Robert Atkinson's Blog

To bring about a lasting global peace, something is needed that opens the hearts of all people to the urgency of remembering, reclaiming, and living by our innate state of unity, harmony, and wholeness that connects us all and keeps us in peaceful relationship with all beings on our planetary home. This inner knowing seems to have been out of reach for eons.

Remembering who we really are leads us into and through an arduous transformative journey that confirms what we all share at our essence. This provides us with the needed hope – and assurance – that we deeply want to be aligned with all that is already being done in an emergent process of creating the conditions for lasting peace.

We, collectively, need to set off on a journey beginning with personal peace, following the way of unity in all its steps, guiding us from family peace to community peace to national peace, and finding its fulfillment in world peace.

To achieve this ultimate goal, in our complex, divided times, what is called for is an all-inclusive, comprehensive way to peace that clarifies an organic process that the entire human family, young and old, rich and poor, can relate to, embrace, and help bring into reality.

Lasting peace can only be the result of a long, conscious evolutionary process that requires building out the necessary preconditions for global harmony. From this foundation and framework, the realization of the unity of the human family in all its rich diversity can become manifest.

Critical to both this evolutionary process to transform consciousness and to satisfy our need to align with the energies of the universe, is individual and group meditation. The more meditation in the world, the more peaceful the world will be. Yet, no matter how inclusive, well-intended, and focused this practice is, meditation alone will not bring about world peace.

All efforts toward inner peace and well-being for raising and transforming individual and group consciousness can only result in peace on Earth if they are consciously coupled with a cumulatively expanding outer process of transforming all social structures to support the oneness of humanity and all life.

A shift in consciousness is the first step needed in an extensive process of global renewal. A unitive consciousness– seeing all things as an indivisible wholeness – is the goal that will bring into focus all that is possible when a unitive perspective is applied in all endeavors.

When this process of elevating consciousness toward wholeness is fully accomplished, it will still take decades, if not centuries, for a totally transformed multi-level local, regional, national, and global infrastructure to be built out and put into effect that would support this unitive consciousness and its continuing growth and development.

Personal, group, community, regional, national, and global efforts toward this goal of unity and peace are all essential as they complement each other and help humanity recognize the interconnectedness of all peacebuilding efforts independently and interdependently working toward their convergence.

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5 years ago, the Evolutionary Leaders published our first collaborative book, Our Moment of Choice. We are still in that moment, and it has gotten even more critical. The old systems are being disrupted. They are most likely irreparable.

While an assault on the values of democracy is underway, so is an even greater assault on the evolution of consciousness. That means our most formidable task of all is to become the leaders of the evolution of consciousness toward unity, oneness, and wholeness that we already are!

Our challenge in this moment is to ensure that the evolution of consciousness continues on toward unity, oneness, and wholeness. How might we better do this than by helping to facilitate an organic renewal process. This is a process that offers a clear course of action, follows natural laws, and assists an evolving process already in motion.

In The Way of Unity, coming out in July, I offer a vision for addressing the key challenges we face in manifesting our inherent wholeness in the world.

The first thing we need to do is observe and learn from the natural world around us. Organic renewal knows that all things are part of the same whole. If we understand the natural order, harmony, and wholeness of the universe, we can reflect that in all our endeavors. By remembering and reflecting the reality that all planets are in perfect alignment with each other, and that all cells and organs in the human body are created to be in perfect alignment with each other, we can bring that unity into the world. This deep connection and sense of belonging to all things arises from a unitive consciousness.

If our challenge is creating the world anew, isn’t that what happens in every cycle of nature? It’s happening right now, all around us, as spring unfolds and new life emerges from the old.

We’re the agents of change for this organic renewal of society. We need to assist the natural flow happening right now under our feet. There is an innate strategy to this renewal process. With a deliberate persistence, the tentacles of renewal, firmly rooted, are coming to life once again, in a cyclical reawakening, to replace decaying structures with fresh fibers of life-giving tenderness and beauty, to eventually bloom into their fullness.

