Apocalyptic

I'll throw my hat in the ring of this Mayan Apocalypse business. (Why not?) Many folks were anticipating some version or other of End of Days yesterday, featuring the snuffing-out of life on Earth as we know it, or some other, well, apocalyptic transmogrification, via alpha-meteors, earthquakes, volcanoes, strange and sudden shifts in our magnetic field, mass hysteria, etc. etc. (You know, "cats and dogs living together" kind of stuff. Horrible.) I'll admit that I, too, was curious to see what, if anything, happened -- not because I believed any of the items on that Disaster Laundry List were going to occur, but rather because so much had been made of that day; that is, so many people seemed to believe something was going to happen. That collective belief and anticipation carried a lot of power. And it got me thinking.

Our species, and life on earth as we know it, appear to have survived December 21st without incident. We can now forget about fiery Apocalypses, and luxuriate in the business of living without Imminent Fiery Doom hanging over our heads. But what if we took a second, harder look at ourselves, and decided that an apocalypse of sorts is, in fact, occurring -- if we want it to? What if we decided to undergo an apocalypse of meaning, understanding, and intention?

On one level, surviving an apocalypse should teach those of us who expected something to happen about, well, expectations. It is my belief that we should take note of our expectations, our attachments to them, and their influence on our psychology. Expectations, and the degree to which we put stock in, or ascribe truth to them, profoundly affect us. Furthermore, when our expectations go unfulfilled -- as in the case, perhaps, of a Mayan Apocalypse -- we should take note, and think a little about it.

Many of us expect the worst in a given situation, no? We expect "everything" (whatever that is) to fall apart; we expect the most painful, hideous things. Life involves pain and suffering at times, sure -- but beware of the words "everything" and "always." If you find yourself beholden to that always-everything mindset of negative expectations, I encourage you to start to actively seek and take note of the countless examples to the contrary which Life undoubtedly presents you.

I digress. My hidden point is to suggest that we can always seek to change our perspective. We can always seek to transform the way we look at the world, or the way we filter life's events through our perspectives. We can do this on an individual and collective level. And we can use life's events, even a Mayan Apocalypse, to propel us into our personal transformations.

Nobody says it better than Joseph Campbell:

Apocalypse does not point to a fiery Armageddon but to the fact that our ignorance and our complacency are coming to an end. Our divided, schizophrenic worldview, with no mythology adequate to coordinate our conscious and unconscious -- that is what is coming to an end. The exclusivism of there being only one way in which we can be saved, the idea that there is a single religious group that is in sole possession of the truth -- that is the world as we know it that must pass away. What is the kingdom? It lies in our realization of the ubiquity of the divine presence in our neighbors, in our enemies, in all of us. — Joseph Campbell, Thou Art That, p. 107