Everything in life has cycles. But natural cycles take time. Through the power of our will, acting upon fear, us humans have compromised not only our home, but the home of all living beings. Have we taken this too far?
According to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Statement, the past four years were the warmest on record, with the global average surface temperature in 2018 approximately 1°C above the pre-industrial baseline. In a special report, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) stated that limiting global warming to 1.5°C will require rapid and far-reaching transitions in land, energy, industry, buildings, transport and cities, and that global net human-caused emissions of carbon dioxide need to fall by about 45% from 2010 levels by 2030, reaching "net-zero" around 2050.
Earth is losing animal species at 1,000 to 10,000 times the natural rate; in May, a United Nations (UN) report estimated that one million animal and plant species were threatened with extinction. We are the only species who has achieved to destroy a living planet.
This clearly underlines the need for urgent action on climate change but also on our level of consciousness: we need to wake up and reassess the ancient ways, remembering we co-exist in interdependence with Nature.
In August 2018, Breakthrough, National Centre for Climate Restoration in Melbourne, Australia, published a report called What Lies Beneath, The Understatement of Existential Climate Risk explaining that the level of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is now greater, and the Earth warmer, than human beings have ever experienced. In reading it, it's clear climate change is now reaching the end-game, where very soon humanity will have to choose between taking unprecedented action, or accepting that it is too late and bear the consequences.
They're also producing Home Front, documentary series explaining the existential threat of climate change from an Australian economic and national security perspective.
"We've reached a point where we have a crisis, an emergency, but people don't know that... there's a big gap between what's understood about global warming by the scientific community and what is known by the public and policymakers." ~ Prof. James Hansen, 2008.
Peru's glaciers spread over 19 snow-capped mountain ranges. These glaciers are the source of the vast majority of the country's drinking water. They also account for 70% of the world's tropical glaciers, which are especially sensitive to warming temperatures. According to The Mountain Institute, a study of 9 glacier valleys in one of these, Cordillera Blanca in Ancash, found that 7 had already reached the “peak water” point, which means less water for farming or drinking during the dry season. Their melting has also exposed mineral-rich rocks to the elements for the first time in thousands of years, so with every rainfall, trace metals and minerals wash into streams and rivers, which poses a threat to human and animal health, affecting irrigation and potable water systems.
According to a BBC article, we now have to deal with poisons released by melting Artic ice: pollution, anthrax, even nuclear waste could be released by global warming, as the permafrost –up until now, permanently frozen land and soil– is thawing out, revealing alongside Pleistocene fossils are massive carbon and methane emissions, toxic mercury, and ancient diseases.
According to a World Economic Forum article, Chennai, the capital of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, is experiencing a massive heatwave and severe drought. Officials are urgently searching for alternative water sources and are beginning to extract water from underground mines. Many businesses have asked staff to work from home to conserve resources. The city's water authority has cut the city's piped water supply by 40 percent, leaving people with barely enough water to bathe or drink.
With nearly 600 million Indians facing high-to-extreme water stress –where more than 40 percent of the annually available surface water is used every year– and about 200,000 people dying every year due to inadequate access to safe water, the situation is likely to worsen as the demand for water will exceed the supply by 2050, said a report from the Composite Water Management Index (CWMI).
According to an article in AP News, Indian President Ram Nath Kovind told Parliament on Thursday that India has created a new ministry to tackle down growing water crisis. India is facing the worst water crisis in its history, and 21 Indian cities will run out of groundwater by 2020, a new report from the National Institution for Transforming India (NITI Aayog) said, highlighting the need for “urgent and improved” management of water resources. Kovind said water shortages are one of the biggest challenges of the 21st century and are likely to be worsened by climate change. He said the creation of the new ministry “is a decisive step in this direction, which will have far-reaching benefits.”
Earth as we knew it, is long gone. But the real question is, which Earth are we going to inherit our children? We borrowed this land from them. We are nearly 8 billion cells causing fever to our home planet, what can they expect from us?
As long as there is life, there is hope -says a voice in my heart. I wish it were that easy.
I believe Q'ero and the rest of the indigenous tribes hold the answers to the problem. I believe the Apus are right when they ask us to go back to the ancient ways and respect and honor life around us.
According to my understanding of the Q'ero teachings, this would be the answer:
Yachay ~ consciousness awakening
Munay ~ heart opening
Llankay ~ ethical will
When everyone is an ethically-driven changemaker, because changemakers know how to work together in fluid, open teams, there is no way problems can outrun the solutions. But to achieve ethical actions one first has to open the heart, the door that lovingly transforms our awakened thoughts into ethical actions.
And herein lies the problem.
Trauma is a wound at soul level. Experiencing trauma is similar to experiencing death. Whenever trauma happens, we experience dissociation, our inner organization is broken, the correlation between thinking, feeling and will are destroyed, the person feels like he or she is not there anymore as their vital forces become separated. This is why trauma can feel like death, as only in death do our vital forces leave our body. Trauma causes extreme fear, anxiety, depression, outbursts, flashbacks, and other symptoms that can cause significant impairment. The perception of time and spacial orientation change. The person is left with no voice as the part of the soul that was broken remains frozen in that moment in time, and so the person cannot fulfill the mission it incarnated for.
