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Are We Becoming a Soulless
Nation?
As we move further into this
millennium year, we are drawn to take stock of where we
are both individually and collectively. On a personal
level, do the majority of us see life as a sacred
privilege or do we experience life as a burden and a
sentence? As a society, are we healing the nation’s
ills and addressing the critical issues of our time? And
are these two questions interminably connected in a
crucial way?
Judging from what we read in
the news and from the thousands of individuals whose
healing we have facilitated over the past 30 years, too
many of us experience life as a burden instead of the
privilege it is meant to be. There is a good reason for
this: most people, even if they believe in a Higher
Power/God, do not experience a direct, personal
connection with a spiritual Source of love, power and
wisdom. They may attend church or temple, they may pray
or meditate, but a personal connection to a reliable
source of love and guidance eludes them. They do not
know how to experience this connection, especially when
they most need it. Without a deep, powerful, and
personal connection to a Divine Source of love and
guidance, we are left feeling like children crying in
the night, desperate and alone. From this inner
aloneness springs the problems of our society: anxiety,
depression, illness, substance abuse and other forms of
addiction (gambling, spending, sex, and so on), divorce,
crime, and all forms of violence, from rape and child
abuse to racism, torture and murder. Are we becoming a
soulless nation?
This internal disconnection
extends outward and leads to collective disconnection on
a massive, unconscionable scale. We are living in an
emotionally challenged country where millions of
Americans rely on anti-depressants and anti-anxiety
medication for internal stability. We are living in an
increasingly violent country: A recent FBI Uniform Crime
Report announced that over 17,000 murders (12% which
were juvenile murders), 2.4 million burglaries, 93,000
rape cases, 450,000 robberies, and 975,000 aggravated
assaults took place in 1998 alone. This intolerable
trend shows no sign of waning. To add to the country’s
seemingly insidious disintegration, the US Department of
Health and Human Services reported marriages evaporating
at an alarming rate, with over 98,000 divorces accounted
for in 1998 as well.
It is time to become aware that
each of us as individuals carry a responsibility for the
collective whole. As unappealing as it may be, we each
play a part in the disintegration of our time. A
soulless nation is comprised of soulless individuals,
and while we may not be directly responsible for the
external crimes and violence, each personal choice and
act we make reverberates on the global web that connects
us all. If we want to turn the tides and heal the
planet, it is time for us as individuals to turn our
attention within and commit to our inner work. It is
through this inner attention that we will begin to
regain our souls. And it is through regaining our souls
that we will affect sustainable change for the
collective whole.
Yet what does it really mean to
turn our attention within and commit to our inner work?
While we know that we cannot continue to live under the
existing unsuccessful paradigm, we may not know how to
change it. There is actually a simple concept that is
capable of bringing about enormous change within our
society. This concept concerns our intent. Our intent is
our primary motivation—what is most important to us—in
any given moment. There are only two intents from which
we can choose:
• The intent to protect
ourselves through some form of control—over others,
outcomes, or our own feelings—in order to get love,
avoid pain, and attempt to feel safe in the external
world.
• The intent to be loving and
learn about what would be loving to ourselves and
others, thereby creating internal safety.
Our intent is the most powerful
tool we have. It is the intent to learn about love that
opens the door to personal connection with spiritual
guidance. Unfortunately, most of us have learned--from
our parents, peers, TV and movies-- to operate from an
intent to protect ourselves with anger, blame,
withdrawal, resistance, violence, substance abuse and
other addictions. The intent to protect is responsible
for our disconnection from a spiritual Source. This
results in unbearable inner aloneness and leads to many
of the problems of our time.
It is a viscous circle: we grow
up learning to protect rather than learning about loving
ourselves and others; the intent to protect closes us
off from experiencing Divine love and guidance, which
leads to inner aloneness; our unbearable inner aloneness
leads us to protect in ways that harm ourselves and
others, which further cuts us off from our own souls,
leading to deep feelings of fear and anxiety, which lead
to further protections, and so on and so on.
A simple concept, with such
profound results. Our society has been protecting to try
to feel safe for a long time; clearly, it is not
working. Instead of feeling safe, we are feeling more
frightened all the time. We will not feel safe until we
do not feel alone within, and we will continue to feel
alone within until we develop a personal, ongoing
spiritual connection.
We feel this connection when we
open our hearts, but the door to opening the heart lies
within. What opens or closes our hearts? Our intent. The
intent to protect automatically shuts us down, shutting
out the very love and guidance we so desperately need.
On the other hand, the moment we choose the intent to
learn about loving, the heart opens and the Divine
Spirit of Love and Wisdom rushes in, just as air enters
our lungs when we take a breath. At that moment, with a
spiritual source surrounding us and filling us, we know
that life is a privilege through which we are given the
opportunity to heal and grow. Life never ceases to
present us with challenges, but the intent with which we
meet these challenges will determine whether life
becomes a constant burden or a learning adventure.
Our Creator gave us free will,
which ultimately means the freedom to choose our intent.
Let us use the millennium to begin to notice our intent.
If each of us changed our intent from protecting and
controlling to learning and loving, this internal change
could eventually change the world!
©Copyright 2000
Margaret Paul, Ph.D. & Erika J. Chopich, Ph.D.
All Rights Reserved.
* * * *
Margaret Paul, Ph.D. is the
co-creator of Inner Bonding, a transformational six-step
spiritual healing process. She is a best-selling author,
noted public speaker, workshop leader, consultant and
Inner Bonding facilitator. She has been leading groups,
teaching classes and workshops, and working with
individuals, couples, partnerships and businesses since
1973.
Margaret is the co-author of Do
I Have To Give Up Me To Be Loved By You? (over 400,000
copies sold), Free to Love, Do I Have To Give Up Me To
Be Loved By My Kids?, Do I Have To Give Up Me To Be
Loved By You?...The Workbook, Healing Your Aloneness,
The Healing Your Aloneness Workbook, and author of Inner
Bonding and recently released, Do I Have To Give Up Me
To Be Loved By God? Her books have been translated into
ten languages: German, Italian, Danish, French, Spanish,
Portuguese, Chinese, Japanese, Dutch and Hungarian.
Healing Your Aloneness and The Healing Your Aloneness
Workbook are best-sellers in Germany. In her spare time,
she is an artist. She has three grown children.
Contact: 310-390-5993,
888-6INNERBOND (888-646-6372), Margaret@innerbonding.com,
www.innerbonding.com,
Inner Bonding® Educational Technologies, Inc., PMB #42,
2531 Sawtelle Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90064
* * * *
Rev. Dr. Erika Chopich is the
co-creator of Inner Bonding, a transformational six-step
inner healing process. Dr. Chopich a best-selling
author, Chaplain and founder of Hope America Ministries
Foundation, a non-profit organization devoted to
re-integrating the homeless and providing assistance to
disaster victims. In addition to having practiced as a
psychotherapist, she was formerly an administrator for
the Los Angeles Free Clinic. She works with individuals,
groups, and business mediation, and is an accomplished
speaker and seminar leader.
Dr. Chopich is co-author of
Healing Your Aloneness and the Healing Your Aloneness
Workbook. Her books have been translated into five
languages: German, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Dutch,
and Japanese. Healing Your Aloneness and the Healing
Your Aloneness Workbook are best-sellers in Germany. Dr.
Chopich lives and works in Santa Fe, NM. She is an
accomplished pilot and experienced chef.
Contact: 888-6INNERBOND
(888-646-6372), erika@innerbonding.com,
www.innerbonding.com
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