The end of a treasured time in Payson, Arizona.
Today, Jean and I together with our 11 dogs and 5 cats start the 1,200 mile journey to Merlin, Oregon. While we have only lived in Payson since February, 2010, it has been a time of fantastic experiences. I had to work through the long process of getting a fiancee visa from the American Embassy in London. Until that was issued my ‘residence’ in Payson was that of a British tourist with me having to leave the USA every 90 days.
The visa was issued in October, 2010 and I flew immediately to Arizona. On the 8th November, 2010 Jean and I were issued with a Marriage License Certificate and we were married on the 20th November at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Payson.
We have made many very dear friends here in Payson but Oregon feels like the start of our home in every sense of the word, not just because it is the first home that Jean and I have bought jointly.
One of those dear friends here in Payson has been John Hurlburt, a devoutly spiritual man. A little over a week ago, he sent me a very thoughtful essay and I wanted to include it today as a guest post in recognition of the way that John and many, many others have embraced these couple of Brits over the last 32 months. Thank you all.
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Unity
Everything fits together
The species of animals we know as human beings is a part of everything that exists. We are a very young consciously-aware species that does not begin to know all the answers. What little we do know has a Natural pattern. It would seem that there’s a lamplighter and a navigator in all of us. The lamplighter is our fundamental awareness of being and provides nature’s guidance along life’s pathways.
Our natural navigator is designed for evolutionary competition. There’s a biological survival kit in our DNA. Extreme demand for limited resources generates deadly combat; both within and between species. As a result of competition taken to wretched excess, our global economy is leveraged 22 times beyond any earthly foundation. The unspoken intent to destroy each other over what remains of our planet is becoming increasingly evident.
The human species is engaged in a global war over money, ideals and disappearing finite resources. Ninety-seven percent of the world scientific community has confirmed that the natural effects of heat and discharges generated by human machines and related human activities are the primary cause of recent rapid climate change.
These dedicated scientists are opposed in the media by three percent of their corporate energy-financed peers. An oppressive worldwide network of often offensive politicians is similarly supported and managed accordingly. Nature couldn’t care less about politics, emotions or idealistic arguments.
Human squabbles mean very little in the totality of universal life. The drumbeat of local natural disasters increases steadily. There are no two ways about it. No amount of human ifs or buts can or will change reality. Our human species is in deep serious trouble.
It has been six million years since the first humanoids emerged and two million years since the rise of human civilization. What a sorrow it is to realize what we have done to the earth in just the past two hundred and fifty years. We’ve reached the moon and are exploring Mars. It’s well past time to clean house and re-grow our local garden.
As an old navigator, there’s a sense of urgency regarding the course life on earth has taken. For those who continue to care about facts, the prognosis is not encouraging. We have the know-how for an alternative. We can avoid the perfect storm of going over the edge of an economic cliff and the crush of an environmental crisis in the midst of a war-fuelled, profit-driven, global, corporate fight to the end. The alternative is that we have the know-how to transition rapidly to a reality-based economy and a way of living that’s gentle to the earth. The solution is global, it’s industrial, it’s natural and it’s our best hope. It may well be our only hope. It’s time to light some lamps.
Conscious human awareness emerges as we relax, contemplate, meditate, and communicate openly. These are levels of awareness beyond the limits of our daily human musings. The wisdom which flows from enlightened awareness embraces humility, experience, knowledge, understanding, and faith. Life has never been easy. We’re fragile biological beings. Our mutual growth is the result of sustained efforts over millions of years.
Yet despite attaining a higher level of conscious awareness our human culture continues to operate on a material basis rather than a moral basis. We have become confused by our own importance or the apparent lack thereof. We all too often retreat into a rut, furnish it and turn on the electronics.
By definition, natural processes support species growth in harmony with all natural life. Those natural processes are indistinguishable from the planetary support systems within which all life interacts. Human interaction is local. We spend much of our lives unaware that we are unaware; initially as infants and throughout our lives in deep sleep. When caught up in the pressures of our daily lives, it’s easy to be unaware of being unaware.
It’s time to wake up. Cosmology is an eternal spring from which the waters of the earth still flow. When we turn ourselves inside-out and achieve higher awareness, we discover who, what and where we really and truly are. In a trinity of spirituality, nature and science, we’re cosmically energized beings; spiritual beings sharing a transitory human existence.
Ninety-eight percent of the human population believes in a power beyond species and self. The simplest understanding of this belief is that we humans did not originally create ourselves. All human wisdom and understanding leads to the conclusion that human beings don’t own the earth. We’re caretakers and we’re only passing through. Given that we have a systemic crisis, what do we have to work with?
We have a species that’s squabbling over diminishing resources, an environment and an infrastructure which both desperately require attention, a sustaining objective of equitable global employment, a world economy that’s about to collapse for lack of any real foundation, a burgeoning population which further strains the system and the clear need for a unifying purpose.
Put it all together and what do we have? The navigator is our guide to growth. The navigator shares our wholeness. The lamplighter is our guide to unity. Everything fits together. Each of us is a part of the unity of life. Unity has a natural purpose. It’s time to build a life boat.
John Hurlburt is a former U.S. Navy aviator and successful corporate executive who presently serves as a senior Christian educator and a founding member of an international Transition Town in Payson, Arizona.
