by Mirjam Usbeck

It’s getting brighter

We write February 23, 2118

This morning I read in the memories of my great-grandmother, after whom I was named, how she envisioned the world in 100 years.

Strange, when I now try to imagine turning back time 100 years into the time and thought world of my ancestor.

A hundred years ago the world must have been a horror

They wrote down a horror vision of a world full of unfeeling, robotic creatures with microchips behind their ears without knowing that every thought they had makes this vision more real and probable.

The power of thought

Thoughts are power – that’s what they knew back then, at least that’s what it says in all the stored records we were able to save over the ages. It has also often been written that the solution lies deep inside.

That is why we still do not know exactly how the global catastrophe could have occurred at that time.

With the dark thoughts and the frightened news the development escalated until the great flood came

It is hard for me to imagine what it must have meant for the people at that time, especially for those who did not know the safe place inside themselves and in a loving and free togetherness.

Many passed away without having lived

The living, including my ancestor, moved closer together and they began to share, to visit inner places where a person could exist for a long time without food and warmth.

Only very slowly the warmth and the fire of our planet began to reconnect with the small warmth of us humans

To the extent that people succeeded in renouncing their possessions and power and uniqueness, a new warming light began to shine deep inside our world and penetrate the world that had cooled down after storms and earthquakes.

The earth cracked open and burst in many places, so that warming light could return to us through deep cracks and fissures

Our magical oceans of fire were born and with them elemental fire snakes, which even I can only look at from a proper distance.

Loving people live here today with each other and secure in themselves on new home ground which they gratefully cultivate.

As a genealogist, I wonder where the ancient story of the people of that time comes from, which they told themselves about a first expulsion from a paradise

Did our great-great-grandfathers also drive themselves away? What forbidden fruit had these sought outside themselves, which had led to their expulsion from paradisiacal love?

My great-grandmother had a house in the country 100 years ago

It’s a strange idea nowadays to claim ownership of a piece of land. To me, this reads like a failed attempt to build a fence around a supposed paradise and thus destroy it from within.

Perhaps today, after the catastrophe, we have more paradise together than ever before. Together we use our valuable water and cultivate our land. Today, technical inventions exclusively serve our communication and our joy of life.

Already 100 years ago people had the important knowledge

In public media, everyone wrote and shouted out into the world that love, trust and togetherness can create the miracle of life.

It is interesting that an unspoken war arose out of this; instead of simply putting this sacred knowledge into practice, people formed competing groups in which it was apparently a matter of who had found the Grail and who should be seen and loved more than the others in return.

Even my ancestor did not always make it easy for herself to renounce her possessions. So many were then filled with fear of not getting enough and not being enough.

I am very grateful that today we no longer give room to these doubts

We love our moments, our senses, our food, our bodies, our children – and of course our ancestors, to whom we owe this world and also the participation in its deep experiences.

Our wonderful ancestors have gone through darkness, cold and fire for us, so that today we can create and experience our world anew in every moment.

In my great-grandmother’s diary I read that she too had to go through a lot of dirt and mud and blood in her life to really appreciate and see the other side and to be grateful for all the little things that life gave her.

I am very thankful to be able to feel these collective experiences within me and to see our world shining through all its cracks and injuries again and again.

To the stars we shine today –

At that time, it was a name of my great-grandmother, when she told stories from dark and distant times, which still left room for a glow inside every human being.