The Resonance We Share

Dear Kosmos Reader,

I have just returned from a remarkable weekend. Were people of wisdom
there? Oh yes, many. Was the program filled with leading edge insights
on the latest value-driven, integral evolutionary wisdom? Yes. That too.
Amazing as this is, imagine that there was something more, something
new, something so life enhancing that it expanded your soul into our
soul.

We are not a group who works or meditates regularly together or even
shares the same spiritual or scientific worldview. Actually, we are a
group of strangers from many lands and different cultures. Why do we
feel as if we are an intimate family who has been scattered across the
globe and has found each other for the first time?

We could analyze this phenomenon and attempt to reproduce the
experience of collective wisdom with exercises designed to bring
cohesiveness to groups. But this was a spontaneous experience captured
through an environment and tone of care and concern that permeated every
detail of our surroundings and our interactions. We were at the World
Summit for Images and Voices of Hope. Our hosts were the Brahma Kumaris.

At each meal we shared animated conversations, enlivened by the high
energy of being together. I swear that with every bite, I could actually
feel the love that went into the preparation of the food. We felt the
love of Nature, too, in the radiating sunshine and clear blue skies as
we breathed the magnificent mountain air.

We are a group of journalists and artists expanding the possibilities
of new media with a conscience. We are professional journalists and
investigative reporters finding ways to circumvent the corporate and
political obstacles that prevent authentic and meaningful information
from being aired to the public. We are creative artists finding ways to
complement analysis with the immediacy of reporting by people who
actually live the story. We are artists glorifying public spaces with
beauty. We are musicians creating new music for a generation who hear
sound in a totally different way. We are creating community through
open-space innovations in radio and television inviting citizens to tell
their stories and to be part of the news. We discovered that the
essential ingredient of our creativity is freedom, both inside and
outside. Most of us are literally compelled from within to find a way to
free ourselves from cultural conditioning, financial obligations, and
institutional blockages to make it possible to present news that
matters.

It was not that we all have one project we are destined to fulfill to
together. It is more that the diversity of our purposes is unified
around a compelling need to transform and expand media into a meaningful
enterprise. Our collectivity nurtures the actualization of our
individual contribution to the whole.

The resonance that we share is born out of a commitment to transform
ourselves in preparation for a new planetary community. Recognizing that
we are part of both the problem and the solution, we have worked on
ourselves to overcome states of consciousness and cultural temptations
that could spiral us down into defeat, fear and anger. Even when things
went wrong during our weekend gathering, we were proactive, looking for
solutions rather than complaining. We responded to little imperfections
by ‘just letting go’ and tackled the real problems with courage. We had
established a field of collective freedom. The purity of these precious
hours together gave us the freedom to tap into our deepest wisdom and
find authentic truths. The beauty of this type of gathering is its lack
of singularity. It is being replicated all over the world by different
professions and communities. Out of the ashes of depleted cultures,
great hope and wisdom is rising. Groups in every country are recognizing
their responsibility to change themselves to change the world. They are
finding others to join them in transforming all our institutions and
together to create a sustainable future.

Have you ever been enthralled with brilliant minds spinning effective
creative ideas that make a difference? Have you ever been in a room
permeated with what seems like the ever-present scent of roses? I
believe that this kind of environment is evoking the collective and
embodied wisdom of our future.

P.S. For more about new media breakthroughs see the next issue of Kosmos.