These are fateful, critical times. Humans have felt this periodically throughout history. Perhaps this is because all of what we call history is a tiny but explosive bit of our planet’s lifetime. But we all know that these are fateful times – as the pace of everything quickens, the hockey puck graphs skyrocket, and we find ourselves locked into systems of increasingly exponential growth, even when we know where that inevitably leads.
Working with the ancestors, which I’ve been doing for a few years now, gives a long perspective. It brings an awareness of having come from somewhere, which is also somewhere to return to, and that there’s some accountability for how we’re spending our time here. It engenders a sense of coming here with some intentions, that include a particular combination of soul development and contribution to repairing the mess humanity is currently making.
It’s not only the endless distractions that make it hard, nor the demands of living in a particulate society, where we’re struggling to do on our own things that humans have always done collectively (like raising kids, for one example). It’s also that precious little in our society is built to support us uncovering what those life missions actually are, not to mention living them. We rarely have the wise elders, the rites of passage, the spiritual instruction, the frameworks for creative apprenticeship, or the clear material support that would help us find and navigate what we’re here to do, especially when it so often doesn’t look logical.
Our destiny is also rarely, if ever, singular. There are usually a number of things we would ideally accomplish in our time here, in different areas and different periods (like aspects of soul development and contributing something). This means that remembering what we’re here to do isn’t a one-shot deal. It’s something we have to come back to again and again, to keep checking back with spirit in whatever form we relate with, to keep asking, “Am I on track? Is this what I’m supposed to be doing now? Is this how I’m supposed to be doing it?” And sometimes, “I am so lost! Please show me the way!”
When we do get a glimpse, then we have to dedicate ourselves to whatever it is, over and over, putting in the time and effort and persistence, and, no less important, letting go of all the other things that we can’t do now if we want to focus on the calling we’ve discerned. It doesn’t matter whether our calling is big or small – in a fractal world, there’s no difference – but it does need to be the right size for us at the moment. And there’s no promise things are going to go smoothly, but there’s something about alignment with what we’re here to do and the not-necessarily-human-or-even-embodied allies who support us doing it, that tends to clear the way.
During those periods of grace when things are moving, and there’s a sense of being in the right place, doing the right thing, the joy is beyond words.
The world has never needed all of us to step in with our gifts as much as it does today. It’s a question worth sitting with: “What am I doing here?” And it’s worth putting in the time to develop practices that will let us hear the answers.