Change Is Underway – May 21, 2023

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By: Joe Martino

don’t know about you but, in most conversations I have with friends or family, the topic of change comes up a lot. 

People want to see the end of war, corruption, capitalism, environmental degradation, polarisation, etc. 

Somewhere, people can sense something better is possible, but at the same time feel things are not changing at all – and perhaps are ONLY getting worse.

But how would it look if change was happening? How could we know if it was occurring?

Would we feel it in our hearts and bodies? If so, are we paying attention to those areas?

Would we only know it in our minds and through what we see? If so, what should we be seeing?

A lot of people I talk to feel hopeless about where things are headed. I can understand this, but would the hopelessness still exist if we took a bit of a different look at what’s happening?

Consider this, since Robert F Kennedy Jr. announced his bid for president I’ve had many conversations with people regarding the issue.

Perspectives I’ve heard from others are:

– I don’t trust him, look who he has hung out with over his career
– I can’t support the duopoly of mainstream politics – even if he is running
– Even if he gets in, which I doubt, he’ll either become corrupt or get taken out
– What Kennedy talks about is still a limited hangout, he isn’t divulging the total truth and therefore he’s no good
– He’s controlled opposition!

There have been the odd few who are inspired and hopeful about his run, but a common through-line is generally: “Nothing is really changing, and there’s no need for hope.”

But is that really true? Is nothing really changing?

You might recall a piece I wrote at the beginning of the month called RFK Jr’s Presidential Run: Disrupting The Status Quo

I invite you to read it, but the summary is that I believe regardless of the end result, RFK Jr’s campaign is going to produce many expansive conversations, points of revelation about the nature of our systems, and the lack of democratic process in developed countries.

The expansion of awareness and consciousness around these issues will continue to produce a new way for people to see things.

In that sense, change occurs, even if it doesn’t quite look how we imagine change will look. 

This leads back to the early questions: this change we all seem to feel and know is possible, have we dipped into hopelessness because we limited our vision of how change might look? About how fast it’s supposed to happen? Or about some perfect flawless hero that is supposed to emerge? 

Is this creating suffering?

In a podcast I did earlier in the year called Interconnection & A Pathway To Change, I spoke about in-system, out-system, long-term, and short-term change to create a more thriving world. 

The message invites us to embrace living now, while playfully engaging in and recognizing change in different ways. 

We don’t have to see an entirely new system emerge in order for change to be happening. Sometimes effective action is about working within the system in the short-term, but knowing where the limitations are so we can also hold the possibility of new and parallel systems at the same time.

These short-term in-system actions can help further expose the nature of our existing system and allow fellow citizens to begin questioning what we’re doing as well.

To me, RFKs run is an in-system action that can help birth a new system, and it can be useful to frame it this way.

He, nor anyone, has to be perfect, we only have to ask: is this furthering the expansion of consciousness around the limitations of our existing system? Isn’t that necessary for something new to emerge?

In my view, yes. And this is why part of the solution is to converse about the long-term, out-system solutions we can hold space for in our hearts while they have yet to be birthed.

In these ways, change is always happening. When the status quo is not challenged, things become stagnant. The upheaval around us is change underway.

One final thought, not everyone around us needs to be questioning the nature of our systems. Some people will hold on, acting as an evolutionary pressure to push the dreamers forward further into action and embodying new possibilities.

We can all be appreciated for the role we play.

I invite you to check out my piece on RFK Jr for further thoughts.

Enjoy your weekend!