What Now?

“The only real place is here.

The only time there really is, is now”.

~~~

I can hear the “tuck tuck” of a motorcycle passing by

in the distance

a warm breeze on my skin

gently my hammock swings

and i feel joy as i come up from a dream.

Opening my eyes i see a canopy of green above

leaves and branches and birds

a squirrel chasing another

I am here now!

i am alive!

~~~

Now, most of us – all around the globe – had a couple of weeks of extraordinary circumstances.

Many of us were/are more or less confined to our home and deprived of many of our normal activities and actions and distractions that usually fill our days and our life.

This Corona Holy-days – as i jokingly like to call them – have disrupted our business-as-usual in many ways, some of them brutal and devastating, some of them mainly boring and monotone and some not so bad at all.

But still, the question might have come to our mind more ore less intense:

What now?

What’s next?

So i think that this crisis could also be seen as a divine intervention that forces us to think about those questions and re-think our personal life.

And maybe even think further about what it all means, this crisis of human vulnerability, this fragmented society we are living in with all its shortcomings that come under close scrutiny right now.

And life in the future in general.

What kind of life do we want for ourself in the future.

For the life of our children and grandchildren.

This kind of questioning and contemplating and soul-searching is stuff that people often do in spiritual retreats, when they voluntarily leave everyday life behind for a time of silence and solitude.

In our day and age now, we are in the middle of a worldwide spiritual retreat.

The question is:

Do we take advantage of this break, this time we have been given, to re-think our life & the future?

Can we come out on the other end of this with a clearer picture of how we would dream to live, what we would love to do with our life and with whom we would want to share life and how?

On the one side i feel my heart break when i think of all those people who die daily under terrible circumstance and all the people threatened existentially by the dire economic consequences.

But i can not – at the same time – deny that i am overjoyed, happy even that this STOP sign has come up all over the world.

Happy that we have a chance to look closer and sharper and more critical at the status quo of our human world.

And the conclusion, the verdict of such scrutiny is clear to me and it is harsch:

We need to change, humanity as a whole has to change its ways to avert disaster down the road – and quick!

So please, bear with me a little bit longer!

I am not intending to give some theoretical or philosophical answers here.

Rather suggest the questions that may lead to answers and might motivate change.

If we just can deeply and sincerely contemplate them.

Here are some such questions:

– Am i happy with my life as i lived it until this crisis hit?

– Have i been missing something essential in my life?

– Who of all the people i know are really important to me?

– Do i communicate my appreciation and love to those people?

– Do i believe in Love?

– What is my basic life philosophy?

– Do i believe in my ability to change and grow consciously?

– Do i believe in conscious evolution or do i believe in learning thru pain and suffering.

– Do i have a understanding what’s the purpose and meaning of life.

– Do i know my personal purpose and place and contribution to the society that i am a part of?

And most of all:

– Do i know who I AM when all titles and roles and relations and familiar circumstances fall away?

I deeply believe that we would give the world and the future a tremendous gift if we would use this quarantine retreat wisely to ponder those questions and come out of it with some deep feelings, some clear statements and renewed inspiration.

Maybe even … vision!