Awakening to our Destiny

“With the utmost joy and gladness, serve ye the human world, and love ye the human race…Wherefore, rest ye not, be it for an instant; seek ye not a minute’s respite nor a moment’s repose. Surge ye even as the billows of a mighty sea, and roar like unto the leviathan of the ocean of eternity.” ~ ‘Abdu’l-Bahá

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In our most quiet moments, each of us yearn for our lives to count for something more. To make a difference. To probe for a deeper significance in life. To discover the clarity of our destiny.

We are each born with a destiny to fulfill. The fulfillment of it as unique as each bud that unfurls. Each star that burns. Each snowflake that falls. And yet, it is a destiny beyond our mere selves.

It is a destiny that ultimately ties us to each other. To one great common purpose. Embedded into the fabric of our very existence, we are all called to the destiny of making the cause of the human race, the common cause for each of us.

That, I believe, is our true calling in life. To love. To honour. To work together for a common good.

It takes a new sort of bravery to live through the 21st century. We are brought to the heights of wonderment at man’s ability to invent. Simultaneously, we are brought to our knees by the depths of depravity the human mind is able to create. We are bowed down at the weight of calamity wrought by the hands of our fellow men.

Perhaps, there is no better time to awaken to our high purpose than –  right now. The foundation we build our world on rests today on what we work together to build it up on.

“That the passing of centuries and cycles of life may not undermine. An edifice of peace which the rolling of ages cannot overthrow.” ~ Century of Light

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This is the time for deeds. The time for words has ended. The wrongs in the world continue to exist because people talk only of their ideals and do not strive to put them into practice. Unless the goodness of our thoughts are translated into the world of action, they mean nothing.

As human beings, we tend to forget easily. If viewed from one perspective, that might be beneficial for our personal well-being. From another, we lose the opportunity to put in place the missing link so necessary for the lasting security and well-being for ourselves by failing to take action.

The furore in Boston. The furore in Delhi. The furore in Aleppo. The sparks of agitated furore all around the globe. I cannot in all clear conscience duck my head and remain oblivious or untouched by the events that have taken place around the world in just this past one week.

It has touched me in a deep, almost wrenching way. It has awakened the mother in me. The spouse in me. The very human-ness in me. Just as I believe it has in you. The thought of putting oneself in the shoes of the victims is a burden too great to bear.

What do regular people like you and I do in the aftermath of such shattering events? Where do we go from here? How do we make sense of this world we live in? What do we tell our children? What do we even begin to tell ourselves? Because, I am sure this will not be the last nor the worst of the storms we as a whole mankind would have to face.

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What will we allow to shape our world today?

All this and more, I grapple with.

I believe the choices we make right now in the aftermath of such evident evils and tyranny will determine the future course of mankind in history. What we silently speak to ourselves. How we connect the dots. How we translate such acts of evil into the way we live.

“We do not veer off the rails in an explosion of error. We make a succession of uncorrected missteps, and then when we check, the good we would do seems far out of reach…. Depravity does not enter creation in a tidal wave of wrongness. It comes in as a slow, silent leak, drip by quiet drip until the earth is flooded…”  ~ Desmond Tutu

It is so crucial that we do not leave the matters of global security only to the hands of our leaders. That is to shrug off our own responsibility which perhaps have a greater impact in the long run. Let us not be the silent leak which drip unnoticed in our apathy and indifference in the face of such challenging times.

“When we pay attention, it is possible to halt evil in its tracks.” Desmond Tutu writes in his book Made for Goodness.

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I see the crisis which engulfs our world today as the birthing pangs in the evolutionary process of growth of humanity. Just as one observes in one’s life the tumultuous rite of passage one takes to reach maturity, these global events are showing us where we have gone wrong. How we address those crucial missing links is necessary for our development as individuals and as a world.

Far from signalising the end of civilisation, the convulsive changes towards which humanity is being ever more rapidly impelled will serve to release the potentialities inherent in man and reveal the full measure of his destiny.

To choose such a course of viewing our world is not to deny humanity’s past but to understand it. Far from a reason for despair, the state of our world today can be viewed as the unavoidable tumult which marks the collective coming of age of our human race.

Each block that we put in place requires the genuine civilisation of our character and the ennobling of our conscience. In light of what has taken place and continue to take place, anger, hatred and cynicism are very natural feelings. Indifference and apathy too.

But what shall we choose to build our world on after the grief and bloodshed? What will we allow to define us as a human race?

Destiny – the fulfilment of one’s true purpose. That purpose is peace and unity and no more hurting each other, please. Our one common purpose for all mankind.

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“There is much evil in the world.
If, when someone harms us, we react with hatred,
in resentment, we are throwing the evil out into the world again,
augmented by our own reaction, but if we forgive the
wrong-doer we transmute his action into a test
by which our soul has been able to develop.
Thus we shall, as it were,
have absorbed the effect of the evil deed and
converted it to good ends.”

~ The Universal House of Justice