed without fear;
speaking out without fear.
In this vein, I received from a
friend this missive from Dan Carter, Professor Emeritas, Educational
Foundation, University of South Carolina, who writes opinion pieces for the NYT
on-line publications: “Above all, Trump grasped the fundamental weaknesses of
our current political culture. He has repeatedly bullied opponents and lied
with the kind of brazen disregard for truthfulness, and for civilized norms of
political debate, that would have left Joseph Goebbels gasping in
admiration. He may be totally ignorant
of critical issues of public policy, the constraints of the constitution and
the challenges of world leadership, but his years as a television salesman (of
himself) allowed him to understand that most of the media—particularly the
broadcasting and cable networks—would simply broadcast these lies in the name
of journalistic objectivity, the more outrageous the better. And in a political environment in which
complex issues are reduced to 30 seconds of: “She’s a liar”/“No, she’s not”/
“She’s a crook,” “No she’s not,”/
democratic debate was reduced to the 140 characters of the tweets he
used so effectively….
“In the coming weeks, the chattering
classes will endlessly explain what has happened either by pointing to the
weaknesses and miscalculations of the Clinton campaign or the grievances that
Trump so successfully exploited.
Reporters and pundits will parse the exact meaning of his appointments. Does naming GOP Party head Reince Priebus
chief of staff indicate a conventionally right-wing course? Or is the appointment of white supremacist
Stephen Bannon as chief counselor the real key to understanding his coming
administration?
“Priebus and his like will become
“steady hands” and Bannon will be transformed from an overt racist and
anti-Semite into a “right wing media provocateur.” We will all analyze Trump’s tweets and
contradictory statements like Roman seers poring over the entrails of dead
chickens, breathing a sigh of relief when he decides to deport only two million
Latinos instead of eleven million and pushes through some flim-flam healthcare
fig-leaf to justify the destruction of the Affordable Care Act.
“And step by step we will normalize
Trumpism.”
We cannot normalize this
ugliness and hatred: The tweets; the misinformation; the use of the Alt-Right
communication network (websites, papers, radio talk shows, etc.), and the
continual disdain for all legitimate media. All these may become normalized – candidates
for office will try to emulate what Trump did; more fake news sites, websites,
and other forms of media will proliferate. This will cause the final blurring
of the factual truth (who do you believe: Breitbart News and Rush Limbaugh or
the Washington Post and Time magazine)?
By the time that happens our democracy, based on an educated populace, may
be beyond redemption. Based on history this is how the gradual normalization of
ugliness and fear will happen.
Another friend sent this to me
from Colin Tipping: Radical Forgiveness – Finding Peace, Love and Acceptance; Institute
for Radical Forgiveness Therapy & Coaching, Inc. – on how to deal with
Trump and the Republican’s victory: “The trick is to be totally into doing what you feel is
the right thing to do, while at the same time knowing that destiny is being
fulfilled somehow and that our actions are all part of the karmic dance.… In
other words, by all means, take action to do your best to be rid of Trump and
all he stands for. However, if you do it, while at the same time, finding love
in your heart for him for waking us all up from the dream of separation, your
actions will have enormous power to raise the consciousness of the planet….
“This may well be the beginning of the
great BREAKDOWN that we have known must necessarily precede the BREAK THROUGH
into a new and higher consciousness. "Thank you, Donald Trump, for being
the one to play that role.… This is our big chance to wake up, shift our
perception and leave this false reality behind. Let's go for it!”
The boil
may be getting close to being lanced. Our bottom may finally be becoming a
reality. Our destiny of moving to an era of cooperation rather, than
competition, and of a true sense of Oneness, rather than absolute Separateness,
may be looming on the horizon. In the words of James Twyman, an ACIM scholar,
who has written about this election: We must surrender to the awareness that we do not understand the
whole picture; we must trust
enough to embrace that awareness without fear; and we must embrace what is
happening with gratitude for
bringing all our ugliness to the surface to be seen, acknowledged and dealt
with in the open Light of Love.
We must be alert and aware to the normalization
of ugliness and hatred. We must speak out.
I hope this helps.
As I’ve stated before, “I have to understand,
on a visceral level, who the “Me” or “I” really is when I am speaking or
thinking. The “I” that says to myself, “I really need a newer, more reliable
car” is a different “I” than the one that says to Spirit, “I can’t do this
anymore; help me perceive things the way You see them.”
Although these messages are mostly for me,
thanks for listening to me and getting to know me – warts and all. As always,
feel free to forward this message to your friends, family, and those
accompanying you on your spiritual journey.
Don
#3 Nov 2016
Copyright 2016
PS: I will be unavailable during
the Thanksgiving week. There will be no message.
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