Wednesday, November 9, 2016
4:40 a.m. I didn’t stay up to watch the election news. Woke up at a little past four to find that Trump was elected president. Realized after a while that probably this would be a good time to talk to somebody on “the other side” for some interpretation, rather than continue working on my novel. So, a la Hemingway, I guess I declare this to be a non-working day, and I’ll put in the time transcribing, if I get anything.
So. Who to talk to? Let’s leave it open and ask, what does this mean for us, and where do we go from here? Or – let’s hold it to the first question and see where we go. What does this election result mean for America, for the world, and specifically for the movement toward greater consciousness? Even as I work on phrasing the question, I can feel the answer hovering, which is always a good sign. So – over to you.
Yes. As you have learned, when someone asks a question and gets the answer in the form of an immediate knowing, that is a good sign that you are connected. Question and answer are always linked, as you know. The 3D linear perspective makes it seem like a question finds an answer. But it is at least equally true to say that an answer precipitates a question – that is, leads you to ask in a certain way. Probably truer to say that as usual 3D conditions distort the appearance of the process, which is closer to aligning yourselves to a question-answer combination than to the way you usually see things. This is not blindness on your part, merely response to 3D conditions.
So, to your question and its unspoken components. How shall we go about it, there are so many spokes leading out from the hub of your question.
How about in the order they came out? For America, for the world, for individuals?
That isn’t quite what we said, but close enough. Very well, only bear in mind, when you go looking for a different point of view, you are likely to get – a different point of view! So, perceive first, and judge later.
Go ahead, then.
Primarily you could look at this as moving America away from anarchy and violence. The people who were certain that the process was rigged will be a little less certain of it. Those who despaired of being heard will see themselves as having been heard. The level of political discourse will now shift drastically, as old accustomed scapegoats are no longer quite so believable.
I know you find this hard to believe, but sometimes it is necessary to take a step back in order to take a step forward.
People are going to be seeing you as Republicans over there.
You think only dead Democrats vote?
Very good. Nice one. But –
Well, conservatives cannot now complain of being powerless, but they will face the same problems and will find the problems don’t go away because you don’t want them. Liberals will find that their own way of seeing the world is not meeting response, and at least some of them will begin to rethink their positions.
But it is very hard to get across what we mean, because for one thing you expect certain ideas or reactions – and your readers even more so – so it makes it harder for you to hear.
1) A Trump presidency has its dangers, certainly. The danger of more or less spontaneous rebellion in the country is lessened, but the danger of intolerance incited by the system is enhanced. Your perception of the dangers of fascism is not wrong.
2) The danger of a foreign policy ever more adventurous, ever more expansionist, may now be somewhat lessened, though some will not think so. Your fears of Clinton’s foreign policy were not wrong, and what will come with a President Trump will not be worse than that.
3) Economically and politically, responsibility brings consequences. It is easier to decry existing conditions than to improve them. But this does not mean that Trump will move toward moderation, any more than Hitler did under similar circumstances. The adventurous path is always more alluring. So, don’t be too quick to say “Now see how you like it” if you are a Democrat or “Now we’ll get things back on the right track” if you are a Republican. Things that have their causes well deeper than politics will not – can not – be fixed by political manipulation. They may be altered in their manifestation, but they have their own causes, hence their own nature.
Socially?
Haven’t we been describing social consequences? A readjustment of antagonisms, expectations, prospects? In politics there are no final victories and no end result, only a continuing process.
Now, to move beyond these surface things. We would say superficial, which means the same thing, but it sounds condescending, and that is not our meaning.
Your analogy about the German city-states, please.
Yeah, I suppose I see where you are going: Different conditions in a society provide different opportunities and different constraints.
Different opportunities and different constraints are two aspects of the same thing.
All right. Well, during the time before German unification in 1870, and even more so before Napoleon’s destruction of the remainder of the middle ages after Jena in 1806, there was no German state as such, only a few states like Prussia and many city-states all over the place. The people in those times had no political outlet, little economic freedom, and no sense of their personal destiny being tied up in the state. Instead, their energies went into culture. That was the high point of the German intellectual.
You might spell out the conclusions to be drawn.
If you don’t have freedom to express your life in one direction, you will find it elsewhere.
Close enough. Now, to repeat what we have said before, though perhaps not lately. Our concern is not with economics or politics, not with nations or empires, but with individual minds – souls – as they shape themselves in 3D conditions. Our bias is toward greater consciousness, which doesn’t mean a more intellectual approach (which may be the last thing to lead to greater consciousness) but toward greater day-to-day connection of the 3D mind and its non-3D components, for that greater connection will lead you to anything you need. Do you feel your underlying question has been answered?
Well, I don’t know. I get that the election may loosen rather than tighten tensions somewhat, that it may be less dangerous internationally rather than more, and that in any case your concern is with each of us doing our work on ourselves. Is that it, more or less?
More or less. Let’s take one more stab at making things clearer.
You all tend to think you are on this side or that side, as if you were teammates. But a team in a game has only one aim – to attain a victory by outscoring the other team. This is the aspect of politics that expresses on election night.
But life is not a sports competition, and people do not divide neatly into teams with undivided interests. Each of you is on different teams depending on the issue, or rather depending on which deeply held values are brought to the fore by a given issue. This is the aspect of politics that leads to bitter accusations of betrayal in the years of governing after election night.
I get that “life goes on,” but I sense that I missed something.
Remember your real lives, not your projected ones. Life is always individual and personal, not collective and abstract. You may participate in the collective and the abstract. But you do not construct your abiding soul that way. Your life is your choices, not your elections.
Nice play on words. You’ve done this before.
We have good writers.
Why, thank you! J All right, any more?
This will do for now. There is always more available when you want it.
Okay, thanks for this, and we’ll see you another time.