We’ve all heard of the predictions of change and we do see an enormous amount and speed of change all around us, from technical innovations to natural calamities and man-made disasters, to political revolutions, to religious fanaticism and more.

The transformation predicted for our age is in full swing but what does it lead to? What is being born? What is the essence of what we are witnessing, and most importantly: what can we do to be part of the solution and not part of the problem? (After all no one in their right mind wants to end up in the camp of the dinosaurs).

Beyond and within all the multi-level change, the essence of the transformation of humankind is the opening of the Heart. For instance: we have the technological capacity to dramatically improve life on this planet: we can feed everyone, supply them with clean water, education, housing and health-care. (Imagine a planet where all the present wars are replaced by this one war on suffering!) What we don’t have yet is the will to use this capacity. We don’t have the Heart. Not yet.

The reason for this lack of willingness is that our minds are ruled by egoism, egoism that has its roots in ignorance and closes the Heart. It is the ignorance of our true potential, of what can make us truly fulfilled.

The ignorant and confused mind seeks fulfillment by trying to grab for itself as much as it can. And what is the result? As we get more and more ‘stuff,’ more knowledge, more power, our hearts dry up. Yes, paradoxically, the more we grab the more we lack. Happiness and fulfillment—what we all truly long for—do not come from outside, from stuff, from power, from distractions and fleeting enjoyments, they arise in the Heart. And the Heart suffers when it is ignored.

This is the true revolution of our day: to recognize this lack, this dryness of Heart and to apply the remedy. To recognize that what can make us fulfilled is to open our Hearts to ourselves and to each other, to develop and express true caring, compassion and kindness. To develop our capacity for giving and loving means to build the foundation of true happiness. And this must and will be the foundation of the new world we create. It happens inside of us.

This change, this jump in the collective evolution of the Heart, is supported by the emerging global brain. The internet is a mere 22 years old and already 2 billion people populate it. Like a fast growing organism in a Sci-Fi movie it continues to revolutionize the way we live. This giant brain we share empowers our individual consciousness.

Now governments and institutions that depend upon authoritarian control and secrecy are falling. They are simply not keeping pace with the evolving human consciousness. When in the transparency the web creates the oppressed find out what the oppressors are doing, change is imminent.

The underbelly of this inevitable awakening is the arising of religious and political fundamentalists who want to push us back to what they hold to be the great values of the good old days, which were neither. But don’t let the upheavals scare you. Change for the better is coming and it can’t be controlled.

The heart of that change is the Heart. The spiritual mass-awakening of today is no coincidence. And not surprisingly, it is occurring largely outside of the old religious institutions that depend upon secrecy and authoritarian control.

This awakening of the Heart is here to stay, to mature and to transform human life as we know it. The present attention to living in the Now is a first step. It’s excellent to live in the Now, and once you have arrived in the Now, what are you going to do with it?

You will awaken the Heart. You will remember what it means to come home to yourself, to be truly human, to dwell in the center and core of your being. This return to yourself, to your Heart by dissolving the obstacles of the negative mind is your most important contribution.

The new world will be created—or ‘inherited’ as Jesus said—by the meek, which means those who are humble and submissive to the presence of the Heart. There you will discover a consciousness that is transcendent, a consciousness we may call God, a consciousness which—through you—is in charge here and now.

Let it wake you up and in all the upheavals around you, you will safely rest in the heart of that consciousness, the consciousness of the Heart.

“Someday, after we have mastered the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity,
we shall harness for God the energies of love.
Then for the second time in the history of the world,
we will have discovered fire. “

–Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

with love,

Ram Giri