We are the world …

A Spectrum, by Dawn Brunke

For the last few days, wherever I go, I see the image of the American flag. Big banner flags are up at grocery stores and Wal-Marts, little plastic flags flutter from car antennas, and a local printing company is handing out free paper flags to tape on the rear window of your car.

Surely, this is a good way to begin healing. This is about Americans coming together, showing support for all those who have been touched by the recent events (which is to say, all of us), grieving together as a family.

But, at the same time, I sometimes sense a bit of righteousness creeping in. The chants of "USA, USA" on television, and other acts of patriotism, make me wonder if we are perhaps using our flag as a shield, a defense, a positioning of "us" against "them."

I wonder if we don't need a larger symbol to call for a deeper level of awareness to this event.

Along with others, I have been reading the many excellent posts that have been on the e-mail circuit: posts from spiritual leaders to those who lost loved ones to those who live in different countries, all of these individuals asking us to look within ourselves as we grow through the deep wounding that has occurred not just in America, but all over the world.

Some of the posts remind us that what happened is a symptom of a much larger problem, of a confused world whose governing bodies continue to bicker, doggedly asserting and perpetuating the myth that "we" are so much better, so very different than "them."

Some individuals suggest that as a whole we are, in fact, so numb and out of touch with the reality of our situation, that we needed a shock this huge, this dramatic, this heart-rending to wake us up. It is in this sense that the "911" was truly a global wake-up call -- an enormous, resounding shock aimed directly at the heart of every single one of us.

I have been sending these posts on to others, thus being part of the chain reaction of awakening that asks us to consider, contemplate and discuss alternative views, rather than succumb to the retaliatory, fear-based war mentality that is being fueled by so much of the U.S. media. As Albert Einstein once noted, the problems of our world cannot be solved with the same type of thinking that created those problems in the first place.

I am encouraged most by those viewpoints that urge us to center ourselves at deeper levels of awareness, to consider the powerful shadow material that is being played out, and to begin working with the deeper implications of what this global cry for help is mirroring to us all.

I believe true healing begins when we start to realize and acknowledge that the shadow reflections we project onto others and love to hate so much are really forgotten, abandoned, stuffed-away pieces of our own greater self. I believe we are being asked to explore and respond from that center.

We need to look more carefully than ever before at what we are doing, at who we really are. We need to move to that place where we can, individually and collectively, access our deeper wisdom, compassion and clarity.

The image I've been seeing as a source of healing and greater understanding is quite simple: a small, yet beautiful, blue-green sphere that is known intimately to all of us.

For me, the image of the earth reminds us we are truly united in a way that transcends borders, colors, races, and ideologies. We are one people. We are the world. And She is really quite patient and forgiving of us as we live and die, love and hate, playing out our myriad dramas as we struggle to remember who we are -- as we begin, finally, to awake.

Dawn Brunke is the editor of Alaska Wellness magazine.