I have always been a mystic.  It’s taken me a long time to realize this.  I always thought of mystics as religious people, deeply evolved and nearing perfection, who mostly lived in the past, and who had achieved a level of spirituality that few people ever achieve.  This definition certainly didn’t seem to apply to me.  But I have come to realize that mystics exist in every time period (not just in the past) and in every country, that they are deeply spiritual people (not necessarily religious, though they might be), that they spend their lives trying to understand their connection to the divine within them (however they define that) and the role they can play in helping humanity, and that they do not consider themselves to be “perfected”, but rather, that they are always learning and always evolving.  There are many mystics in the world, and they don’t always define themselves as such.  But they exist, and they continually work on their own self-improvement and understanding, realizing, at the same time, that they are a reflection of something greater – that their existence has meaning and that they hold a spark of divinity within them.

Mystics are often contemplating the meaning of events occurring around them.  They observe effect and seek to understand cause – likewise, they are concerned with cause because they know the effects that can occur.  They are conscious of interconnectedness, of the synchronicities occurring in life and of the symbolism they frequently encounter.  Their focus always has an element of looking at something greater than themselves, even if much of their life is spent needing to pay attention to their day-to-day responsibilities.  And mystics know that, to really connect with divinity and to seek understanding, requires opportunities for silence and going within themselves.

It has seemed to me that with each year, our world gets noisier and more distractive.  It not only takes us away from ourselves and gets us looking elsewhere, but it also limits possibilities for silence.  In doing so, it keeps us disconnected from who we truly are.  This is a form of enslavement and disempowerment.  And, I believe, it is intentional.  When we are so emmeshed in the noise and the focus on things outside of ourselves (outside of our control), we cannot connect with that divine spark that exists within all of us.

Currently, we have a master manipulator in the office of the US Presidency who thrives on noise and external chaos – pointing to everything going on around him, assigning blame, playing with reality and facts, never taking time to engage in self-reflection, never having the ability to empathize or show compassion, making personal material possessions and status his only focus, etc.  Many are sucked in by his message of chaos – many are deafened by the constant noise he creates.  It is a skillful attempt to separate people from themselves and from each other, so that they never can focus on the things that the mystic focuses on – so that they can never become “the mystic”.  Trump mirrors the “effect” of separation from ourselves and our connection to our divinity.  As such, he unintentionally shows us the importance of going within and of seeking the silence.  That is, after all, the place in which our true power lies and where our answers can be revealed to us.  When we know who we truly are, we can no longer be manipulated.