Every human being recreates in the outside that which lies within; so, whenever trauma is present, Munay cannot happen because the heart is closed. This means that instead of focusing on developing resources and traits to share our mission with the world and contribute with life through an open heart, we offer more trauma to an environment already dealing with trauma.
I've been sharing Soul Trauma Healing ® for 2 years, per instructions from Spirit, but it's only now that I understand why I was urged to do so, why it's so important we heal trauma.
During one of my initiations I remember hearing a female voice in my heart, saying you now have the Power of Love.
Back then I had no idea what this meant, I just wrote it down in case I needed to tell my P'aqo about it. It's been 2 years since that day, and every time I recall all the teachings I was receiving at that time I somehow feel like a fool, I wish I had published a book already because now I understand those teachings were not meant only for me, they were meant for all of us: I was receiving answers to questions I hadn't pondered, because I didn't understand what was happening around me, but clearly people out there did. Very much a city person myself, there was no practical use for that comment whatsoever in my world; after all, what did climate change had to do with me? And what could I do, anyways?
Well, according to this TEDx Talk to Dr. Jonathan Patz, whom I interviewed some weeks ago for Amanece, my radio show for Spanish speakers, climate change has to do with each of us and our children, because it is not only affecting polar bears, whales, giraffes, koalas, plants and minerals, it's affecting human health.
As stated on this video, climate change is not just about rising temperatures. It's sea-level rise, extremes of hydrologic cycle which means more severe droughts, floods and fires, which will affect our health in many ways. For example, insect-borne diseases are especially sensitive to weather conditions, bringing yellow fever, dengue fever and zika virus.
North Americans emit 6 times more CO2 from their energy habits compared to the global average but according to this Politico article the Trump administration has stopped promoting government-funded research into how higher temperatures can damage crops and pose health risks. This avoidance attitude poses one of the world's greatest ethical dilemmas as the actions that we do to mitigate climate change could have enormous opportunities for public health.
According to The Guardian, Mike Pence repeatedly refused to say climate crisis is a threat to US stating they are not going to raise utility rates. We are no longer in an age when we can measure productivity through optimization of production factors and our own, material welfare linked solely to economic indexes. We may need a new concept of economy that does not just think in terms of utility, but has conscience and considers social and environmental wellbeing. The economy based on production and wealth growth has taken us toward endless production. The objective of perpetual productivity has led to market stagnation that solved the problem of how to keep consumption going by cutting short the useful life of goods, but such practices produce a greater harm, pollution. According to this Worldcrunch article, we must change the traditional economy for a sustainable and ecological version that maximizes individual welfare without overlooking the general welfare of the world.
It's been 2 years since I received the call. And finally, I get it. I think I know what that voice meant: the solution is to encounter fear with love so it can be transformed back into love.
And how do we do this exactly, in practical terms?
Well, it's a multi-layered problem that has to be faced in a multi-disciplinary way.
For example, in our world, very different to that of indigenous people, we deny young people the growing-up opportunities to become changemakers, and with this we are denying them -and their families- a life. Economically, socially, emotionally, even in terms of health. This denies them opportunity, hope, and dignity. The world is doing this to many hundreds of millions of young people right now. And trees. And animals. And minerals. Earth itself is under our unconscious attack. If we all woke-up and consciously knew what we are doing, it would be criminal.
But then that is what we all need to do. We need to wake up!
Transportation contributes to sedentary lifestyles. Many trips by car are distances easily bikeable, even walkable, but in some places this could be dangerous due to crime levels or because there are no sidewalks or biking lanes available. Cities with the highest rates of cycling and walking have the lowest obesity and diabetes rates. Think of the air-quality benefits. Think of public health and economy benefits like less mortality, absenteeism and hospitalization savings. Exercise also reduces the risk of heart disease, cancer, dementia and depression.
Cities need to consider health benefits when designing their infrastructure, and we need to choose leaders with ethic health and environmental mindsets.
Love can open the way. But not just any kind of love, real love: unconditional love, the kind of love our families teach us through experience, the love we feel for our pets, the love that creates life. Actually, that's why we're here.
Yesterday, I had an aha moment: I was shown, through a past memory, how separation creates pain, as we believe love is ending. It tears us apart.
But the truth is love is never ending because there is no separation. We don't loose people we love, we just choose a different path. Eventually we all do this, for the advancement of our soul and our contribution to Spirit.
And that is what we need to remember. That we are all unconditional, ever-lasting love because we are all Spirit.
And by all, I mean all species: the 6 classes in the Animal Kingdom, the 24 classes in the Plant Kingdom, and the 3 classes in the Mineral Kingdom. We've grown to believe it's just us, human beings, but the truth is we all have the same right to live here. We all are Spirit.
This is why, I'm opening Thou Art Spirit as an Association, a working platform that will help us defend life while sharing the message "you are Spirit" with the world, as well as do something, in a practical sense, from that standpoint, about what is happening.
To begin with, we will work with you on Yachay, by contributing with weekly emails delivered to your inbox and social media posts that include latest international uncensored news, together with my humble interpretation of Spirit's messages. These will run along workshops, conferences and retreats for those who resonate with these messages. In this way, we hope to contribute with your mindful awakening process.
As a friend said to me this morning "awakening on a global level has become vital."
What will you do to help?