Understanding why civilizations rise and fall

Many people have been lulled asleep and they have no ambition, no drive, no desire to self-transcend or to see their cultures and their nations transcend the current state of poverty and inequality and economic instability. In the Age of Higher Awareness the people need to be awakened from their unwillingness, their inability to self-transcend, their unwillingness to mentally step outside of their current situation and look at their surroundings and look at their culture and say, “This is not enough. I want more. I want more than tradition. I want more than what was known to my parents in past generations.”

Marxist, communist, socialist ideology is not the answer
You see in many areas this longing back to the past, whether it be to the grandeur, or the so-called grandeur, of the Inca or other past civilizations or even to Colonial times. The Age of Higher Awareness cannot be brought in by an elite, for it is indeed the existence of power elites, going back through the millennia, that is responsible for the warring and the inequality that has led to the current state of poverty.

Thus, this elitism must be overcome, and it can be overcome only when a critical mass of the people themselves awaken. But they cannot be awakened through the consciousness of anti-peace that leads to revolution, for we cannot have people turn to a left-wing, Marxist, communist, socialist ideology as has begun to happen in some nations. This will only lead to greater instability that will lead first to civil war and then war among nations. 

A few people will not save the earth

The savior of planet earth is you. The savior of your generation is you. You cannot expect someone else to come and solve the problems for you, for the only way these problems can be solved is that those who have created the problems, and those who are serving to uphold them, transcend the state of consciousness that led to the manifestation of these outer problems.

This is the only way that humankind can possibly grow. This is the only way that humankind has ever grown. And when you have seen cycles where humankind’s consciousness has indeed gone into a downward spiral, it is precisely because most people – including the more aware people – have not understood this very principle, which is the very reason for the existence of the earth as a schoolroom.

The earth is not created so that one or a few can come and save the many. The earth is created so that the many can raise their consciousness and thereby ascend to higher levels of learning. The descent of humankind into a lower awareness began with certain lifestreams. Yet for these lifestreams to get back into a positive spiral, they must change their consciousness. They must self-transcend. They must want more. They must be willing to reach for the higher direction that guides them forward, that prods them forward, that pulls them up by their hairs if they are not willing to walk on their own.

There is a limit to how much higher awareness can pull up anyone. And that is why there must indeed be a willingness to take what is given, to multiply that gift and to bring it back to the altar in its multiplied form, so that it can be multiplied further and thereby create the upward spiral that is the only means for the raising of the earth and the consciousness of humankind.

Study how civilizations become rigid and self-destruct

The Inca civilization that took over Machu Picchu is indeed a good example to study, in order to understand how an entire civilization can become trapped in a rigid mindset, a rigid culture, being so concerned about maintaining their rituals that they are not willing to self-transcend. They are not willing to go within and bring forth a creativity from within the heart that can renew their rituals, their practices, even their entire belief system and world view.

Thus, at this place you will see certain rocks that are large and carved with great precision. On top of these huge rocks you will see smaller rocks carved with far less precision and stacked up with far less skill. This shows you that the Inca’s built upon temples that are far older than the Inca civilization. It also shows you that the Inca civilization was not that creative in itself but often copied what they saw around them.

The Inca civilization was very good at organizing, and that is why they grew and were successful and managed to conquer many of their neighbors who were not as organized. And this is indeed one of the necessary qualifications of any civilization. It must have organization because it creates stability. Yet stability and longevity are not the same thing. For stability without self-transcendence, without creativity, cannot create longevity, neither in your personal life nor in an entire civilization.

That is why the Inca’s themselves – even though they had a very quick rise to power – also had a quick fall because their own rigidity, their own unwillingness to self-transcend, did indeed create the opposite force from the cosmic mirror that brought about the Spaniards who came in and very quickly conquered the Inca civilization.

Thus, one might say that the Inca civilization is a perfect example of a civilization that – even though it reached a certain height – simply was not sustainable from the very beginning, because it had too many contradictory forces. It had too much rigidity and unwillingness to go beyond rigid doctrines, beliefs and rituals. No amount of ritual can ever save a human being or an entire civilization.

