art by Rita Loyd. If the last week has taught us anything, it’s that we have no idea what’s going on inside the minds of others. A client told me yesterday, “everyone else I know is having so much fun.” In today’s glitzy social media world, it’s so easy to look at the Instagram feeds of your friends and think that everyone is having a perfect life. That’s the curated version – the one that we choose to show the world.
Often the real version, the life that we are actually living, is quite different. And the gap between how we really feel about our lives and how we see the lives of others is growing thanks to the power of social media to amplify the ideal and hide the truth.
Social media is the 21st century equivalent of the Christmas brag letter. Quite a few years ago my husband and I laughed over such a letter – one of the sons had been arrested that year and the other had had a bad acid trip and ended up in the psych ward. These two events were completely transformed in the Christmas letter to make it appear as though everything was just fine.
When we look at the life of someone we don’t know and assume their life is perfect, we are missing the point and hurting ourselves. We don’t know what kind of misery that person may have gone through to get where they are today. We don’t know what their happy exterior might be hiding. But most importantly, envy and resentment close the heart and keep us from happiness.
Neptune is at a standstill right now as it prepares to turn retrograde on the 18th. Neptune is a transformative outer planet – it inspires us to let go of attachments and fears and find our own inner divinity. Along the way it helps us to open the heart and embrace compassion. It’s often easier for us to be compassionate towards others than to ourselves, but when our own hearts are starving it is difficult to give to others and I believe finding that nourishment of the heart is the place to begin with any personal transformation.
This old but still wonderful chant can be a beautiful ritual to aid in the process!
After reading some of the 2010 articles, it’s amazing how low we have come in 8 years.
Yes, we need more compassion to unite our country.
Many other countries in the world are in a bigger mess than we are.
As we focus on growing spiritually, the world can heal.