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Creating a Golden Age

Building Paradise Within Ourselves

ROB BREZSNY

MAY 14READ IN APP

CREATING A GOLDEN AGE

I suspect none of us has the capacity to foretell the future of the human race. No one—not psychics, not doomsayers, not intelligent optimists, Indigenous shamans—no one.

There is a persuasive case to be made that this is the worst of times, and an equally compelling case that this is the best of times; a case that everything will collapse into a miserable dystopia and a case that we are on the verge of a golden age. It’s impossible to know in any objective way which is truer.

Anyone who asserts they do know is cherry-picking evidence that rationalizes their emotional bent. The variables are chaotic and abundant and beyond our ken.

In the meantime, let’s do what we can to create a golden age. How?

• Prepare for the unpredictable. Cultivate mental and emotional states that ripen us to be ready for anything.

• Don’t get lost inside our own heads.

• Avoid being enthralled with the hypnotic lure of painful emotions, past events, and worries about the future.

• Trust empirical evidence over our time-worn beliefs and old habits.

• Turn up our curiosity full blast and tune in to the raw truth of each moment with our beginner’s mind and beginner’s heart.

• Be eager to maintain our poise and grace amid the confounding questions that tease and teach us.

Everything I just described is also an excellent way to prime yourself for a chronic, low-grade, always-on, simmering-at-low-heat brand of ecstasy—a state of being more-or-less permanently in the Tao, in the groove, in the zone.

WHO WE ARE

We are dissident bodhisattvas rebelling against potencies that celebrate fear and blaspheme love.  

We are spiritual freedom fighters plotting and wrangling to revere nature and incubate the still small voice and foment the wildest peace we can conjure. 

We are subversive mystics stoking the cool blue fires of poetry and lobbying for the liberated imagination.  

We are militant ecstatics invoking the transformative powers of pleasure to sanctify and beautify our one and only Earth.  

We are mutinous purveyors of grace who redistribute the wealth so that all creatures may have the means to thrive. 

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YOUR SPECIFIC GOALS

You may already understand what I’m about to tell you. But in case you don’t, I’ll say it. Few principles are more important than those immediately below. 

Be crisp and clear about naming your concrete intentions. The more specific your goals, the more likely it is you will accomplish them. 

You can’t create vivid visualizations of abstract, generalized aims. They may appeal to your intellect, but they can’t mobilize you all the way down to the roots of your desires. As a result, your motivation to achieve them will be wan and weak. 

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I began to formally study at an occult magick school at age 23.

I was surprised and amused when the first lesson of the first course, “Seven Steps in Practical Occultism,” informed me that the most important thing I needed to do as a magician was to know exactly WHAT I WANT. 

What specific experience, feeling, or situation do you want the most?