Organic renewal chooses to move at its own pace, because it knows its outcome is assured. It doesn’t resist anything around it, because it is busy building towards its own innate potential of a future not yet stolen. It is focused solely on building its own networks of care, cooperation, and sharing, by safeguarding the common good.

Such organic renewal spreads invisibly, through networks that are self-sustaining, vastly scalable, and growth-producing through the strength of its own unity-in-diversity. This describes the mycelial networks that are always weaving their wholeness beneath the surface of the ground.

Whether we realize it or not, we are all part of such a mycelial network. Humanity is its own mycelium network, patiently, insistently weaving our own wholeness. We too are meant to endure whatever is happening above the surface. This is our time to emerge, to rise up in new growth with a fresh force to put forward.

The existence of such a process of organic renewal should provide us with hope, instead of despair, with conviction that can lead us onward. Organic renewal doesn’t fight against what assails us, it builds toward what inspires us, toward the vision we hold most dear.

So, what’s the equivalent of mycelium networks in the social world?  How do we translate the natural process of organic renewal to the social world we live in?

Could our best course of action be to recreate the entire infrastructure of social relationships upon a new foundation of universal harmony and unity achieved through an ongoing process of growth and transformation involving the full participation of the entire human family? Carrying out our mycelial functions in the social world could mean building out vibrant, resilient, inclusive, deeply connected, peaceful communities right where we are.

A couple essential components of this process would include, first, recognizing the oneness and wholeness of human relationships, where there is no “other” left to exclude from the human family – or from the web of life.

 

This would require adopting the central organizing principle of humanity is one family to guide our process from here on out. To achieve this, also required is that humanity live by a set of unitive principles that will create the conditions for maintaining unity on all levels.

As we enter the Unitive Age, this set of unitive principles includes the equality of women and men being fully realized, the elimination of the extremes of wealth and poverty being fully realized, freedom from all forms of prejudice being fully realized, harmony between science and spirituality being fully realized, and the protection of nature as a divine trust being fully realized. This is the way of unity, built upon universal love, that leads to the oneness of all life.

Our role is keeping our focus on the wholeness of all things. Living by unitive principles will enable us to undertake unified coordinated social action to build vibrant communities. When community members, irrespective of background or belief, are invited to gather together to share and better understand their social reality, devise appropriate responses to the challenges they face, empower each other, and create capacity building conditions, an inner potential is released, and the outcomes are profound and far-reaching.

With the common good as its focus, social action initiatives would apply unitive principles locally through a method of relationship-based activism embracing what we might call a collaborative learning process consisting of:

study of a chosen need, with relevant guidance;consultation, following a process of defined steps;social action, based on the will of the group; and,reflection, adding resources, learning lessons, making modifications.

This repeatable process ensures sustainable growth and maintains a continuity of learning and action. Rather than being “top-down” or “bottom-up,” this approach built upon reciprocity and interconnectedness incorporates both and leads to transformation through a meeting-in-the-middle of the two approaches. Our role in initiating and carrying out this method in our own communities is vital to achieving the long-term, overall goal of global unity.

One component of this process is the art and practice of consultation, a primary, all-purpose tool for fostering unity and strengthening social coherence. As a group process for seeking truth, identifying relevant principles, exchanging a diversity of views and opinions in a respectful manner to build consensus, consultation achieves a common understanding for making unified decisions leading to unity-in-action. Our role is to help integrate the art of consultation into as many settings as we are in, whenever possible.

In this purposeful and intentional work, we experience the true nature of unity as a mycelial network carrying out the organic process of renewal needed in the world today. Underlying all this is love-in-action. We are the ones that can create a ripple effect of new energy moving outward toward its unifying attractor that will connect the human family. Love is the foundation, framework, and thread weaving all things toward lasting unity on this Earth.

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In a holistic view of reality, with everything dependent upon what Teilhard de Chardin called a “single energy at play in the world,” all things would be so interdependent that apparent opposites—like yin and yang, feminine and masculine—are seen as complementary, interrelated halves of the same whole, balancing, integrating, uniting, and transcending their own presumed duality.

Lao Tzu called this wholeness of existence the “nameless,” which is all there was at “the beginning of heaven and earth.” In this original wholeness, all things are revered, in harmony with all other things, without divisions, and in perfect relationship.