Why ritual cannot save you

You can pick any spiritual technique or philosophy found on this planet. You can practice it with great determination, yet the practice of ritual itself will not save you, because the practice of ritual cannot guarantee the transcendence of your consciousness. For a ritual to be effective, it must be approached as only a foundation for self-transcendence. And you must then connect to the source of creativity in your heart, thereby adding your inner creativity to the outer ritual, so that you make it a living ritual. And that is precisely what will bring about the contact between your lower being – performing the ritual – and your own higher being. That contact can happen only through the open door of the heart, that is the connecting point between the lower part and the higher part of your own Being.

Unless you open that door of the heart through creativity and love, you cannot establish the figure-eight flow in your own being that is the very key to self-transcendence and spiritual growth. Likewise, unless a civilization opens that door of the heart of its people and especially of its leaders – and especially its spiritual leaders – unless that happens, that civilization cannot have the figure-eight flow that leads to self-transcendence and thereby longevity.

The Inca civilization was not connected to higher awareness

If you will study the Inca civilization, you will see how the priesthood and the kings fell into the typical trap that you see in almost every civilization. Once they had ascended to power, they began to be more concerned about maintaining or even increasing their power than being concerned about maintaining the connection to higher awareness.

The Inca civilization never had a connection to higher awareness. Their priests needed drugs in order to induce a “higher” state of consciousness, and therefore they could not communicate with higher awareness, for it does not communicate with people through drugs or any other mechanical means. It communicates only through those who have opened their hearts through love.

So the Inca civilization was actually, from the very beginning, in contact with lower forces. Yet even these lower forces would have been able to promote some form of self-transcendence in the Inca civilization—if the priests had been willing to continue to heighten their contact. Yet the priests became so focused on the outer rituals and the rigidity of those rituals, and therefore they started having contact with lower and lower spirits.

And as they realized that there was no more the power in their rituals – in terms of giving them inner visions – they instead reverted to the traps seen in so many religions, including the Catholic Church and other Christian churches today, where they became more and more focused on the outer ritual instead of the inner experience beyond the ritual. And so the ritual itself became an end in itself rather than the means to an end. And that is why the Inca civilization, the Inca priesthood, became more and more rigid, which is indeed what led further and further into the downward spiral which quickly became irreversible. And the Spaniards were only the outer tool for this.

Western civilization is transcending itself

Of course, the Spaniards themselves were not a sustainable civilization. But the European civilization has been far better able to transcend itself than most other civilizations. Thus, you do indeed see – in Europe and in the United States today – a civilization that is very quickly transcending itself, having to a very large degree, abandoned the ritualistic rigidity of the past.

Thus, even though you see in modern western civilization many conflicts and contradictions, that do indeed threaten the longevity of this civilization, you also see the willingness to self-transcend on the part of many people. The willingness that is far greater than what you see for example in South America or in other cultures around the world.

The Incas were too unbalanced in terms of being too rigid and not having enough creativity. What you see in the western civilization today is almost the opposite form of imbalance—where the western civilization has thrown off the rigidity of the Catholic Church yet has not found anything to put in its place, to give the spiritual stability that can counter-balance the innovation you see in technology.

Thus, you see indeed the unwise use, the unbalanced use, of technology because people do not have the inner contact of the heart—for they have no spiritual basis and foundation upon which to build their exploration of technology. What you see is a tremendous outpouring of creativity in terms of using the base energy in ever new ways. Yet you do not see that this happens under the guidance, under the direction of higher awareness. And thus, you do not have, as of yet, a healthy figure-eight flow in the modern western civilization.

By using appropriate teachings and tools, the more aware people can re-establish that figure-eight flow on a personal scale and on a larger scale, that can then bring society back to a more balanced state, where there is no longer the imbalance between the Alpha and Omega qualities. And thus, a civilization can then use the basic energy in the form of technology under the guidance of higher awareness. And thus, higher direction can come to play its intended role, where it sets the perimeters. And as long as people exercise their creativity within these perimeters, they will not self-destruct. Nor will their civilization self-destruct, as did so many civilizations in the past that did not have the proper balance.