One of my students told me that since she watched Zeitgeist, she hasn’t really been able to sleep well and her mind has been completely absorbed in the horror of what is happening in the world and her seeming powerlessness. For those of you who haven’t seen Zeitgeist yet, it is a video circulating around the internet which presents a neatly interwoven compilation of just about every conspiracy theory you’ve ever heard about from the U.S. government’s orchestration of 9-11 to the international banking scam to Christianity itself! (I think the only thing they left out were the chem-trails).
Too much information.
I am sure there is both truth and fiction in there. It’s hard to deny that the world is in crises. And we would have to be starving fools to consume everything that the media serves up as truth.
Now, more than ever perhaps, is the time for viveka.
Yogis have taught the concept of viveka (discrimination) for centuries. It is a skill we must hone to deal with the vagaries of life on this imperfect planet.
What do I believe, what do I let pass by? Who do I trust, who do I keep at a distance? Where do I get my information? What do I read/watch and what do I leave alone?
Critical thinking skills, in other words. Meditation and yoga develop them.
Specifically pratyahara – the practice of withdrawing the senses from the world and tuning into the rich inner life waiting in the silence.
It is through pratyahara that viveka emerges and strengthens, and it is through viveka that we can wade through the gunk and get to the essence.
If you simply inhabit the landscape of the pseudo-culture, you can not see the forest for the trees. The excesses of modern life will constantly whip your senses and emotions around. If on the other hand, you decide to live with the conspiracy buffs, you will have to contend with some amount of paranoia and delusion.
But silence delivers an essential truth – that truth is simply the pervasive presence of love. The essence is love and love is a force that every evil conspiracy crumbles before – it is unchanging, unstoppable and inevitable.
It sounds trite, but it’s the replacement of fear with love at every moment that keeps us sane when the world out there doesn’t feel too sane. And it then leads to a clear understanding of the right course of action, of what you should do, personally and collectively.
The practice of silence devoted to cultivating the relationship of love with your inner Self is the antidote to Zeitgeist-induced anxiety. Even the producers of the movie recognized this – it actually ended on an upbeat note that we are all one and we must move together. Samgacchadvam – the yogis have been saying the same thing for 15,000 years.
Too bad the movie didn’t end with a meditation lesson…
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