The Labor and Birth of a New Humanity

It should be obvious by now that we are in terrible trouble. We have created a multifaceted disaster with no quick or easy solution. Climate change, unleashed pandemics, overpopulation, and the resulting breakdown of our economy now culminate in an existential crisis of enormous proportions that will affect every aspect of our lives. How can we, confused and chaotic human beings, a species still in its tumultuous adolescence, possibly understand and respond to the terrifying reality of civilization’s unfolding crisis? Is there a spiritual dimension to this insane Armageddon that can provide any comfort or guidance? I believe there is.

Archetypal psychology, world mythology, and mystical theology have long suggested that human culture evolves in an ancient and recurring cycle of four stages, beginning with a sacred vision of Creation, its subsequent corruption and exploitation by the ego, the consequent collapse of civilization, and humanity’s spiritual rebirth amidst the rubble. In this vision, our current global crisis may represent the “bill of sale” for centuries of anthropocentrism and the abandonment of nature. The accumulated karma of human history breaks over us like a great silent tidal wave, portending vast human and wildlife suffering in its wake. Yet recognizing this ageless spiritual cycle, we can also sense something deeper if we try, something transpersonal, metaphysical, other worldly, supernatural, divine, mystical, transformational, evolutionary, irreversible, supernal, necessary, awe-full, and reality-shifting. While words fail me here, the spiritual intuition resonates nonetheless – a visionary transformation is at hand.

Now here’s an intriguing idea. I believe that the symbolism of human pregnancy, labor and birth informs this apocalyptic time. More than a metaphor, our planetary emergency may signal a cosmic, divinely-transmuting miracle, profoundly feminine in nature, planting seeds of transformation in the inner darkness of the human psyche, and bringing forth a fresh new consciousness, achieved through blood and pain, yet in the end scrubbed clean of ugliness and corruption. In short, a new beginning.

The New Blossom

Beautifully describing the birth of her first child, Laura Weldon, Ohio Poet of the Year for 2019, wrote, “Childbirth taught me it is possible to understand pain.” She recalled,

Labor with my first child progressed very slowly. All night I centered myself through contractions by staring at a chosen focal point – my husband’s green eyes. At 22, I had no friends who were pregnant or had given birth. What I knew came from books and childbirth classes. I’d found the only doctor in our area who practiced the gentle natural birthing method known as Leboyer. He was a gruff elderly gentleman who reluctantly snuffed out his cigarette when I objected to it during my first office visit. I’d been told by another obstetrician I was certain to require a cesarean section because I was too petite. Yet here I was mentally celebrating as labor intensified because it meant I’d soon meet my child. I barely noticed the birthing room’s white walls and its large black-rimmed clock. All my attention went to picturing the pain as urging a blossom open. In the morning a red-haired boy emerged weighing 9 pounds, 10 ounces.

All day I felt euphoric. It was revelatory to hold this new being. I wanted to do nothing but return his long liquid gaze. My own discomfort and hunger seemed irrelevant. That night as I held my baby, unable to sleep from wonderment, I heard the cries of a woman laboring in a nearby room. Perhaps it could be blamed on exhaustion or hormones, but for a moment the walls evaporated and I was with her, sharing her effort. Then time itself evaporated and I was with every woman who had labored to bring forth each previous generation, all the way from the beginning. Their struggle, their strength echoed in my own body. I could feel this resonate in the atoms making up every body ever formed. The moment ended but the feeling didn’t. I had never used drugs but afterward I was high for days.

Likening birth to this moment in history, Laura added, “The pain we’re undergoing, relentless as any mother’s labor, may very well be urging a blossom open. This struggle and the strength required to get through it has been present each time history contracted, expanded, birth a better reality.”

At this moment of humanity’s new birth, we are equally unprepared for the necessary, powerful and painful contractions. Young, inexperienced in visionary transformations, attended by callow mates and gruff teachers, full of fear yet giddy with hope, we, too, seek to transmute our collective pain by urging the blossom open, ultimately rewarded with unexpected euphoria, the grace-filled miracle of new tender new beginnings, the loving embrace of motherhood, deep compassion for the epic struggle of all life to survive, and numinous revelations of beauty, creativity, and cosmic abundance that arrive as we enter again the sacred dimension of being.

Conclusions

The labor and birth of a new human consciousness is more than a metaphor. This intuition forecasts a breakthrough of cosmic consciousness, but this time, a profoundly feminine one, missing for centuries in the patriarchal worldview. Loving, maternal, inclusive, natural, non-competitive, and non-hierarchical, this crisis may be the collective blossom of our time. The old world will die, a new one revealed, and our spiritual evolution will continue onward. Put another way, humanity’s new birth holds the promise of a new savior, who we will eventually discover is you and me. Now is the moment of humanity’s greatest step forward or final step into extinction. Like all sacraments, this birth, too, is sacred. Indeed, the global crisis is humanity’s own sacrament – personal, collective, and planetary. The angels watch in fear and hope. This is not the punishment of an authoritarian male God, it is the return of the deeply feminine power of unconditional love, offering at long last the sacred marriage of masculine and feminine, human and divine, Heaven and Earth. But it’s up to us.

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John Robinson is a clinical psychologist with a second doctorate in ministry, an ordained interfaith minister, the author of nine books and numerous articles on the psychology, spirituality and mysticism of the New Aging, and a frequent speaker at Conscious Aging Conferences across the country. His recent book, Mystical Activism: Transforming a World in Crisis, argues that a mystical awareness of life is critical to our survival in the rapidly approaching climate crisis. This book will also be the book selection for the first meeting of the Sage-ing Book Club, to be held on-line on Wednesday, June 3 from 4:00 to 5:00 pm ET.  For more information please click HERE.  His new book, Aging with Vision, Hope and Courage in a Time of Crisis reaches out to conscious elders to heal our psyche and our future. You can learn more about his work at www.johnrobinson.org and www.resilience-books.com.

John Hunt Publishing – 2020

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“The need for this book is so urgent. A brilliant and comprehensive manual for understanding and surviving this very challenging and confusing time.”

Anne Baring, Ph.D. (Hons.) author of The Myth of the Goddess (with Jules Cashford), The Birds Who Flew Beyond Time, and The Dream of the Cosmos.