Overcoming Negativity

                                                            Christine Aagaard

At the moment we are very much within the energies of Sagittarius, a zodiacal sign called in some ancient books the ‘sign of silence’.1 It refers to that silence that comes from the restraint of speech through the control of thought. This seems particularly pertinent today with the intensity of debate and the polarisation of thinking that is occurring in all aspects of human living as it adjusts to the new incoming energies. Humanity is facing many crises and deciding on the best course of action, for example on problems such as the pandemic, climate change, the migrant crisis, to name but a few, is causing great divisions of opinion. Opinions that are frequently fuelled by intense emotion that leads to careless talk, negativity and sometimes downright nastiness. 

Opinions are more often than not formed from information gained from the media and the information we read on-line or see on the news is predominantly negative. While framing news in a negative way and in a shocking style might be good for grabbing attention, it mires the truth of situations and circumstances making it more difficult to see the reality. When watching the daily news, we are more likely to come away believing that the world is rapidly descending into disaster and chaos, even though we know deep down that life is much easier and kinder than it has ever been for a large proportion of the world. It is not the ‘nasty, brutish and short’ life as summed up by Thomas Hobbes in the 17th century. Max Roser, an economist at the University of Oxford and the founder of Our World in Data, reports that on virtually all of the key dimensions of human material well-being—poverty, literacy, health, freedom and education—the world is an extraordinarily better place than it was just a couple of centuries ago.2

So why don’t we know that the world is getting better? ‘Because the media does not tell us how the world is changing, it tells us where the world is going wrong. It tends to focus on single events particularly events that have gone bad. By contrast, positive developments happen slowly with no particular event to promote in a headline. “More people are healthy today than yesterday,” just doesn’t grab attention.3

Exposure to consistent, sensationalized pessimism and negativity leads to an overestimation of the significance of negative events leading people to become increasingly stressed, fearful, disillusioned, depressed and less trusting of others that can manifest in more insular and selfish behaviour. 

It is an evolutionary instinct to look for negative situations because those who were aware of dangerous situations in the past were more likely to notice and therefore survive when there where potential threats to safety. Nowadays there are less dangers to our physical security, certainly no Sabre-toothed tigers, but it doesn’t seem like it because human beings are attuned to the negative and this has been employed very skilfully by the media to keep our attention.

Conspiracy theories which are having a field day in this pessimistic atmosphere are the ultimate in negativity because they see darkness everywhere, they see the domination of the selfish and materialistic in all aspects of society. There are of course seeds of selfishness everywhere and we each, if at all self-aware, can see those seeds within ourselves. But just as we are not all bad, that there is a predominant goodness within us, so that is true of humanity. As the Tibetan tells us, pessimism and negativity are related to an unjust appraisement of the quality of humanity.4 When we learn to tap into the beauty and goodness that is emerging within humanity, there is no room for pessimism.

Sadly, when we have decided on the fearful nature of the world, we then look for confirmation of that opinion, we actively look for evidence to support negativity. Our psychologists call it confirmation bias. It occurs when the brain selectively focuses on information that supports pre-existing theories and ignores conflicting facts. This makes it much harder to hear perspectives that suggest the contrary.5

As light workers therefore, our task is to not let the negativity of the times overcome us, to see to it that we are not drawn into the vortex of fears and of pessimism which surrounds us. The heart of humanity is sound and out of the present chaos and perhaps largely because of it, there will emerge ‘those competent to deal with the situation and adequate to the task of unification and synthesis’.6

Albert Einstein is quoted as saying, ‘The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.’7 It is our responsibility to control our thought and through our focus on the good, the true and the beautiful, on the thought of the emerging goodwill of the majority, we create a world that is exactly that because, as we all know, ‘energy follows thought’. 

The ajna centre of the Lord of the World is just beginning to express itself in a recognisable manner through the New Group of World Servers, of which this Triangles group is very much a part. It is through the ajna centre that energy from the lower centres can be focused and directed for the good of all. If we focus on the negative, we build the undesirable, if we focus on the positive, we build the beautiful. Through right thought, therefore, holding to a vision of a better kinder world we direct energy towards the manifestation of the divine plan on earth. This is the power of the New Group of World Servers and as part of that group it is our responsibility to focus our minds on the wonders that are in store for those who know the meaning of love. There is much beauty being expressed in all areas of human living and it is to this that we need to direct our attention. We are after all on the cusp of a New Age and there are many groups that recognise the opportunity for change that this brings. Much selfishness is also being brought into the light providing the opportunity for redemptive change. And, with the reappearance of the Christ imminent, optimism has to be the keynote of the times.

As we approach the festive season and a new year let us harness the joy and new hope that this special time of year brings and as we work to control our minds so that only the good, the true and the beautiful have entry so we contribute to hastening in the wonders of the new Age.

References:

1. The Labours of Hercules, Alice Bailey, pg. 160
2. https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevedenning/2017/11/30/why-the-world-is-getting-better-why-hardly-anyone-knows-it/?sh=49235cb37826
3. Ibid
4. Discipleship in the New Age II pg. 64
5. https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/the-modern-brain/201909/how-negative-news-distorts-our-thinking
6. A Treatise on White Magic pg. 409
7. https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/1799-the-world-as-we-have-created-it-is-a-process