All existence was intended to remain forever whole. However, adding intrigue to mystery, the evolution of existence took a detour in the Garden of Eden with the eating of the forbidden fruit. And, in another version of this narrative, in Greek mythology, with the opening of Pandora’s Box.

These narratives are not only about asserting our individual will over a greater will, which brought forth an archetype that introduced separation and opposition into the world. They also signal humanity’s fall from wholeness.

The separation of the “named” from the “nameless,” the temporal from the eternal, fragmented the “named” into “ten thousand things,” as Lao Tzu noted, and broke the Whole into pieces.

Yet, there is a hidden thread of wholeness that connects us all, that helps us remember where we came from, who we are, and where we are going. Imagine a world in which the explicit purpose of life is to realize the wholeness of the entire creation, to serve the good of the whole, to live our lives in wonderment of and in harmony with that whole.

 

 

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The language we use to co-create the future we want is one of the most important components of getting through that transformative process. Language is the way we communicate intended understandings of essential concepts.

 

In these divisive times, using language to bring us back together as a whole is especially crucial. Language is a catalyst to the evolution of consciousness. We need to use language in ways that facilitate the evolution of our consciousness.

 

Stories and narratives have always been central to this endeavor. The first peoples gathered to share stories that embodied the values and principles they lived by. These stories held the community together. They were unitive narratives, essential to their wellbeing.

 

Over time, communities expanded, spread out, became more diverse, and experienced conflict and disorder. Out of this discord emerged divisive narratives that maintained separation.

 

As we approach a consciousness of global integration, a new story of our wholeness is needed to frame this emerging interconnectedness. Humanity has arrived at a time when it is necessary for our own survival to come together again through unitive narratives that express the unified nature of reality.

 

The narratives we use to define us need to be unifying. Consciously choosing language that comes from and speaks to the heart carries the power to heal the wounds of the generations.

 

We are entering the unitive age, when individually and collectively we will arrive at a unitive consciousness. With this will come a vision of reality as one, the understanding of our undivided wholeness, and the desire to work collaboratively toward our common destiny.

 

Emerging now is the realization that only narratives guiding us toward wholeness will serve this evolutionary impulse.

 

Unitive narratives address the needs of our time, help us regain a natural balance in the world, and invite us to embrace the wisdom of the complementarity and wholeness of seemingly opposing forces. Binaries like feminine and masculine qualities encompass all the human attributes we all have access to.

 

Adopting the language of unity will assist us in better achieving a common understanding of the key terms we utilize in this evolutionary unfolding. With unity as the intended outcome, we can define these key terms in this way:

Story is a weaving together of a sequence of events that may or may not be true. Narrative is the form, structure, or pattern an ongoing myth or story is told in. Unitive narrative is a truthful personal or collective story of living into the wholeness of the unified field of existence all around us.

 

Wholeness in this context is experienced in the qualities of completeness, harmony, balance, and unity within all the parts of a whole.

 

As the use of unitive in describing various parts of the unified nature of reality develops further, it will become more common to think of unitive narratives as narratives that bring about unity.

 

Unity is the primary characteristic of the wholeness of all things. Understanding this and applying it in everything we do, especially in the language we use, will help us live into the understanding that wholeness is all there is.

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Imagine all things in the entire Creation making up an interconnected whole. Imagine a world in which the explicit purpose of life is to realize the wholeness of the entire creation, to serve the good of the whole, and to live out our lives in wonderment of and in harmony with that whole.

In this wholeness, everything would be so interdependent that apparent opposites – like yin and yang, feminine and masculine – become complementary, interrelated halves of the same whole, balancing, integrating, uniting, and transcending their assumed duality.

A vision of this wholeness is found in the Hermetic principle of “As above, so Below; all things accomplishing the miracles of the One Thing.” This is the vision of wholeness that Plato offers us, too:

Perhaps there is a pattern set up in the heavens for one who desires to see it, and having seen it, to find one in himself.

