Besides knee-jerk calls for “gun control” and ramping up “mental health care” — both of which can and mostly likely will be hijacked —

“gun control”: either by gun-lovers who continue to cry “freedom” while fearing others and so determined to arm themselves against them; and/or by increasingly fascist “authorities” who will be the only ones left with guns if they are banned;

“mental health care”: by Big Pharma;

— here’s an example of the kind of shift in values we’d like to see. First of all: disconnect profit from weapons production. I.e., stop feeding, directly or indirectly, off destruction of any kind.

Cerberus Capital, Owner Of Gun Manufacturer Freedom Group, Will Sell Off All Assets In Firearms

Think about what it means to “stop feeding off destruction.” A lot of us will need to re-evaluate the kinds of jobs we do to earn our daily bread. What system is your little cog in the machine a part of? Does it serve life?

How about our relationships? Are we kind to each other? Do we walk in each other’s shoes? Give of ourselves unstintingly?

And then there’s the biggest elephant in the room: federal taxes, over 50% of which go directly or indirectly to fund America’s killing machine.

That’s on the outside. What about the inside?

Do we love ourselves? Do we even know our own natures? And if not, how can we know and love others? How can we be generous if all our energy is locked up in denial of the parts of ourselves we refuse to look at?

A lot of us will need to look at patterns of violence inside ourselves. I had to do this, back when I was 40 years old and woke up and realized I was a violent peace activist. That’s when I moved into a tiny yurt in the Tetons and stared into a fire for four long months, looking at my life, unearthing memories of my own violence. A devastating, liberating, soul-shuddering time which I had to then follow up on with years upon years of journaling, processing with female friends, paying attention to my dreams, watching my own knee-jerk reactions, and so on. And I’m nowhere near done. As long as I’m in a body, there will always be choices, and I can always go unconscious. I watch myself carefully, for tell-tale signs of selfishness.

A lot of us will need to continue to center ourselves deeply within our own beings as in communion with the infinite universe while simultaneously grounding ourselves within Mother Earth’s constant care, so that we may serve as refuge in the stormy-seas of the collective unconscious mirrored by the intense Uranus/Pluto configuration (2012-2015) and amped up extremely right now in these days prior to the Winter Solstice and the End of the World meme surrounding the culmination of the Mayan Calendar “long count.”

This time of year is always hard for those who feel disconnected from their families. Imagine how hard it is for these folks this year.

And while we’re at it: we need to face up, squarely, to the culture of violence that we have allowed our civilization to mutate into. I recommend an extraordinary article by Tom Engelhardt that documents the history of the — at first stealthily, and now loudly, boldly, triumphantly, institutionalized — Invisible Government that has been secretly pulling strings from below our awareness for far too long.

The Visible Government

How the U.S. Intelligence Community Came Out of the Shadows

Excerpt:

In the 48 years since their pioneering book [Invisible Government] was published, Wise and Ross’s invisible government has triumphed over the visible one. It has become the go-to option in this country. In certain ways, it is also becoming the most visible and important part of that government, a vast edifice of surveilling, storing, spying, and killing that gives us what we now call “security,” leaves us in terror of the world, never stops growing, and is ever freer to collect information on you to use as it wishes.

Yes. Let us wake up, stay awake, breathe deeply, and turn our enormous beautiful hearts on as beacons in the gathering darkness, so soon to begin its turn to the light, initially slowly, one minute per day, then longer, longer. Let us view the Sun’s Solstice shift in the heavens on 12.21.12 as a metaphor for our own, gathering more and more light, shining brightly over all who cross our path, each and every soul worthy of our utmost care and attention.