What led up to the creation of Shadows Illuminated?
The Unraveling
(an excerpt from Spirit Work, Too by Cedar Branches & Diane Carol Mark)
I reflected for some time on what type of manifestation would make the most possible difference in the world. I had been through many reflections and had created many positive manifestations that I had thought would make a true difference in a world that was slipping increasingly into unsustainability and toward its own demise. During these reflections, I had indeed discovered the great powers of unconditional love and forgiveness, of allowance and unity through individual responsibility. Certainly these were the keys for positive change, yet humanity was far from being equipped to employ such capabilities.
Most of humanity was operating with very little understanding of what these traits actually were. The deceptions that had been put upon them for many generations kept the majority in a continual state of deep misunderstanding and in turn inauthenticity. Forgiveness was understood as a process of blame. Unconditional love was understood as being an agreement of expectations and dependencies. Unity only occurred against some perceived common foe. Individual responsibility was only accepted relative to some external circumstances.
Attempts to either describe or become an example of the true meanings of these powers were equally misunderstood, but more often met by an extreme resistance. In their blind pride, people would unconsciously cling to their upside-down belief structures rather than allow their minds to be changed or their hearts to be truly opened. This situation of mass cognitive dissonance was a difficult conundrum to affect, for the continuing power of suggestion saturated through the media and the continual state of fear created through the same devices were of an extraordinary level.
Occasionally small breakthroughs could be made on an individual basis, yet these took some amount of careful counsel and the client would then return to the same environmental factors that kept them in such a state of confusion. The apparatus of psychological controls was so extreme, as well as the beliefs of those who had been exposed to it for their entire lives, that even the people became unaware propaganda machines, constantly perpetuating the same deceptions that had taken hold of their own consciousness onto others.
Almost everyone had become a loyal and unconscious participant to a system that enslaved them and would ultimately destroy them. Regardless of their level of intelligence or goodness of heart, they acted as reactions to external factors above all else. Their desire for physical and material security drove them to pay those who enslaved them and they prioritized their time, energy and focus to such comforts above all other gifts inherent in life. It had become a very complicated situation and almost the entire world had fallen victim to the apparatus of deception.
Those who were able to break free from participating and perpetuating the unsustainable societal system would face great challenges and hardships. They would be ostracized by their family, friends, and loved ones who did not have the courage to take such a meaningful step. The abundant controls by the societal system would prevent them from succeeding as sovereign individuals and they would most often end up homeless and hungry, restricted by scarcity and quite alone. Such individuals may find reprieve in the truth of spirit and the gifts of beauty and true love, yet the majority of society would not view these beings as being role models to learn from, rather taboo archetypes to avoid aspiring to. These outcasts would be pressured to conform and re-adjust into society’s construct, move into the life of a hermit, or travel continually in service while facing severe adversity every step of the way.
So despite the positive manifestations that might have been brought to bear to aid in the situation, from an individual perspective, these tools would likely not be sufficient to transform the escalating situation. The source of the deception would need to be swayed before the positive tools could become useful, and this would not be an easy task, given the energy and resources behind it and that the patterns had already rooted themselves for so long.
The apparatus had developed great power over hundreds if not thousands of years. It had accumulated through many tactics almost all of the resources of the world, including human resources. It had been refined to an exceptional degree at every level of microcosm and macrocosm. Any opposition would be either subtly co-opted to serve it or would be shut down through any number of various methods. Fighting against it was not a viable option, nor was fleeing from it. Neither would prevent it from continuing on its path of domination and destruction.
Anything is possible in the realm of magic, however, and the greatest magical feats are accomplished with ease. The solution truly already resided somewhere in nature’s existing design and the systems’ own unsustainability would bring it to and inevitable end. The burden of its own expansive weight was too great to control for much longer. Its countless moving parts would eventually spin out of alignment and the entire construct would fail as a result. This may occur due to a total environmental breakdown, for the apparatus had already pushed the earth to the edges of sustainability, or it may occur due to many other influences that might be less impactful. Certainly a global environmental breakdown was the outcome that would best be avoided for the sake of humanity’s future.
After all of my reflections, I understood that there were a few manifestation tools that might have a small hope of alleviating such an outcome. The cycles of death and birth had been modeled by nature in all of its designs. Impermanence in nature is a given, and in nature’s cycles, death is an opportunity for a new birth. Karma was another major natural influence, where everything in the Universe requires that a balance be maintained. Anything in nature that moves out of balance is destined to fail, and by nature’s hand will be brought into balance in a new form. I realized that the manifestation of a symbolic death would provide nature the opportunity to create a new balance on earth.
If it had been the apparatus of deceit that had caused such an imbalance and such injustice, then it would be this same deception that would need to be unraveled. The web of lies had become so extreme, that almost nothing could be trusted any longer. With just a few more deceptions coming to light, the entire web would be fully exposed and no amount of cognitive dissonance would be able to rationalize away the truth of the matter any longer. Humanity would be forced to some degree to face the truth of the situation, and in turn would receive a clearing for the opportunity to employ their innate capabilities of love, acceptance, and individual authenticity.
Knowing that any manifestation is possible, I set my intention for the unraveling. I would simply remove small threads from the fabric of the illusion until the entire cloth degraded and fell apart from its own burdensome weight. I set into meditation and spent the majority of my focus on this particular intention for many months. I knew that few would ever have the courage to attempt to manifest such an outcome, knowing that there would almost certainly be great suffering along the way, yet I also realized the importance of the calling and that I must trust in spirit’s guidance in allowing this death and rebirth process to come forward.
As I meditated on this unprecedented task, I observed the world and the on-goings of the society around me. Occasionally I planted a seed of intention into the field of unified consciousness and symbolically into my external world. Along the way, I would witness omens of validation as my manifestation intention began to take hold. These might be small and subtle, such as the appearance of a goldfinch on the podium of a popular political figure, or they might be more overt and large-scale such as the ultimate election of an official who was a symbol of the shadow-side of the entire culture.
After many months, I could see the hand of spirit increasingly exposing the widespread corruption, and could discern the beginning of the end of the apparatus that had dominated for so long. Just like facing death on a personal level, the society began to experience a great amount of emotions and resistance to what was unfolding. The unraveling was a scary dynamic and the breakdown of cognitive dissonance is quite uncomfortable in itself. It became predictable that soon denial, anger, fear, and sadness would set in on a massive scale as the illusions died away and that it was likely that mass hysteria would follow closely behind.
These emotions and reactions were unavoidable, given the lack of qualified societal grief counselors to aid so many people through them at once. And though I felt a great level of compassion for those experiencing such challenges, I understood deep down that it was all part of the process of healing and that ultimately these stages of grief allowed for the possibility of acceptance as a gateway to clarity. After this tribulation, the mourning over the death of the old paradigm, the birth of a new paradigm might finally emerge.
https://www.amazon.com/Spirit-Work-Too-Cedar-Branches-ebook/dp/B06XB8ND3B/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1521696119&sr=8-3&keywords=spirit+work%2C+too
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