Is this holistic view of correspondence, balance, and harmony between the macrocosm and the microcosm fleshed out anywhere else? What if there were even more ways we could discover a pattern designed to maintain the harmony of the whole that also is found in ourselves?

Drawing meaning from existence and from life on all levels is one of the main goals of all fields of knowledge. Deciphering the nature of life often comes down to two ways of seeing all life forms, as either separate and distinct or as connected to the same tree.

A common way to find meaning and make sense of all things is to be able to make connections in apparent randomness. This is what patterns do.

Could the earliest Indigenous peoples have observed patterns in nature that gave them wisdom to live by? They observed the cycles of nature, which do not occur in a linear fashion. They structured their rites of passage according to a similar cyclical pattern that helped guide individuals from one stage of life to another.

Built-in to their rites was a process leading to and through transformation, to assist and enable the transition to the next stage of life. Arnold van Gennep identified this pattern as a core a process taking the initiate through the three phases of separation, transition, and incorporation. This ritual process was designed to guide the young person from a dependent state through independence and on to interdependence within one’s community.

Transformation is at the core of a pattern that keeps us moving along a trajectory intended to guide us from separation to union, or wholeness.

It turns out that this central pattern of transformation can also be uncovered within the basic structure of story itself. It is not just beginning, middle, and end, but on a much deeper and more meaningful level beginning, muddle, and resolution.

The muddles, or challenges we face, represent the core of the pattern bringing the process of transformation to its completion, or resolution.

This   hidden thread of wholeness connecting us all also runs deep in mythology and mysticism. In mythology, another version of this pattern was made popular by Joseph Campbell who pulled together the archetypes of the world’s myths to form the pattern he called the monomyth, consisting of a journey of departure, initiation, and return.

In mysticism, Evelyn Underhill described “the mystic way” as a journey of spiritual transformation following a pattern that leads from awakening to purification to union.

Does this pattern of living into wholeness find its way into psychology? Carl Jung called this the “individuation process.” It consists of the conscious experience of the archetypes we are born with, embedded in our psyche, or unconscious, bubbling up from within, released by life experiences, making us aware of their innate existence, and enabling the merging of opposites into a new whole. This involves great struggle and takes in the stages of birth of the ego, death of the ego, and birth of the whole self.

What we end up with when we merge these ways of knowing and practices into one is a blueprint for living into the wholeness that brings with it a unitive consciousness. This blueprint consists of the 3 main parts, Call to Wholeness, Path of Purification, and Return to Wholeness.

Could this pattern be part of our archetypal DNA, transform our lives, keep our focus on the wholeness of all things, and keep humanity on its evolutionary path, all at the same time?

If such a universal, transformational pattern did exist, how might it change the way we live our lives?

We become aware of this universal pattern as we communicate more with the inner realm and as the eternal bursts forth from our unconscious, giving us a timeless understanding that countless others have experienced before us. When this happens, everything changes.

This universal pattern could be a roadmap for achieving the greatest expansion of consciousness that is humanly possible. Through it, we not only fulfill our innate potential, but also, by naturally wanting to pass on its understanding to others, we would transform the world in the process.

Living into our wholeness includes wrestling with our demons, dancing with our angels, making plans with our inner guide, and connecting with our soul, all of which results in a deeply lived life.

 

 

 

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Wholeness is all there is. There are a couple problems in understanding this. First, like the moon, we tend to see it in its pieces first. New, waxing, crescent, first quarter, etc., but it is always the whole moon. Second, we can barely, if ever, really grasp its entirety.

We may still not even know the extent of the wholeness of all there is. Yet, we do have ways of grasping its fullest extent. One of the best ways of doing that is by how we experience wholeness. Some things, like wholeness, are best known by the qualities they express or encompass.

Wholeness is experienced in the qualities of completeness, harmony, balance, and unity within all the parts of a whole. Applying the principle of “as above, so below,” all levels of whole systems co-exist as interdependent sub-systems within the Whole and are designed to maintain their own wholeness within that greater Whole as a complete wholeness-in-motion.

As a microcosm of the Whole, the human body is one such sub-system consisting of an organization of organs, all connected one to another, designed to function as a whole, each in harmony and balance with all the others, maintaining a fully functioning whole being. Cooperation is the principle that governs the functioning of the whole.

