The End of the World

So, this morning as I picked up a coffee at my favorite coffee shop, the proprietor happened to be there, and after exchanging pleasantries, I asked, so what are you going to do to observe the end of the world tomorrow? There was a moment of confusion crossing his face, then he remembered the Maya apocalypse. It seems this one just isn’t generating the juice other end of the world prophecies have. But, he was game, and opined, well, what if the prophecy is just a tad off and that instead of bad things coming, the world is going to stop being such a nasty piece of work…

I find myself thinking from time to time about how we humans do these end time things. I think pretty much all cultures touch on the deal one way or another, sometimes a real end, sometimes a reset, sometimes, a marker on a cosmic spiral.

But, a moment of change.

When it goes bad. Or, more rarely, when it goes well…

Few of us are really immune to this ideation. I recall the great hubbub among my friends as the calendar rolled into the twenty-first century – a real bit of craziness around a secular apocalypse. Among my favorites, one I have a tinge of believing myself is the Singularity predicted by such notables as Vernor Vinge and Ray Kurzweil, when things come together in the artificial intelligence world and a super intelligence emerges. Then the question becomes, does the entity that emerges find us annoying or entertaining…

Whatever.

The end of the world is always around the corner.

I’m sure it was as real as could be for those in the way of Genghis Khan, or watching their family die in one of the great deaths that have washed over humanity.

Life and death is a grave matter.

No doubt.

And our knowing we are like a bubble of morning dew can be a scary thing.

A profound thing.

If we actually integrate our body knowing we will die, each and every one of us, well, in that moment of fragility, other truths can also be revealed.

We open to them, and my goodness, I think my friend at the Coffee Exchange could be right.

And a new world can emerge.

So…

My wishes for tomorrow is that we all step into the great mess, and find our demise, and discover our true lives.

Wouldn’t that be a lovely thing?