“I believe there is an evolutionary movement towards love in the universe, a self-organizing process around love that’s moving us toward what we call higher levels of consciousness.” — Riane Eisler, IN SWEET COMPANY: CONVERSATIONS WITH EXTRAORDINARY WOMEN ABOUT LIVING A SPIRITUAL LIFE

Call me a Pollyanna, but I believe in Goodness. The manifestation of virtue — our individual trove of good thoughts and deeds and the goodness we amass en masse — seeds the future, sets invisible forces in motion that actually, eventually take form. Whether we call these arrangements good luck or good karma, miracles or answered prayers, or whether we feel we just happen to be in the right place at the right time, that such experiences exist, that the expression of virtue manifests in our lives, is proof that Goodness has a life of its own.

Neuroscience tell us that specific areas of our brain twinkle like Christmas lights when we feel positive emotions, that repetitive “twinkling” deepens these grooves and creates compatible grooves in our neural neighborhoods. Joy breeds joy. Metaphysics tells us that the principle of karma follows this same pattern: What goes around, comes round. While it is essential we that repair our broken world, it is fundamental that we blueprint Goodness in our minds.
   
When good thoughts are hard to come by, to keep the ball rolling in my favor, I call up vintage memories, “borrow” from a stash of joy and goodwill, and reconfigure the present moment in the same way I “borrow” from my past each time I relieve a mistake, only in reverse. If our thoughts, for good or for ill, direct our lives. I want to stay on the sunny side of the street for as long as I can!

The holidays are ripe with opportunities to both create and borrow Goodness. The heart of the world opens a titch; we taste something special in the air. Or we don’t. We smile more. Or we don’t. We gather. Or we don’t. Either way, invisible forces become visible. Either way, it’s the right place, the right time to blueprint Goodness. To seed the future.

Your thoughts?