What was the Election
Initiation the Hard Way
[audio version below]
We survived!
And what a wonderful chance to make so many astonishing observations.
The character of the thoughts and inner life of other beings as well as the laws governing natural phenomena can be recognized by an inner sense. We can gauge the quality of others’ thoughts when we hone this sense, specifically when we become more and more impartial on the inside. The warm or cool quality of these thoughts becomes apparent to us as we master our inner life of feelings, thoughts and actions. 1
I’d say most of us have been through somewhat of an initiation these past four years, and that is clear to see with the dramatic upsurge in discernment, often from the most unlikely quarters.
By now we are all wondering what planet we are on. We have realized that something in the atmosphere is different since that Tuesday and since January 20th, and one could say the shift in energy is comparable in seismicness to the Arc landing on Mount Ararat. Or the troops returning home after the end of World War 2. Or the day you graduated from high school. It’s that stark of a shift.
So how in all the world did our beloved Democrat party manage to lose this election? They had the entire news media on their side, as well as academia, and yet have been revealed as… the minority.
I’m not even taking sides here; this is just why things went the way they did.
There are some real head-scratchers in this whole business - for example, why did that team make it clear to everyone that they supported, well all the things American people don’t like? At least 70% of Americans do not support the (sterilizing) gender treatments for children. Only 10% support abortion up till birth, while 73% would limit it to before 15 weeks. 86% feel that illegal immigration is either an important or a critical threat to the vital interests of the US. Censorship of political views on social media is seen as likely by 73% of adults. 2 3 4 5
Not to take up too much space with details, but the campaign chose as its VP candidate someone who made Minnesota a sanctuary state for children seeking gender modification surgeries without their parents’ consent, passed a law allowing abortion until birth and removing the requirement to provide medical care to babies surviving abortions, and declared that freedom of speech is not absolute and needs to be monitored (yes, I’ve read the text of the laws). The presidential candidate had at various times come out strongly in support of all of those things.
Having gotten some useful push-back from a community member, let’s look some of this up, because it will not help us to chase catch phrases and red herrings: 13,994 - that’s the number of minors who received sex-change treatments in the US from 2019-2023. Of those, 6,747 were surgeries. These are just the children. Tens of thousands of prescriptions were for puberty blocking drugs, which can be sterilizing, and in combination with cross sex hormones or surgery certainly are. Under the affirming care model, pre-treatment consultation is most often under two hours. What do we suppose the average person thinks of this? Do they want it celebrated, as was proposed?
It is sometimes said that “late term abortions” aren’t happening. But that is only if the definition of after 37 weeks is used. In the US last year, there were about 9,300 performed after 21 weeks, and 137 after 28. We don’t need to imagine what that actually looks like in the operating room. Again, what does the average person think about this?
Many on both sides believe the election was won and lost because of the transgender issue, which keeps a lot of us up at night. And also of course because of Peanut the Squirrel.
I’ll stop there. The real point we want to make is coming.
What is really interesting is: the way the campaign’s loudest slogan was about “saving democracy”, particularly stopping the “threat to democracy” embodied by the other candidate. Simultaneously, the above key positions speak to the fringe of the party, in other words… the minority. So, saving democracy equals minority rule… What?
Can we really afford to feel that we as an enlightened minority ought to decide what is good for everyone, even if it is wildly unpopular?
What does it mean when an entire folk is continuously told to disbelieve their own senses? Why would a significant message of a campaign be: the minority is the majority; men can become women; there is no inflation; the border is strong; late term abortion is fine and is not happening; unpopular opinions are misinformation?
Does this trend of saying something is the case which is not, this rather powerful force in our culture provide a sound basis for our inner development as human beings, for the unfolding of deep and subtle senses which tell us about the true nature of thoughts and living beings?
(And by the way yes, we are leaving out taking the other side to task for now)
If you are familiar with Rudolf Steiner’s key Six Basic Exercises, you know they are indeed basic to perceiving deeper meaning in the world around us. They awaken the heart.
Learning to control our thoughts, achieve mastery over our feelings, take charge of our actions, live in radical open-mindedness, become able to see the positive in everything and create a harmony in our inner life — this is what it means to become capable of discernment; to become more and more human.
Initiation is not an artificial process that someone discovered or invented; it is completely organic. By becoming able to withhold inner judgement, we strengthen the depth of our understanding of the thing being judged. I was talking to a friend who felt very strongly about the way she had voted. It was hard to stay calm listening to her repeat the list of terrible things she had (I believed) heard on the news. All I knew was that I didn’t like the conversation, it didn’t feel good and it was upsetting that she wasn’t looking for a higher perspective. Oops - was I really looking for deeper meaning in that moment? What happened when I suspended my judgement of her motives and her psychology? I began to see the emotional pain, I began to sense the “shape” of her thoughts.
Anyone can try this. It’s like forgiving. In fact that’s what it is; maybe if we forgave people for thinking differently sooner rather than later we’d find the insight into their way of thinking much more satisfying than the scorn and derision which the judgement route yields. And, I guarantee you’ll see something different than expected. In this case, the thoughts about how awful another person was were kind of two dimensional, and didn’t move much. Likely they came from outside herself. But the desire to see others protected from the perceived evil and the compassion for them were warmer and had a softer quality. Try it! You don’t have to be clairvoyant to make these observations. Just forgiving.
We awaken the heart by freeing the soul. By freeing it from compulsion. In becoming master of the kingdom of our inner life, we gain an army of knights who give us understanding of neighboring kingdoms.
Audio Version:
*If you would like a pre-publication copy of the booklet I’m editing on what Steiner had to say about these practices, I’ll send you one as a thank you for being a subscriber. Just include a mailing address.
Rudolf Steiner, Knowledge of Higher Worlds, ch 4