I grew up watching Star Trek. Somehow, rationalism, technology, and the scientific View have failed to deliver that shiny, clean world of unlimited exploration in which human beings get to lecture less evolved races on other planets about their bad behavior.

Instead, the individualistic greed of our human cultures has injured, not only the space program, but our air, water, land, and the lives of millions upon millions of people and animals.

Welcome to the Kaliyuga. The Kaliyuga is the final, and darkest, cycle of four epochs that make up the entire wheel of cosmic time. “Darkness” means ignorance. Ignorance is ignorance of one thing only: Reality.

Beginning with the Satyayuga, the age when people are closest to Self-realization, human beings descend into greater and greater ignorance with each epoch. At the end of the final epoch, the Kaliyuga, the cycle begins again with a renewal of the Satyayuga.

Each of the yugas is associated with a particular kind of sadhana to help the people of that yuga. The appropriate sadhana for most people of the Kaliyuga is mantra japa. In the Satyayuga, many people are capable of engaging in the most refined contemplation.

The progression of the four epochs expresses the understanding that Reality has the capacity to beget ignorance and that the deepest ignorance still contains the capacity for realization. The root ignorance, or anavamala, is our conviction that Reality is constituted of distinct entities or objects. We are limited to the View that we are separate beings.

In the Kaliyuga, the View of separation reigns. Thus, physicists search for the basic “particle” of life. Doctors search for the causes of disease in individual genes. We wantonly kill other living beings and destroy our planet because we are cut off from empathy and compassion. It is difficult for most people to think beyond the question of “How do my actions affect me?”

We are driven by the View that we can use mechanistic, scientistic means to compensate for the losses in our environment and the toxins eating away at our blood, brains, and organs. As we kill off our bodies, piece by piece, we fantasize about being saved by shiny, new parts, impervious to death. Scientists try to fix, for billions of dollars, what simple recognition of our Reality and a little everyday compassion could set right for free.

In the Kaliyuga, a small, steady, sincere effort to Self-realize goes a long way. However, there is no sense that practitioners are heroes of the dark age. Heroism is only an attitude that helps some people find the motivation to pull away from ignorance. The attitude of heroism must ultimately be surrendered.

The cycles of time are inevitable. This is all. Until you step off of the wheel of time, do your best to work with the grace of Guru manifesting as the opportunity and capacity to do sadhana and benefit yourself and others. In an age of ignorance, it is better to cultivate gratitude than feelings of superiority. It is better to share the fruits of your practice by living alongside those who are mired in ignorance, than to build walls–real walls or attitudinal walls– using the excuse that you are protecting the dharma.

It is true that the world takes care of itself. But we are this world, and we have our parts to play. There is no world separate from us. Expressing warmth, empathy and compassion is the world expressing itself. If you are able to do this, give thanks. Give great thanks.

In Matriseva,
Shambhavi

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