There are some things we should all know — without having to think about it: humanity is headed in the wrong direction. Everyone knows this except for those who believe they can benefit from tearing their own ship apart — while it’s still at sea — in order to sell its pieces at a profit.

But, much as in the timeless story of “The Emperor’s Clothes,” where no one would speak the truth of their ruler’s nakedness for fear of losing the King’s favor, so we continue to deceive ourselves. We hope for a happy ending that never comes…because undetected self-deception never ends. How can it when the only thing we change about ourselves are images that have already proven powerless to change anything? And so it is that blame has become the balm of our suffering. Yet, rather than healing these wounds in our psyche, such fault-finding only makes them worse, and the cycle of pain deepens in the darkness of ourselves. Let’s be clear:

Making war — for any reason, at any level, is not a necessary evil, but an evil made necessary by people who have not learned anything about love.

Hatred of any other, for any reason, has no justification unless self-destruction is deemed wise.

Conspicuous consumption has become the backbone of our culture and justifying it, our art.

There are no excuses for remaining as we have been. All of us know we are made to be more than what has become of us. But IF we are to realize our true possibilities, then we must deliberately step out of this world of illusion with all of its lies. To see the truth of this statement — to accept its edict without flinching, even if we don’t know how to fill the emptiness left in the absence of failed old certainties — is the seed of evolution in the individual soul. The fire of insight fuels this revolution of one.