Forget the world, and so
command the world.

Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder
help someone’s soul to heal.
Walk out of your house like a shepherd.

Stay in the spiritual fire.
Let it cook you.

Be a well-baked loaf
and lord of the table.

Come and be served
to your brothers.

You have been a source of pain.
Now you’ll be the delight.

You have been an unsafe house.
Now you’ll be the One
who sees into the Invisible.

I said this, and a Voice came to my ear,
“if you become this, you will be That!”
Then Silence,….and now more Silence.
A mouth is not for talking.
A mouth is for tasting this Sweetness.

                        —Jalaluddin Rumi, Ode #3090 (translation by Coleman Barks)

Rumi’s poem suggests that the mouth is there to taste the sweetness of the creation. We can savor what comes to us as we receive it. There is a substantial harvest that is ours to receive and to bless. But what has been made really clear to me in the last few weeks is that there is yet a much greater harvest. We are responsible for planting and tending seeds that are ours to plant, that hold promise of a wonderful harvest to come. And there are many seeds being planted in the world all the time, creative impulses being given expression and manifestation. Some of those seeds give promise of a beautiful harvest, and some will yield a less-than-beautiful harvest. Nevertheless, the harvest that comes to us is ours to receive, to welcome and to bless.

I’d like to read some words that David Karchere wrote recently.

What will happen in the days to come will be no more than the vision we hold right now. We have no right to think that what will happen in the future will be greater than the truth we are perceiving and giving voice to now.

I believe those words put the responsibility for what the future will be squarely where it belongs—in the hands of those who have accepted responsibility for being in position to receive the harvest. That harvest includes people—people’s hearts, people’s response, people’s questions, people’s ideas, people’s desire to collaborate, to co-create. There is a wealth waiting to be welcomed and received.

I love the phrase that is used in some of the Eastern philosophies, which speaks about a field of infinite possibilities. What is possible to us depends on the vision you and I hold. With a large enough vision, it’s all available.

But there are limitations to the vision that can be held in a self-preoccupied consciousness. Thank God for that, because imagine if self-preoccupied function had free access to an infinite field of possibilities! It does a pretty good job of causing havoc with what is available to it in its present state. I don’t think that it needs to be given any more power than it already has.

A consciousness that is yielded in humility to divine Source—which is in reality at the core of that consciousness, and actually created it in the first place—can hold an expansive vision that will allow the manifestation of that vision in the earth.

I discovered a quote the other day from Arnold Toynbee, a British historian who lived in the early 20^th century. He said: “Material power that is not counterbalanced by adequate spiritual power, that is, by love and wisdom, is a curse.” Spiritual power, brought into the world by those who know in humility that it’s theirs to bring and who have the wisdom to balance the material power that’s already present, can allow a shift to occur in the way humanity relates to that power.

But the invitation has to be extended broadly into the world, as the invitation was extended in this country recently through these words, which were the name of the recent Creative Field Conference in Cape Town: “South Africa: Your Destiny Is Calling.” Something wonderful was born through the Creative Field Conference and the Destiny Concert as a result. Surely the call is now “World, your destiny is calling. Humanity, your destiny is calling.” Who is it who will extend that invitation? We are the ones. We are the ones who have the vision of what is possible. We are the ones who have it to extend; it is the business that we are about together at this time. And we are ready and eager to welcome whatever might come back to us in response to that call.