Change: Stepping Inside of a Tornado

I’m starting with the man in the mirror;
I’m asking him to change his ways.
And no message could have been any clearer;
If you wanna make the world a better place

take a look at yourself, and then make a change.

(Michael Jackson, Man in a Mirror)

I remember watching a video of a woman giving birth to a child without an epidural. I had never heard screams like this before; she was screaming during the delivery as if there was no tomorrow. After the birth, however, something very strange happened. During an interview she was asked how she experienced the process of giving birth and somehow she replied, "it was pleasurable".

Michael Jackson's "Man in the Mirror" is about an idealistic man; someone who wants to change the world for the better, and he wants to start with himself. The song has a nice tune and the lyrics should talk to us spiritual travelers, but for me this song lost its meaning when it became apparent how much Michael Jackson struggled as a person in his later years. Actually, my reservation even goes beyond that. More often than not we are fooling ourselves with our well-meaning conscious efforts to change. The better our intentions, the more they get undermined by our nature. Good intentions are a little like the famous carrot hanging in front of the donkey, always perceived as being so close, but never reached.

True, a spiritual path starts with the intention to do something meaningful. But the change - if we truly stick to our good intention - will be imposed on us from the outside. It is our subconscious that has to be turned upside down, and that has to come from the outside. The spiritual path will get us to our desired destination kicking and screaming. Don't get me wrong though, along a spiritual path there are many beautiful stretches of synchronizing, of being pampered by the WAY. A few years ago I wrote an entire book about this magic synchronization process in "The Magnificent Experiment". But a few dark stretches are unfortunately also part of the awakening. And those are often most effective in making us change our ways.

Getting rid of interferences are most effective if it happens with one big bang. This is a little like  stepping inside a tornado where a FORCE beyond our comprehension is ripping the old ways of doing things out of us. Change hurts. But then, one day we will probably be exclaiming in hindsight, "it was a pleasure ride", just as the woman who gave birth to her baby. So if you have reached that fork in the road where change is enforced on you, just let happen what has to happen and get it done with. The most magnificent sunrise is already on its WAY.