To those that know me, I must sound like an old Bing Crosby record that keeps getting stuck. But whereas the old crooner sees everything at Christmas time as soft and cosy, I can’t help seeing the damaging effect society’s attachment to the material continues to have...

I’ve just moved to Glastonbury where the town council is very keen to promote the need to recycle and to use our precious resources carefully and with respect. It is also a place where many see the beauty of the inner connection to God so on the one hand I was able to celebrate everything that is right with Christmas. However as I visited family I was also made aware of our apparent escalation in conspicuous consumption and consumerism.

On the typical housing estate, I noticed how just about every other house had fairy lights adorning the outside of the building. I saw my children (from whom I am separated) totally distracted by cheap plastic Chinese toys to the exclusion of all else. I was exposed to debilitating central heating burning practically 24 hours a day and the copious quantities of food that ended up in the waste disposal. I wondered how many houses across the country and throughout the so called ‘developed world’ did this model apply to?

Even some ‘awakened’ people that I meet question the need to recycle and to use our precious resources carefully. Some appear to see God’s abundance in abundant wastefulness rather than abundant resourcefulness (a judgement or an observation? - judge for yourself!).
So as I continue to surrender to what I observe (hopefully without judgement), I still find it difficult to dissolve the ultimate conclusion that we are destroying our world and even with all the love and positive thinking truly awakened souls can muster, there is little we can do to turn back this tidal wave.

So what then is the way forward? Perhaps by staying positive we will awaken sufficient people to turn back the tide of destruction - the hundredth monkey effect? Perhaps we will descend in a Tsunami of chaos wiping away the structures and lifestyles that are causing so much damage. Or perhaps a ‘chosen few’ will ascend to a different dimension that serves them better leaving the rest to figure out their own choices?

I would like to think the first option is workable but I remain open to all possibilities. And so perhaps this is the way forward. Living in the moment, raising our own consciousness, influencing those around us and trusting in higher consciousness - “let thy will be done not mine”.