There are many ways to walk a life. Many ways to look at life, many ways to receive our experience, many ways to interact with what’s going on around us, many ways to do things. The cosmos is banging in infinite directions at once, expressing itself in countless ways, becoming multitudes of forms, shapes, colors, textures, and versions, untangling structures and reconfiguring matter. We get to look at the world around us, think about the vastness of the universe, experience the moment and also put it in the context of something much larger. We don’t only get to participate in the story of existence. We also get to interpret the universe. 

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When Krsna in the Bhagavad Gita says; “I am the origin as well as the dissolution of the whole world…” he’s claiming his almightyness. But there are more layers to his claim, more to explore, more lenses to look at the text through, more to interact with here than just the ordinary way of reading the text. There is more than one way to interpret the text, and the Bhagavad Gita is a rich invitation to read it in more than one way. There is more than one way to interpret the universe. There is more than one way to interpret your life. 

There is no doubt, we are living through a historical phase that spreads over the planet like a heavy load of bad news. Down the spiral humanity goes, taking other species down with us, of course. Environmental crisis. War. Bigotry. Oppression. Dogma. Dictatorships sprouting all over. Rigid thinking. The death of intelligence. We’ve cycled through dark ages before. We know that renaissance will follow. 

With Trump in the White House again, and everything that he’s up to, his sick ideas, and the company of mad men he surrounds himself with, one can easily fall into despair. “Let’s get the fuck out of here!” I find myself saying to my husband pretty much every day. “Where is there to go?” we ask ourselves. It seems like too much of the world is riding toward fascism. 

In the history of yoga there’s never been a text interpreted in more ways than the Bhagavad Gita. In some way, diversity of interpretation is one of the key teachings of this piece of literature. 

A sacred scripture, a spiritual guide, a poetic piece within the epic of the Mahabaratha? Is it a story? A metaphor? A religious doctrine? A well of wisdom one can tap into and converse with and explore and deconstruct and reconstruct? Yes. And… 

The meaning of the messages that make up the content of its 18 chapters has been argued over by every Indian school of thought, by numerous teachers and students of yoga philosophy, over many centuries. There are myriads of topics and ideas the text touches upon. It is an unfolding conversation that reaches into what came before, pulling threads from nature, society, family life, and philosophy, and weaving together a collection of messages that were new for the time it was compiled in, and continue to renew today through study and interpretation. It’s a whole world. 

Krsna offers himself as the vastness of the cosmos, as the presence that permeates all of existence, as all the forms as well as their origin. Nothing, according to him, exists beyond him. “There isn’t anything at all higher than me…” he tells Arjuna. “For all this is strung on me as are pearls on a string.” In the history of Indian philosophy, this might be the first time a Hindu deity shows up in myth and scripture as the principle of Brahman; the expanse of the creative force of existence, the essence of the universe. And he goes into great detail about all the things he is. There is diversity there in that unifying force. There is contrast and paradox and complexity. 

What would happen if you put the word “You” instead of “I” in Krsna’s sentence? What if he says; “You are the origin as well as the dissolution of the whole world…?” I’m toying here with a concept I’ve heard Douglas Brooks examining in Gita studies. 

If we read the text from a Jungian perspective, this is clearly the invitation. Krsna is a part of you. And so YOU are the expanse of the universe, the thread that life’s pearls are strung on.

There are some problematic pieces here that must be addressed. 

First of all, there is a problem with the idea of the almighty. No matter what culture comes up with it, the beliefs that come with megalomaniac god characters, who stand for something Absolute, lead to (and maybe even come from) forces (AKA people) who try to gain control over others. There is way too much certainty in those kinds of gods. The Hebrew god, Allah, Jesus, and his big daddy-o all belong here in this category. There’s no room for questioning and doubt, no room for growth, no room for other ways – it’s all one, it’s all in them, it’s all of them, it’s all expressions of them, there’s nothing other than them. Do you see the problem here? Do you smell the autocracy? Do you see the tyranny that comes through such claims? 

And then, when you spin it around and take the psychological approach that tells you that the story is yours, there is the great danger of narcissistic tendencies spinning out of control. And we’ve seen it in our culture, haven’t we? We’ve seen it in the yoga room, across spiritually monetized traditions, at the music/yoga festival, within every facet of the wellness industry, popping like mushrooms after the rain on Instagram. Make it all about you and you’ll drown under a massive wave of narcissism. 

We’ve seen what; “take care of yourself first” – which is good advice, because you do need to put the oxygen mask on yourself before you help someone else – has done to the way that people excuse their own behavior in relationships. We’re a culture that emphasizes individuality, and it has a massive shadow, which saturates this day and age. YES, we are each an individual and it is important to live life as you – someone who is unlike anything else that the universe has made before. But it’s also important to revel in the fact that you are not special. You are part of nature’s recursion. 

And perhaps the dichotomy is the point. Maybe every conversation needs to begin on the ground that holds two opposing truths. In the soil beneath the feet of a concept there are two directions moving as contradiction simultaneously. When a seed sprouts it grows down with roots and up with stem. The creative force of nature reaches for both darkness and light. 

What if Krsna invites us into the creative endeavour of life? When he says “I” and means “you” and also “us.” He, as the creator of the world, tells us that we – as individuals as well as a collective – create our world. 

This is YOUR life, my darling! It does all start in you and dissolves in you. What do you want to do with this power? What do you want to do with the creative capacity to make something with this life? What do you want to do with this one precious life that you get to live as you? Who do you want to become? 

On this creative journey, where you are the artist, there are infinite other artists that shape and dismantle and reorganize the world. You are Krsna. And so is everyone else. And this world, and this art piece, and this journey are all stories that can be written and rewritten, but also interpreted and reinterpreted. 

And when Krsna says “I” and means “you” which also means ”us,” he invites us through the nuanced pathways of interpretation, to do this life thing, this art thing, this universe interpretive dance thing TOGETHER. And there’s responsibility in that. There’s hope in that. There’s support to give and to receive through that. We are never just us in this creative endeavor. We are part of a larger ecosystem. Always. 

So as the world falls apart around us, we get to reimagine it. On our own and with one another. 

We need not to bypass the shitstorm. Get an umbrella, find cover, but don’t ignore it. You can’t, really. Just as the Gita with all its topics and concept and threads stirs the spirit of diversity, and calls for the power of interpretation, we are summoned by the powers of life and nature and culture to re-examine our ways, to reconsider our participation, to listen to the voice of inspiration, and to redefine our identity – personally and collectively – through the collapse of the world as we know it. 

Find the poet in you. Listen to what makes your heart beat. Extend yourself into the world from that deep place of desire and wonder. Uncover the muse that poses in all her glory and beauty, naked, with the world burning around her. 

The word Apocalypse comes from the Greek word Apokalupsis, which comes from Apokaluptein, which means “uncover, reveal.”

Who will you become through the experiences that pulse within you and around you? What’s the story being told through you and the environment you’re in? How do you interpret it? What are some of the messages that spin the web beneath the surface of experience? 

As we feel the world dissolving, and see the sadness and the madness, as we experience the intensity of it, let us receive the invitation into artistry and inspiration. Let us see what is uncovered through dystopia. Let us orient toward it from the currents of creativity. Let the tenderness and terror of what is revealed through the ruins of civilization inspire us to create something new that breathes hope and oozes with the muses.