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On the road again:
Greetings from Green Valley, Arizona
Today's Story
Many people think that evolution is a gradual uphill ramp that slowly and steadily takes us from our current status quo to a higher place that’s just a little bit better than where we are now.
Wrong!
In their book
Spontaneous Evolution
:
Our Positive Future (and a way to get there from here),
authors
Steve Bhaerman
(aka Swami Beyondananda) and
Bruce Lipton
explain that evolution occurs through a series of plateaus and vertical ascents.
The pattern begins with a smooth horizontal timeline, like a very flat road, that, historically, might go on for centuries.
But then something happens to throw a few pebbles onto that path.
As time goes on, the road becomes strewn with rocks and then boulders. It becomes nearly impassable.
Societal earthquakes shake the road. It becomes terribly uneven and unfair, especially to those who are marginalized.
The roots of society are shaken to their depths.
Old, comfortable norms of decency and humanity crumble.
Leadership becomes nil and corrupt. Life becomes untenable. Social discord becomes volatile.
Peaceful way-showers might be assassinated.
But, fortunately, somewhere in this process, a growing number of visionary outliers begin to search for a solution. Their mantra becomes “There must be a better way.”
What is it? No one knows. Many don’t care.
Some see the chaos as a way to plunder the masses and amass personal riches.
Things get worse.
“There must be a better way! What is it?” becomes the cry of a vocal few.
This generates an initial swell, like the leading lip of a bell curve, that begins to move through the populace. The few are joined by a larger few.
Some new concept, such as “Love your neighbor,” begins to take hold.
More and more people start to say, “Maybe
that’s the better way.”
Visionaries become actionaries. Some take to the street. Some organize. Some meditate and pray.
Eventually—if not soon—the groundswell becomes a
critical mass.
The dictionary defines critical mass as the “size, number, or amount large enough to produce a particular result.”
In business, a critical mass is “the point at which a growing company becomes self-sustaining.”
In physics, a critical mass is “the smallest amount of fissile material needed for a sustained nuclear chain reaction.” (
In social dynamics, a critical mass is “a sufficient number of adopters of an innovation in a social system so that the rate of adoption becomes self-sustaining and creates further growth.”
In street jargon, a critical mass is “the minimum size of an excited audience that leads to a wildfire.”
The numbers or percentages used to calculate a critical mass are not large. They are far, far, far from what we know as a majority or even a plurality.
This was after the chief of police stated that the only thing that would create a 20% drop in crime would be 20 inches of snow.
In 2019, the BBC reported on “
The ‘3.5% rule’: How a small minority can change the world.” This number has been supported by articles in
The Guardian and videos on the web site for the political reform organization
Represent.US.
In 2018, 61% of voters in Michigan approved a ballot initiative to end gerrymandering in that state.
The number of volunteers by the citizen action group Voters Not Politicians numbered approximately 13,000, which is 3% of the number of people who voted and only 1.3% of the state’s population.
And then there is the famous long-standing quote by anthropologist Margaret Mead: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”
In the evolution of a caterpillar to a butterfly, the critical mass is related to the organism’s biological
imaginal cells, which are its change agents.
(Good, 3-minute video)
At a certain point in the caterpillar’s life, these latent cells “come to life” and begin metamorphosis. Naturally, the cells that had made the caterpillar a caterpillar protest.
But the status quo doesn’t stand a chance against the inevitable power of evolution, and the butterfly eventually emerges from the cocoon as a creature of color to dance in the air.
Can we do that? Not in the biological sense, like the caterpillar does.
But, does
our human society have imaginal cells?
Yes! Definitely, we have the power to emerge and rise above our current chaos.
And when we do, it will be so spontaneous that the results will seem to be magical.
In the words of Dr. Lipton: “We see a decaying caterpillar world. And yet, everywhere,
you and other human imaginal cells are awakening to a new possibility. We are clustering, communicating, and tuning into a new, coherent signal of love.”
~~~~~ ~~~~~
Thank you for caring. Thank you for reading my stories.
God blesses everyone ... no exceptions.
Robert (Bob) Weir