In the same way, as the health of the body is contingent upon the health and wholeness of every cell and every organ, so is the health of society contingent upon the unity and wholeness of the entire human family, both locally and globally.

Wholeness is the remedy for an ailing humanity. As Bahá’u’lláh stated, “Regard the world as the human body which, though at its creation whole and perfect, hath been afflicted, through various causes, with grave disorders and maladies… The mightiest instrument for the healing of all the world is the union of all its peoples.”

Let us reclaim our identity as whole beings living in harmony with all things around us. As we share our own deeply lived stories of wholeness, we can look forward to bringing back together the human family, one story at a time.

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The introduction of A New Story of Wholeness provides an overview for identifying the qualities and characteristics of a new narrative of the evolutionary impulse. It unpacks the various formats of the core pattern of transformation designed for remembering and living into our innate wholeness. It inspires us to conceptualize our own journey from separation to union, from the many to the One, toward a recognition of our inherent wholeness.

Following this, a “Blueprint for Living Our Story of Wholeness”—a rich outline of the microcosm of a “pattern set up in the heavens”—serves as a reference tool throughout the entire process of telling your own version of this journey to wholeness.

The three main parts of this book are:

1) The meaning of the process, with three chapters looking at the primary principles of evolution, consciousness, and wholeness.

2) The pattern of the process, with three chapters explaining its parts: Call to Wholeness, Path of Purification, and Return to Wholeness.

3) The Guide, with a personal example to consider, keys for the process, and writing exercises providing all the needed roadmaps, tools, and understandings for identifying and telling your own story of living into wholeness. This practical, step-by-step process incorporates reflective writing exercises consisting of key points, prompts, a worksheet of personal experiences for all the archetypes and motifs, and instructions for compiling a narrative for each part of the pattern. The Guide provides everything needed for a do-it-yourself writing workshop. In addition, a “Meditation for Living into Wholeness” wraps up the Guide with a focused way to achieve the goal.

A New Story of Wholeness equips you to participate in the story of our time—a global movement of transformation leading to the unity in diversity of the entire human family—by identifying those experiences in your life that place you on a path to wholeness. Writing your own version of this new story of our evolving consciousness brings clarity and focus as you begin to recognize how your life’s unfolding is part of something much larger.

With the Blueprint as our compass to point the way, we see not only the essence of the whole narrative pattern itself, but also how our own experiences follow this ancient, universal and, at the same time, new narrative we can all reclaim in this critical moment. Throughout the process, we are guided to become writers of our own unitive narrative engaging in the important work of conscious storytelling.

 

 

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A New Story of Wholeness was written to provide the means for identifying and telling our own story of wholeness. The creative process of exploring and expressing our own experience of wholeness gives us all a deeper commitment to ensuring Earth’s well-being as a living organism, reveals to us the necessity of collaborative relationships and dynamic coevolutionary partnerships on a planetary scale, and confirms for us that our personal and collective evolution of consciousness depends on the stories we tell.

There is a pattern “set up in the heavens” and imbedded within us that constantly assists our conscious evolution and confirms our wholeness on all levels. It encompasses a process of transformation that helps us move from beings endowed with an inherent potential to beings having fulfilled that potential.

This book illustrates not only the universality of this pattern but also, more importantly, guides us in becoming the whole beings we are meant to be, who recognize that this inner transformation serves a greater purpose in preparing us to be transformers of society.

This book provides a clearly focused set of guidelines that helps facilitate the process of personal and collective transformation already well under way. In The Story of Our Time: From Duality to Interconnectedness to Oneness, a 2017 Nautilus Book Award winner, I offered a narrative of the evolution of consciousness framed by seven unifying principles drawn from the world’s wisdom traditions that traces love’s unifying power guiding the collective transformation occurring now.

While The Story of Our Time shows how humanity is currently approaching the next step in its collective maturation by providing an overview of the larger, big picture narrative unfolding all around us, A New Story of Wholeness shows how the personal experience of this timeless pattern leads us directly into the process of collective transformation by guiding us toward contributing to the good of the whole.