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Don’t know about you, dear reader, but I find those incredibly powerful words. Words that provide the truth. A truth the whole world needs. John set out in a personal email to me the three simple fundamentals of our lives. Just a few more words to sum up the truth.
“There’s an environmental crisis. There’s an inevitable global economic abyss touching us all on a daily basis. The need for a green economic transformation is obvious.“
Thank you, John.
Learning from Dogs 
Thank you so much for posting this piece by John. (I hope the travelling circus goes off without incident). 🙂 I must admit that the thing that has always troubled me about ‘God’s creation’ was the deadly fight for survival that we see in Nature and, even as a pre-pubescent child, explanations involving Genesis Chapter 2 did not impress me.
Not being an economist, I am intrigued by this reference to our global economy being leveraged 22 times beyond any earthly foundation (can John please explain?). However, I will not quibble about dates (i.e. how to measure the length of time over which civilisation has persisted), because I agree wholeheartedly with the analysis of our current predicament: “No amount of human ifs or buts can or will change reality. Our human species is in deep serious trouble.”
Garrett Hardin’s ‘Tragedy of the Commons’ is the poor prognosis that scares me the most: Humanity was given it 44 years ago; but has steadfastly refused to take the medicine that might save us. We still show no signs of putting into practice the “mutual restraint… mutually agreed upon” that Hardin said would be necessary and, instead, seem determined to burn all the Earth’s fossil fuels simply because they are there. One of my favourite verses from the Bible is this: “As a dog returns to its vomit so a fool repeats his folly.” (Proverbs 26:11)
On my bad days, I must admit I sometimes worry that religious beliefs are no more than collective hypnosis. When I look up at the starry night sky I do not think how awesome God is; I think how insignificant the Earth is. I maintain that people like Stephen Hawking and Richard Dawkins have exceeded their brief when they make theological-sounding pronouncements. However, I have to admit that their reductionist thinking is entirely logical and rational. My only remaining defence is that, “There is a way which seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death.” (Proverbs 14:12)
On my better days, I would argue (as I have done before) that: “[God] has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.” (Ecclesiastes 3:11)
Ultimately, I think Stephen Hawking is right, humanity’s lifeboat will be the colonisation of Mars. However, first we must geo-engineer its atmosphere.
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Thank god for Hawking having invented thinking, maybe we should make him and his wheelchair the new god and crucifix… Then we could go on our kneees, and debase ourselves in unthinking worshipping, and feel strong again, as we are personally acquainted with god, and actually make his existence possible with that thing we do inside our heads…
It’s only safe to spread out civilization.
However, Mars colonization is only an aspect of the fact that it is only much more advanced technology that will allow us to survive. I am not saying that it will save us, but it is the thing to do, simply because there is no other.
Anyway enough for now, I do not want to upset Paul’s number one helper… ;-)! I was going to evoke bacteria in the gut and how much we need it, but shall apply the brakes to hazardous metaphors, lest I cross the red line of impropriety…
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I am not advocating bowing down to anybody or anything; and I am sorry if my non-judgmental use of Bible quotation upsets you. However, as I seem to be distracting you, I think it might be better if you just post a separate comment in response to what John wrote instead. (Oh, you did already, even better.)
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The symbol of money is a component of a resource based economy in which currency is exchanged for goods and services. In order to sustain a realistic foundation, the resources represented by money need to be more than or equal to the material resources available.In the present world economy, we need twenty-two times the total material resources of the earth in order to balance the books. The term “betting the farm” comes to mind. The problem is that we only have a single farm called the earth; not twenty-two of them.
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Thank you for the explanation hank667. It is very much appreciated. If that is the case, however, it is a wonder that Earth Overshoot Day did not fall in January this year.
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Paul, how exciting! I loved to see the picture of your wedding – I got a fiance visa myself to be able to come to the US, and Martin and I were married at our small, picturesque town hall when I arrived.
I wish you a safe and uneventful trip to you and the dogs. Oregon is so beautiful. I am so happy for you all. Please take many pictures of your new home and town. I’d love to see them. Oregon is a place Martin and I dream about. It would be really nice to take a peek through your eyes. 🙂
Good luck and please keep us posted on the move!!
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Congratulations on the happy event. While on the one hand it’s totally none of my business and on the other it can be argued that it is, I do hope that you at least considered signing up to vhemt.org before the visit to the nuptial bed… 😉
Thanks for posting John’s piece ‘Unity’. Like you, I found this to be a powerful piece.
As an aside, I was intrigued by the manner in which it was crafted so as to be inclusive to those of a religious persuasion and atheists such as myself. (As an example, referring to a belief that “we humans did not originally create ourselves” will naturally be interpreted by those who believe there is one or more gods that the author believes the same; whereas it is entirely possible to believe both this statement and, at the same time, that no prior intelligence was required for ours to arise.)
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I am even more certain that Paul will now be off-line for at least three days (unless Jean allows him to visit Internet Cafes en route to Oregon). Your congrats on the (clearly very) happy day are two years late; but I am sure they will be appreciated nonetheless. Well done for spotting the cleverly-worded nature of John’s article. Paul told me it was very deliberate (in order to ensure the widest-possible appeal).
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Re: mis-timed conger-rats: D’oh! 🙂
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I agree with John’s discourse. Let me add this aphorism which some may find confusing:
In the fullness of time, morality is just materialism done right.
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