Waiting for Magic
Perhaps the burden of change falls on each of us

By RAVI DYKEMA

I've been on a save-the-world kick for decades (welcome to the club, Mr. Obama). My first magazine was named "Attunement, For a Better Madison" and it focused on positive news. I was sure a New Age was dawning because all the signs I paid attention to were pointing to it. Most of the people I hung out with thought so too, as did some convincing spiritual teachers whose many seminars I attended and whose books I read. And my Yoga-Guru in India many years earlier (when I was 20) had said that the Bhagavad-Gita teaches that when most people on Earth became selfish and ornery the divine-person named Krishna would re-incarnate and fix it all up. Like, soon, he said.

So, I waited, and published my good-news magazine.

He didn't come, best I can tell. Nor did the NewAge.

Well, that's not quite correct. I have personally spoken to hundreds of people over 30 years of publishing who claimed to be trying to lead humanity out of darkness. Humanity just seems pretty hooked on it, I guess.

Since I started saving the world, life on Earth has become more precarious. The word "sustainable" has become popular in the last year because the word "un-sustainable" suddenly describes the future pretty well to a critical mass of people. Of course the epitaph "un-sustainable" has long moaned from the tombstones of thousands of extinct species. But only recently have enough influential humans said OUR species' party may be ending. They cite party-crashers like dwindling fossil fuel supplies, atmospheric changes, over-population, and humanity's abiding appetite for nationalistic and religious violence, just to name a few.

Yoo-hoo, Krishna! Where aaare yooouuu?

. . . Silence . . .
Perhaps waiting for the messiah, capitalism, democratic yearnings, military might and om-circles-for-world-peace to work their magic is naïve of us. Humanity and her habitat depend on vast masses of people to choose to change their ways, I think. Some scientists say we have the needed technology now, or can develop it soon, for Earth's population of people to maintain their status quo lifestyles or improve them a bit. But a bunch more of us have to wake up and do our part. What will it take for folks on Earth to notice the fact that we’re in this together?

Perhaps we shouldn’t wait for magic. But we can at least hope for unprecedented leadership. Ya hear me, Mr. President?

(Also see “Big Ideas” on page 21)

How to save Spaceship Earth in five easy steps

1. Don’t fight

2. Share

3. Listen to smart people

4. Be willing to sacrifice and change

5. Keep working on it