What The Story of Our Time elucidates on the collective level, A New Story of Wholeness facilitates on the personal level by inviting you to identify, express, and share your own story of transformation as a vital part of the process of global transformation. Together, both illustrate how collective and individual transformation are so interdependent upon each other that they cannot be separated.

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If we could see with the eye of the Creator, we would see the present politically disrupted, economically paralyzed, and socially writhing world slowly but ultimately breaking up, preparing the way for the birth of the new world.

The evolutionary shift rate is speeding up, though from our perspective this may seem slow. We cannot say when the birth process will finally be completed. Nor do we know for sure whether the just and equitable global society sought for by so many for so long will be achieved only after further unimaginable horrors resulting from blindly clinging to old patterns, or more quickly and smoothly by consciously embracing and acting upon the newly revealed spiritual principles of our time.

What we do know is that the choice is fully ours. It is a gradual and unfolding process of evolution that guides our collective progress in assuming responsibility and actively carrying forward an ever-advancing civilization.

            The world is birthing a whole new way of seeing the world. We are in the midst of a transformation of consciousness never before witnessed. Spiritual energies that have already been released will ensure the renewal of individuals and institutions, opening the way for a higher order of organization and well-being on earth. As Baha’u’llah said, “The object of every Revelation” is to “effect a transformation in the whole character of mankind, a transformation that shall manifest itself outwardly and inwardly, that shall affect both its inner life and external conditions.”

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A “turning point” that is either overlooked or as yet unknown in the evolutionary process of collective transformation, but is considered by many as when the rebirth process itself began, is the Revelation of Baha’u’llah in the mid-19th century. Could this have been the spark that ignited the “clarifying and unifying vision capable of transcending irresolvable religious conflicts”? Could the recent scientific and spiritual advances, and other far reaching changes the world has witnessed since then, be part of this release of creative energies?

            Though smaller in numbers than other world religions, with 7.5 million followers, the Baha’i Faith has expanded worldwide more rapidly than any other tradition, and is now the second most widespread religion in the world. Its teachings and universal spiritual principles have appealed to people of all backgrounds. People who follow the mystical traditions within the world’s religions (such as Kabbalah, Sufism, and Contemplative Christianity) as well as Indigenous peoples around the world resonate deeply with its primary emphasis on unity and oneness.

Profound changes certainly have taken place throughout the world since the beginning of this rebirth process that has borne much pain in all realms of civil life. Convulsions in society, fierce antagonisms among the entire range of identity groups representing the peoples of the world, the downfall of kings, the collapse of nations, the extinction of dynasties, the deterioration of time-honored institutions, world wars, and the rise of fanatical terrorism are all evidences of the travail that has characterized the slow but inevitable symbolic death of an aging civilization.

At the same time, a new consciousness of oneness is laboring to be born. Bearing the seed of a new world civilization, the Revelation of Baha’u’llah has as its foundation what have since become the core principles of our time: that one single Divine Being, known by hundreds of names, such as Brahman, Yahweh, God, and Allah, whose ultimate nature is unknowable, created the universe and all creatures and forces within it; that from this Supreme Being have flowed a continuous succession of Prophets to guide humanity toward understanding reality, around whom have formed the world’s religions and spiritual traditions; that all humanity is part of one human family; that, with only one reality, the discoveries and findings of science must be in harmony with the principles and beliefs of revealed religion, and vice versa; that the full equality and partnership of women and men is essential to human progress; that prejudice – whether racial, ethnic, national, religious, or economic – must be overcome if humanity is to establish a just global society; that there is an essential connection between equitable economic prosperity and the spiritual principles governing life; that without preconceptions we must acquire knowledge through our own efforts by independently investigating truth; and, that the longed-for goal of world peace, now the greatest need of our time, is within our reach.

Though it has taken us nearly a century and three quarters to get to this point of near-universal awareness of these principles, and though we are still awaiting the final shift in consciousness to bring this understanding into full acceptance and practice, we can find motivation and renewed energy in witnessing the widespread change that has and is continuously occurring in these directions in the world.

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