Tag Archives: Mohandas Gandhi

First They Ignore You, Then They Mock You

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It's the circle of life. First they ignore you, then they mock you.

A number of different individuals have observed a certain life cycle as a new idea enters the world.

First they ignore you, then they mock you

Quotation enthusiasts consider this quote to be misattributed to 17th-century German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, but their research showed similar words being said or written by a number of others:

Truth passes through three stages: First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as self-evident.

The 19th-century Christian missionary Hudson Taylor, best known for opening the interior of China to Christian missions, said:

I have found that there are three stages in every great work of God: first, it is impossible, then it is difficult, then it is done.

Finally, other quotation enthusiasts consider this quote to be misattributed to Mohandas Gandhi:

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.

I mention these quotations because the New Message from God has taken a step forward from mostly being ignored. The website of the Atlantic magazine recently mentioned the New Message from God.

First they ignore you, then they mock you. Is this mention a big deal? I believe it is, and I will tell you why. The Atlantic has existed in one form or another since 1857. The Atlantic exists in a number of different forms, with content in many different areas. I surmise from this history of the Atlantic that the Atlantic considers itself to be a platform where serious people contemplate and write about serious ideas. Web traffic monitor Alexa reports the Atlantic website to be the 800th most visited website in the world. That’s number 800 out of over 1,000,000,000 websites in the world. Say what you will about the Atlantic’s content or its editorial viewpoint; its status as a successful and influential website is indisputable.

First they ignore you, then they mock you. The Atlantic conducted a survey of participants in new religious movements, asking about a half dozen questions. I believe they were trying to get the participants to describe the distinctive aspects, the “secret sauce” of their movement. I was one of about 400 people to respond to this survey, according to the Atlantic. They didn’t select my response. That might be a good thing, as I was more terse than the New Message response they did select, from David Drimmel. I haven’t met David in person yet, but we have had some helpful online chats.

David Drimmel. First they ignore you, then they mock you.

First they ignore you, then they mock you. I give the Atlantic credit for looking at David’s testimony with a relatively neutral stance. They wrote:

David Drimmel writes about the sense of connection offered by The New Message from God, a movement based on the teachings of Marshall Vian Summers, an American who says he received divine revelations about alien life and other things:

Here is the portion of David’s survey response reprinted in the Atlantic.

The New Message from God is unique in that it emphasizes the importance of the theology of the greater community of intelligent life. It has broadened my perspective and understanding of what humanity is facing in the world today, the alien phenomenon, and quenches my thirst for knowledge about life in the universe.

When I first learned about the New Message, it was like I had been waiting for it, searching for it all my life. What sticks out for me the most is the emphasis on building the four pillars of my life on relationships, health, work/providership, and spiritual growth. The chapters about the pillars in the book Living the Way of Knowledge helped me see my life from a perspective that engages me in relationship instead of the disconnected, depressive state I was in. Essentially, I was called out of my depression and into the world.

First they ignore you, then they mock you. I concur with David’s report that preparing for a successful emergence into a not-all-human future is a great emphasis of the New Message. Both Alisa and I have written a number of posts on this subject. I haven’t read Living the Way of Knowledge yet, but it’s on my to-read list. I have written about the four pillars here. This is one of the ways we work on being better people.

First they ignore you, then they mock you. I haven’t thought about this too much, but David, for better or for worse, is now the most well-known student of the New Message from God in the world. I believe he will bear that title well for the time he holds it. Will the New Message succeed in preparing humanity for the greatest transition in its history? Well, you know what they say…

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Welcome to Mystery of Ascension! We are students and advocates of the the New Message from God. We are members of a worldwide community. We seek to assist the world in successfully navigating difficult times ahead. We seek to assist the world in successfully emerging into a greater community of intelligent life. You will also find some poetry. Find out more about us here. Contact us here.

We Take Inspiration From These Great Lives

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ShouldersOfGiants. We take inspiration from these great lives.

Sir Isaac Newton said “If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” In the past two months, the students of the Free School of the New Message from God (myself included) have been contemplating, among other things, people whose efforts and contributions make them examples we wish to emulate.

We take inspiration from these great lives

In March of 2015, we read and reflected on the revelation “The Gift of a New Life,” received by Marshall Vian Summers in May of 2011. There are many great ideas here, but the part I wish to share is this part about the efforts which must be made on our part.

“To have a new life, you must do the work. It is not a spell that is put upon you. It is not taking some magic potion and having everything be different. It is not a form of addiction or intoxication.

You will have to do the work. You will have to take the risks. You will have to make the decisions. You will have to disappoint other people. You will have to disappoint your own goals and ambitions. You will have to change your plans.

This is where you become strong. This is where you become united within yourself. This is where you follow one voice instead of many voices in your mind. This is where your true allegiance emerges amongst your other commitments and obligations.

This is where you reclaim your strength and your self-confidence. This is where you stop behaving foolishly, giving your life away to silly and meaningless things. This is where you know who to choose to be with and how to resist the temptations that lead you elsewhere in life.”

We take inspiration from these great lives. In April of 2015, we were asked to consider people who did the work, people who took the risks, people who made the decisions, people who became strong, etc. Students shared people they selected, and gave examples of the work they did and the risks they took. Our selections included, but were not limited to:

Mohandas Gandhi. We take inspiration from these great lives.Mohandas Gandhi (1869-1948), father of modern India, called “Mahatma” or “great soul,” nonviolent advocate

Giordano Bruno. We take inspiration from these great lives.Giordano Bruno (1548-1600), philosopher and heretic, prophet of the Greater Community.

