A recent study discovered that the numbers of people on antideprressents has more than doubled in the last nine years: “About 6 percent of people were prescribed an antidepressant in 1996 -- 13 million people. This rose to...27 million people by 2005…”
Any guesses about how many people are on antidepressants this year? Any guesses about how many people would be on them if they could afford, or were more inclined, to seek professional care?
Today, most people see human reactions as either good or bad – constructive, or something to suppress. We all know that there are underlying causes, but there’s no time to think much about that. We have goals and responsibilities. So, we push on pretending we’re more machine than human.
The report goes on to say: “The rise in antidepressant prescriptions also is seen despite a series of public health warnings on use of antidepressant drugs beginning in 2003 after clinical trials showed they increased the risk of suicidal thoughts and behaviors in children and teens.”
So, more people are depressed than ever before, and more people are turning to suicide as their final recourse. Sadly, this trend is most prevalent among children and teens. Is that the legacy we want to be remembered for?
We live in a world of individualists. We each have our own path, and for the most part we’re all walking it alone. Sure, we work and walk along with others, but when one falls by the wayside, we just focus harder on our goals. We have to! We have rent and mortgages – and suicidal kids to take care of.
We’ve all had some great successes! Yet lately, life just isn’t working the way it used to. At some point before antidepressant usage reaches 100% (of those who don’t opt out via suicide), we’re going to have to wake up to the shift back to the old, simpler priorities of really caring about those around us enough to stop what we’re doing and help – or at least show them that they’re not alone.
This may not seem relevant to those of us who are scrambling for survival right now. Everyone has important, personal reasons to keep doing their absolute best to make a way in this world! Still, while we do what we have to do, we also need to learn to shift our priorities and expand our awareness to the needs of others around us. When we do that, others might do the same and for us and we just may be on our way to building the world we all want.
Humans weren’t made to do everything all by themselves. Yet, that’s how we live. Communities break up and scatter as people move on to “better opportunities” elsewhere. Extended families split up, and lately most of our isolated little core families break up too! People grow apart and go their own ways and then need therapy, or at least antidepressants to keep on going.
Isn’t it maybe time to rethink this system? The problem is partly solving itself as kids move back in with their parents after they lose their jobs and/or marriages. Still, others aren’t so lucky and end up under overpasses. These are the humans that the system has used up and spit out, and it’s depressing to live in a world that does that no matter how we’re personally doing!
As we move into the 2012 era of endings and new beginnings, many of us are very aware of what we don’t want in our world anymore. Still, it may seem like a big leap of faith to begin building the foundation of our new world by taking our attention off of our personal priorities and giving it to those around us.
Yet, as we each do what we have to every day, it might be worth investing a little conscious attention on the needs of others. It doesn’t take any time at all to really look into the eyes of the person who’s talking to you. It just takes a minute to really listen and care.
Community is built one conversation and one concern at a time. It’s not really that hard, and reaching out is a proven cure for depression. Besides, those caring conversations may very well end up saving lives – maybe even your own.
Hunt Henion
www.shiftawareness.com
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Love & Guidance from Mother Earth
When we channeled a few days ago, Rasha tried to reassure me about the future. Unfortunately, I’ve gotten myself in a predicament again where there isn’t anything concrete just around the corner he could point to as a positive development to alleviate my concerns. He ended up reminding me of the “new dimension” that’s developing.
Even though I keep getting glimpses of it and how things will be when we cross over to it with Mother Earth, it still seems like a remote possibility when I come back to my logical mind. In actuality, I can’t dismiss the visions I keep getting about it, but not really knowing why such a thing would happen, keeps throwing me back into a reliance on my human consciousness. Still, that question of why such a thing would happen has been hanging around in my mind for a while now, and yesterday Mother Earth made herself known and felt deeply to help explain it.
I’ve only had a few conscious contacts with that great soul. Usually, when I think of her and wish we could talk, I sense her all over the world scanning and experiencing the emotions of her people. I’m just one – like one ant in a colony of 6.8 Billion! Yet, on several occasions now her focus has found me. We’ll blend a little, and she’ll share images and feelings with me.
Yesterday, she came to answer my discouragement with her great happiness and relief to be so close to the ascension that can save us all! Even as I say that, she reminds me that most will probably not choose to make such a drastic shift. Still, everyone’s lives will be better by the time the shift comes. (I write about how and why in Looking, Seeing & Knowing.”) Still, that’s not the point for today.
Mother Earth came to share her joy and some images to put the state of the world in perspective for me, and I’d like to try to pass some of that on to you. Still, before I share the individual earth images, I want to try to convey the first image of Mother Earth I got, because after it was all over, that’s still the most powerful of them all.
We know that Mother Earth isn’t really a woman, but that’s how she presented herself to me. Her energies coalesced from all over the globe manifesting into a beautiful, energetic, greatly excited and delighted woman in her 30s-40s. Still, as I continue to contemplate the experience a day later, the single prayer that reaches up out of all of my confusion is that my life be guided in harmony with her vision and that I might somehow grow to reflect her great joy.
My first question after seeing her like this was “Why…?”
She planted the image and excitement of the pilgrims venturing out to the new world. She reminded me how I felt after graduating high school and then college. She showed me how I looked and inspiration and infinite hope I felt when I got married the first time. With those great transitions in mind, she showed me an image of the actual event that excites her right now.
First, I saw her showering in a sparkling light that washed away the negativity she carried. This is currently lightening her load each day, and would explain her boundless joy. Still, her joy is for us too. She showed me how people will focus on her sparkling presence after she’s been cleansed of all the negativity she’s taken on over the past 15,000 years or so. I saw how people will focus on the luminous, twinkling new reality and just walk through into to a new world once she had gotten settled and solid again.
