Inner Power Hour with Dr. Antonia M  

We’re in the final stretch of the 2008 presidential race. In just a few hours we will make a most important decision about our nation’s future. Not only will we select a new president on Tuesday, November 4 but we will also choose between two fates. Which way should we go? The race, the candidates and the choice we face all personify the crossroads in consciousness that we as Americans have reached. While the candidates have shared the direction in which they plan to lead the nation, the recent presidential and vice presidential debates revealed a hidden dimension of dialogue between Cosmic Consciousness and America about the path we need to take.

The Real Debate
During the first presidential debate, there came a moment of deep insight that opened my spiritual eyes and ears about what we’re really facing as a nation. The surface issue: Should we meet with the Iranian leader (or leaders of other hostile nations) without pre -conditions? Absolutely not, according to McCain. Perhaps so, argued Obama. “…this notion by not talking to people we are punishing them has not worked,” Obama said. Instantly, I saw something underneath the surface that I hadn’t noticed before: Isn’t that how a five-year-old handles conflict–by pouting, not talking to the “enemy,” and demanding to get his or her way? And isn’t that what we continue to do as adults if we never learn more effective ways of dealing with conflict, challenge and change? So a big metaphysical question behind the election is this: Are we as a nation ready to grow up, yes or no? That’s the real debate.

Despite the nation’s age and the achievements that have taken place during the last 200+ years, it seems we still have a lot of growing up to do beneath the surface. We’ve been shouting “Mine, mine, mine!” for a very long time, which many of our policies and much of our history reflect. This is an evolutionary dead-end. In other words, we are facing extinction as a powerful, independent nation. Already we are in a steep decline intellectually, physically, spiritually, financially, culturally, socially, and in a number of other ways.  This has been apparent for quite some time. On November 4, what evolutionary path are we going to choose instead?

The Call for Change
Change. Real Change. These are not just campaign slogans but rather an inescapable cosmic message. A mere “changing the guard” will make no difference for us if the energy behind our circumstances do not change with it. Metaphysical change is about healing and transformation from the inside out. If our values are not different, if our philosophy is not different, if our perspective and commitment are not different, the outcome will be no different regardless of what we do. This is because every decision and every effort will always be directed toward the same end for the same reasons. The leader of any community - be it a nation, a league of nations, or a small neighborhood group - serves as a conduit for the energy that will underlie its development. He or she harnesses and focuses the energy that will give the group direction. If he does not understand the relationship between the energy, the community, and the path the community must take, he will be unable to benefit the people regardless of what his experience may be. Understanding, not mere experience, is what prevents history from repeating itself. It is through understanding that one gains awareness of the principles of a thriving community and wisdom about how to apply those principles to bring about growth, healing and transformation.

In the metaphysical world there are no mistakes and there are no coincidences. For a nation in such desperate need of growth, healing and transformation, I find it incredibly revealing that we are so divided between a candidate that physically embodies the path of the old, the inflexible, the cancerous and the easily agitated, and a candidate that embodies the path of the youthful, the open-minded, the healthy and the calm. The reality is that learning and leadership happen more by emulation and example than anything else. Which of the candidates’ energies would you desire to emulate in your everyday life? Which example would you choose to set for all the world to see?

Responsibility & Our Karmic Footprint
The vice-presidential debate was no less revealing about the karmic crisis America faces. It was a poignant cosmic dialogue about our responsibility as human beings and as a nation. It was also a clear statement that the time to do what we need to do is quickly running out. While on the surface the candidates debated the value of having a “timeline of responsibility” as a strategy for war (Biden for it, Palin against), the fact is that we walk a timeline of responsibility our entire lives. Responsibility is a core catalyst for growth. How much time do you really have to accept responsibility in your life before the damage of irresponsibility becomes irreversible? Imagine, for example, a child who never tries to feed himself. How long would you as a parent wait to address it? 7 years? 25 years? 50 years? Until he starved the death?  We’ve forgotten who is responsible for America. As a result, we as a nation and as individual citizens are left needing to take responsibility for quite a number of things that have gone unaddressed — some for decades, some for centuries. Those things are culminating now in crises and calamities of epic proportions.

Many issues are at stake. The economy, taxes, the war, terrorism, the environment, the health crisis, and the energy crisis just to name a few. In metaphysical terms, however, no crisis is an island. Each is merely a different face of the same core conflicts that need to be resolved. For example, the call to develop alternative energy is both a literal and symbolic call to find an alternative way to fuel our society at every level.

We’ve left a big, muddy, karmic footprint on the world with the toxic fuel we’ve been running on: competition. The alternative fuel we desperately need: cooperation. A competitive society by nature is oppressive. A cooperative society is supportive. Cooperation is an uncomfortable choice for many and, unfortunately, a choice many won’t make unless war or some natural disaster forces their hand. That’s a very high tax to pay.

Life is full of challenges that spark internal debate. While we might not want to answer the questions that the Great Moderator (Life) asks because we’re unprepared, choosing to avoid the issues and stick to our script breeds complacency. Once we become complacent, we stop looking for excellence–even in our leaders. We stop expecting it to be there. And then we stop cultivating it in society, at home, at school, at work, in our relationships, and so on until excellence is nowhere to be found.

Our Next Leader, Our Next Step
I have only shared a few of the signs I saw and the messages I heard about the metaphysics behind the 2008 election and America’s fate. This election day, you must take your own deep look at the issues behind the issues. Take a look at where we are and how we got here. And take a good look at what it will really take to turn things around. More importantly, we must each move beyond our fears, judgments and ignorance and take a honest look at the motivation behind our own decision. Is it a choice rooted in responsibility or a choice rooted in complacency? Is it a choice that will transform or a choice that will maintain status quo? This election is asking each of us to be more deliberate than we have ever been, not only in choosing our next leader, but in choosing a new karma for our nation. Most people feel safest with the same old approach and the same old patterns, no matter how detrimental they have turned out to be. They tend to stick with what is familiar until they hit rock bottom and there is nowhere left to go but in a new direction.  Are we ready to let go of our familiar but destructive patterns in favor of something that is more compatible with the new nation we need to build? Or will we stick to our literal and metaphorical guns until we shoot both our feet off and have nothing left to stand on?

Behind the illusion of safety is the reality of stagnation. Our next leader represents our next step toward or away from a renaissance in America. On November 4, 2008 — and every day thereafter — have the courage to make the choice that has the greatest potential to set you free.