Paul Farmer. We take inspiration from these great lives.Paul Farmer, American physician who is best known for his humanitarian work providing suitable health care to rural and under-resourced areas in developing countries, beginning in Haiti.

Amma, the hugging saint. We take inspiration from these great lives.Mata Amritanandamayi, also known as Amma, the hugging saint. They say she has hugged 34 million people.

Chico Mendes in 1988. We take inspiration from these great lives.Chico Mendes (1944-1988), Brazilian rubber tapper, land rights advocate, and environmentalist. He said “At first I thought I was fighting to save rubber trees, then I thought I was fighting to save the Amazon rainforest. Now I realize I am fighting for humanity.”

Tesla in his lab. We take inspiration from these great lives.Nikola Tesla (1856-1943), Serbian-American scientist, engineer and inventor. Our electrical grid works because of his ideas.

We take inspiration from these great lives. We seek to stand on their shoulders, that we may see further. We seek to follow in their footsteps, that we may give what we yearn to give.

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Welcome to Mystery of Ascension! We are students and advocates of the the New Message from God. We are members of a worldwide community. We seek to assist the world in successfully navigating difficult times ahead. We seek to assist the world in successfully emerging into a greater community of intelligent life. You will also find some poetry. Find out more about us here. Contact us here.

I Should Be Suspicious Of What I Want For The World

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Paul Atreides would avenge his father and bring the universe to its knees. I should be suspicious of what I want for the world.

Steps 65 through 67 of Steps to Knowledge have something in common.  They all contain some variation on the sentence “You have come to the world to work.”  Step 65, “I have come to work in the world,” introduces the idea.  Step 66, “I will stop complaining about the world,” gave the idea of something I need to drop if I’m going to take this idea seriously.  And now, Step 67, “I do not know what I want for the world,” brings another item from which I need to slowly back away; my designs for the world.

I should be suspicious of what I want for the world

Someone might say “I don’t demand that the world devote itself to making me happy.  I’m willing to be the change I wish to see in the world.” But what if the change you wish to see in the world sets other events in motion resulting in changes in the world you didn’t wish to see?  Are you wise enough to see it fully through?  I’m not.

Someone might say “I would make the world a more just place.”  But many who live deserve death, and some that die deserve life.  Can you give it to them?  Even people who care about strangers, who care about evil and social injustice, can be heartless and cruel and hard and cold.

I am recalling the Rumi poem which I have already shared once in this space:

Who makes these changes?
I shoot an arrow right.
It lands left.
I ride after a deer and find myself
Chased by a hog.
I plot to get what I want
And end up in prison.
I dig pits to trap others
And fall in.
I should be suspicious
Of what I want.

Someone is going to ask, “Well, what should we do then?”  Steps to Knowledge recommends at this point that we cultivate a healthy suspicion of what we want for the world.  Steps to Knowledge recommends at this point that we reserve a space for what Knowledge knows it must contribute, for the mission we have in life to fulfill, for the work we have come to the world to do.

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Welcome to Mystery of Ascension! We are students and advocates of the the New Message from God. We are members of a worldwide community. We seek to assist the world in successfully navigating difficult times ahead. We seek to assist the world in successfully emerging into a greater community of intelligent life. You will also find some poetry. Find out more about us here. Contact us here.

Why Do Tyrants Fall?

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Mohandas Gandhi said that tyrants always fall. But why do tyrants fall?In his autobiography, The Story of My Experiments with Truth, Mohandas Gandhi wrote:

“When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall — think of it, always.”

I realize that some people might dispute this claim, or have objections as to length of time it takes for a tyrant to fall.  For the sake of argument, I wish to accept this statement as true.  I wish to offer a reason as to why tyrants fall.

Why do tyrants fall? They rely on centralized intelligence

One of the things that makes tyrants fall is something that has come to be known as the “knowledge problem,” developed by the 20th century economists Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich Hayek.

Why do tyrants fall? Friedrich Hayek says its the knowledge problem

No, what they call knowledge has nothing to do with the knowledge in Steps to Knowledge.  What they call knowledge could also be called data or information.  You don’t have to be a scholar to understand Hayek’s 1945 paper “The Use of Knowledge in Society.”  The barbed point of this paper is that economic activity managed by distributed intelligence does a better job than centrally managed economic activity because it does a better job of mobilizing the knowledge relevant to the decisions that need to be made.

Northwestern University economist Lynne Kiesling explains why this is a big deal:

What does this have to do with tyrants and their fall?  Tyrants are the ultimate central planners and managers within their lands.  Their egos demand that they make the decisions, even if they can be better made by what Hayek called “the man on the spot.” Their egos demand that finite resources be spent on sending information about events to a central point, and relaying the tyrant’s commands to the peasantry. It is as if the tyrant’s belief in his own wisdom and goodness, imposes a heavy, hidden tax on every transaction within his domain.

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Welcome to Mystery of Ascension! We are students and advocates of the the New Message from God. We are members of a worldwide community. We seek to assist the world in successfully navigating difficult times ahead. We seek to assist the world in successfully emerging into a greater community of intelligent life. You will also find some poetry. Find out more about us here. Contact us here.