I asked how she saw the condition of the world right now. She replied by showing me scenes of largely peaceful civilizations during the last 100 years and comparing them to scenes throughout the last 5000 years when pockets of peace were the exception. Yet, as I pondered the progress we’ve made, she showed me scenes of situations that hurt her heart the most: Cold, calculated cruelty to animals and calloused disregard of the needs of children.
I was impressed by how much these issues bother her. Then, she showed me the progress we’re making in learning to see the true motives of our leaders. Mass realization of how public opinion has been manipulated will undoubtedly cause chaos before too long. Still, purging that popular illusion will be like untying a huge weight from the consciousness of the world’s people, so we can rise like balloons above all the troubles we’ve known for so long.
Many images of progress of the grand plan floated through my mind as the beautiful and deeply encouraging presence of Mother Earth looked on. I hope I’ve shared the ones that best describe the general situation we all face moving into and through the “ending times” of 2012. Still, each of our relationships to life and the earth is a personal one, and a personal understanding simply has to involve a personal experience.
Mother Earth wants me to assure you that such a personal experience is as easy as walking on the ground with awareness of the life that courses under our feet. Seeing what she sees is as simple as looking into the eyes of those around us with love and acceptance. We are in the midst of a tremendously exciting shift that we may never intellectually understand. Still, a working understanding of the miracle of ascension is as easy as giving or accepting a hug with an open heart.
This great smiling soul ended with this instruction for all of us: “Work on it.”
Pass the word: It’s time to take shelter in our heart.
Many Blessings and hugs,
Hunt
Previous messages from Mother Earth here.
Even though I keep getting glimpses of it and how things will be when we cross over to it with Mother Earth, it still seems like a remote possibility when I come back to my logical mind. In actuality, I can’t dismiss the visions I keep getting about it, but not really knowing why such a thing would happen, keeps throwing me back into a reliance on my human consciousness. Still, that question of why such a thing would happen has been hanging around in my mind for a while now, and yesterday Mother Earth made herself known and felt deeply to help explain it.
I’ve only had a few conscious contacts with that great soul. Usually, when I think of her and wish we could talk, I sense her all over the world scanning and experiencing the emotions of her people. I’m just one – like one ant in a colony of 6.8 Billion! Yet, on several occasions now her focus has found me. We’ll blend a little, and she’ll share images and feelings with me.
Yesterday, she came to answer my discouragement with her great happiness and relief to be so close to the ascension that can save us all! Even as I say that, she reminds me that most will probably not choose to make such a drastic shift. Still, everyone’s lives will be better by the time the shift comes. (I write about how and why in Looking, Seeing & Knowing.”) Still, that’s not the point for today.
Mother Earth came to share her joy and some images to put the state of the world in perspective for me, and I’d like to try to pass some of that on to you. Still, before I share the individual earth images, I want to try to convey the first image of Mother Earth I got, because after it was all over, that’s still the most powerful of them all.
We know that Mother Earth isn’t really a woman, but that’s how she presented herself to me. Her energies coalesced from all over the globe manifesting into a beautiful, energetic, greatly excited and delighted woman in her 30s-40s. Still, as I continue to contemplate the experience a day later, the single prayer that reaches up out of all of my confusion is that my life be guided in harmony with her vision and that I might somehow grow to reflect her great joy.
My first question after seeing her like this was “Why…?”
She planted the image and excitement of the pilgrims venturing out to the new world. She reminded me how I felt after graduating high school and then college. She showed me how I looked and inspiration and infinite hope I felt when I got married the first time. With those great transitions in mind, she showed me an image of the actual event that excites her right now.
First, I saw her showering in a sparkling light that washed away the negativity she carried. This is currently lightening her load each day, and would explain her boundless joy. Still, her joy is for us too. She showed me how people will focus on her sparkling presence after she’s been cleansed of all the negativity she’s taken on over the past 15,000 years or so. I saw how people will focus on the luminous, twinkling new reality and just walk through into to a new world once she had gotten settled and solid again.
I asked how she saw the condition of the world right now. She replied by showing me scenes of largely peaceful civilizations during the last 100 years and comparing them to scenes throughout the last 5000 years when pockets of peace were the exception. Yet, as I pondered the progress we’ve made, she showed me scenes of situations that hurt her heart the most: Cold, calculated cruelty to animals and calloused disregard of the needs of children.
I was impressed by how much these issues bother her. Then, she showed me the progress we’re making in learning to see the true motives of our leaders. Mass realization of how public opinion has been manipulated will undoubtedly cause chaos before too long. Still, purging that popular illusion will be like untying a huge weight from the consciousness of the world’s people, so we can rise like balloons above all the troubles we’ve known for so long.
Many images of progress of the grand plan floated through my mind as the beautiful and deeply encouraging presence of Mother Earth looked on. I hope I’ve shared the ones that best describe the general situation we all face moving into and through the “ending times” of 2012. Still, each of our relationships to life and the earth is a personal one, and a personal understanding simply has to involve a personal experience.
Mother Earth wants me to assure you that such a personal experience is as easy as walking on the ground with awareness of the life that courses under our feet. Seeing what she sees is as simple as looking into the eyes of those around us with love and acceptance. We are in the midst of a tremendously exciting shift that we may never intellectually understand. Still, a working understanding of the miracle of ascension is as easy as giving or accepting a hug with an open heart.
This great smiling soul ended with this instruction for all of us: “Work on it.”
Pass the word: It’s time to take shelter in our heart.
Many Blessings and hugs,
Hunt
Previous messages from Mother Earth here.
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