What Happens When 2012 Doesn't Happen?

2012 could well be a huge disappointment for a huge number of people. It’s supposed to be the year that the planets line up, the earth turns on its axis and the age of enlightenment starts. After that year, the nasty power-brokers and money-lenders will get their come uppance, goodness and light will bathe the world and we’ll all be living the oneness and harmony that we’ve always dreamed of ... or so the stories go.

... and so the stories have always gone ... the Christians have been waiting for Christ to come a second time, the Jews are waiting for him to come the first time, people predicted the end of the commercial world on 1^st January 2000 and people have been predicting “the end is nigh” and Armageddon since time began. However, no matter what we’re all looking for, nothing’s going to change – tomorrow is just another day, what’s happening now is what’s going to happen next and 2012 could just be another year ... the now is nigh.

You probably don’t know this as it’s The Secret, but I’m Methuselah’s brother and I’ve been around long enough to have seen it all, over and over and over again. And I really do have to say that it’s so very boring and so very predictable.

Now, it’s possible that the predictions are right. Four rocks in the sky could line up and save your relationships and propel you into a new era of love-based abundance. Yes, the earth could wake up on 25^th July 2012 and decide, just for kicks, to spin the other way, thereby eliminating greed forever. Yes, Battlestar Gallatica from Pleiades could plomp down on a crop circle at Salisbury, issue forth the New Christ who will command an end to financial disasters, warts, debt collectors, noisy neighbours, spam emails and international corruption.

All this and more could happen. If someone can imagine it, it can happen. In fact, it’s probably already happened and nobody told me – my internet’s been down for over a week.

It could all happen but I’m not betting on it. It could happen and it could change absolutely nothing. You see, the Buddhists tell us that the way we come into each incarnation is the same way we left the previous one. If we went out angry, we’ll return as an angry baby. If we went out depressed we’ll be reborn as a depressed baby. If we died in poverty, we’ll be reborn into poverty. If we died happy and loving, we’ll be reborn happy and loving. The deal is, the Buddhists say, to get our stuff together ... now. Death will not fix our anger. Going into spirit will not eliminate our bankruptcy. Starting a whole new life will not wipe out our love and kindness. Whatever we create within, by our willingness to make those inner changes, will stay with us.

If death and rebirth make no difference to our world, how do we think some rocks in the sky are going to change anything?

As Michael Jackson sings in his Man In The Mirror song:

I’m starting with the man in the mirror

I’m asking him to change his ways

And no message could have been any clearer

If you wanna make the world a better place

Take a look at yourself and make a change

In fact, I well remember when I was a younger old man, some 2,500 years ago, after several bad harvests, a plague of tax gatherers and a credit crunch – when people were so desperate for light in their dark tunnels – that someone stumbled upon a stone with strange carvings over it. It brought out all manner of experts and crackpots who all had their varying interpretations about this weird assembly of images. We now know, since the discovery of the Rosetta Stone, that it was a shopping list for Tescos in Abyssinia.

Anyway, as the people were so desperate for hope, at the time, the most commonly latched-onto version was that the carving was a prophesy of a Messiah, a Saviour, who would turn up and save the world and all it’s ills and there would be no more famine, wars or unhappiness ever again. There were, of course, a multitude of guesses about how and when he would appear and about what specific problems he would solve and how he’d do it. Well, those people waited and waited and waited and he didn’t come – nothing happened. Disappointment and blame all round.

As you now know, a messiah did turn up 500 years later but wars, poverty and unhappiness are still with us. The lives of a tiny number of people changed as they listened to his teachings and started to live by them – poverty, wars and unhappiness left them. But, for the majority who wanted something different while doing the same old thing (is that the definition of madness?), nothing changed. I tend to think that nothing will change in our lives unless we put the work in, show a little willingness and make the changes ourselves, but what would an old man like me know?

Over my 4,997 years on this planet I’ve seen many opportunities for change. We’ve had Buddha, Krishna, Jesus, Woody Allen, Paris Hilton, Maldek (the planet that blew up) and planetary alignments for Africa – and yet the earth is still plagued with disappointment, bitterness and separation from God. I’m just an old man and really don’t know much at all but it seems to me that messiahs, magnetic transmutations and magic mushrooms are not the change we’re looking for – they’re simply opportunities for change. What we do with them is up to us. They are simply God’s signposts to a better way and we’re given free will to choose change or to continue with our choice of misery.

I might even go so far as to say that if you want change, do it now. Yes, NOW. Be present to the present. You don’t have to wait for rocks to line up, for a burning bush or for Michael Jackson’s return – you can make the change today. Being so old, I’ve forgotten what you need to do but I think the idea is that you show a little willingness for positive change and God does the rest. “The now is nigh” as we used to say in kindergarten, 4,000 years ago – our future is exactly what we’re doing right now or, more accurately, what we’re thinking right now. By aligning ourselves with God, with our truth, we won’t have to wait for rocks to align. By changing our magnetic direction from fear to love, from separation to oneness, we won’t have to wait for planet Earth to flip around. By changing our present, the future will take care of itself.

Oh, my memory isn’t as good as it used to be and I’ve just remembered that my 5,000^th birthday is on 25^th July 2012 so don’t forget to come to my party – no presents, just your presence ... in the present.