Richard sends a message of hope and optimism for celebrating this holiday season.
Despite the emphasis on conflict and violence so prevalent in the media, there is a steady and inevitable self-transcending aspect to our consciousness that is steadily, albeit gradually, overcoming our old survival based psychology.
I was raised in a very non-religious reformed Jewish family. And Christmas holds a really special place for me because my parents were very wise. They realized that, for children, at least children in the United States when I was growing up, and perhaps it’s still the same, the Christmas holiday was really the holiday for children. It was the exciting holiday of gift giving and receiving.
I remember getting up in the morning and going down into the basement. We didn’t believe in Christmas trees, so we had made this kind of cardboard chimney, cardboard fireplace, and we decorated it with strings of colored paper and all kinds of things. And there would be all kinds, I remember the time when there was a hamster for my brother and a little hamster for me in their cages. It was my first pet because I was very allergic.
At any rate, they knew that, because it was such an important holiday for children and because so many of the children in the neighborhood where I grew up were Christian, they didn’t want my brother and I to feel left out. And so it was the major, major holiday of joy for me, even though I was part of a very non-religious Jewish family.
So I’m hoping that this holiday, and I know how people can get cynical about the commercialization of it. I know that. I know that’s true, but sometimes what’s really beautiful is to take something you already own and that means something to you and for the people who mean something to you, give them something you already have. And, in that way, there’s a recycling of love, a recycling of joy, and a real statement, an important statement of this means something to me and I love you, and so I’m giving it to you because I love you. And happy holidays, Merry Christmas, seasons greetings, blessings for life.
And also, the shop owners and all have to make their living, even though some of it’s become these gigantic corporate things like Amazon. I don’t want to look at it that way right now. I just want to say to all of you celebrate, give love, be loving, let the love in.
And remember that, even though so much in the world seems to be dark, what we don’t see is what’s light in the world. And there is so much of it. We are evolving in consciousness. We are progressively becoming more and more certain about human rights.
Progress is happening as we approach the big challenge of environmental change and global warming. We have built within us, because of the nature of our consciousness, the ability to witness and be aware. And anything that we can be aware of, we’re more than. We can transcend.
So we have a built in self transcending mechanism in consciousness. So even though what survival has given us, which is we look for danger, we look for a threat. We amplify it because, if we were clear about threats, if we were clear about danger, if we can perceive them and anticipate them, we had a higher survival value.
And that means the media tends to dwell on the fearful things, it dwells on the threatening things. It’s still kind of buried in the domain of survival, but here we are at the holiday season, and just remember, we’re really beginning to learn to thrive. More and more of us are finding our way into a life path of thriving and of generosity and of giving and of donating from our hearts and through the radiance of our hearts to others, silently and actively at a time like this holiday season. So I send you blessings and wishes for, really, a loving, wonderful holiday season.