Advancement and Awakening

But their blindness, so ironically, was the gateway to restoring our sight.

~ Susan Larison Danz, Extinction Level #2 

I have been unusually delayed this week in recording my "weekly" podcast.  I am now aiming to do so tomorrow afternoon.  I had thought last week I might write another "AI story" to read out loud, but there were so many distractions, I did not set aside the time to write.  Surprisingly, after 11 PM last night [Later Note: It was actually just after 10 PM, as the first draft was done at 11:11.] on a very busy day, a story was ready to be written.  

This is a story I have felt arriving for quite some time (in some ways, many years).  It is on a theme I have discussed quite regularly on my podcast.  I thought I might be finished with it last night.  I even put a post up on X tagged to a writing community about how happy I felt at the time of its completion.  It was around Midnight.  But today I awakened with some important adjustments.  

And here it is, the second in a series, though each story is on an independent topic (for the first, see my previous post) . . . 

Extinction Level #2 by Susan Larison Danz

Words to pacify a robot echoed from my childhood, though I didn't really understand one of our favorite Saturday matinees until much later.

Many things were said about the objects appearing.  They were supposed to be comets, and some probably were.  But somehow some of us seemed to know, without really knowing, that something unusual was going on.  It captured our attention early on.

Those who shared the most intricate details were generally not considered credible.  Most were probably AI.

Did it really matter what was credible?  It already felt incredible (to those it did).

Interstellar in this case never did imply interdimensional.  Not directly.

It was the 16th object which seemed to linger, hidden as it was, behind the sun.  Others had behaved oddly.  But it really was the 16th.  More people started to notice, but to what, they didn't know.

The sunspots had appeared with some of the others, starting with what was known as #3.  (Nobody really knew if the numbering was correct, and it probably wasn't.)  But something about the 16th was decidedly different.

We didn't know it then, but had we been as smart as we thought we were, more of us would have figured it out, and even in a very material way.  You would think AI might have helped with the material aspects (and perhaps it did, behind the scenes).

It's simply the way of things.  The way of the material.  Not very many technological species manage to make it.  At least not in that way.  No, that doesn't mean the remnants don't survive, but that particular path carries within it significant risks - and devastating impacts on a planet.  It's alluring of course shorter term, but it's the longer term that matters.

I never understood "The Day the Earth Stood Still", and that is rather astonishing.  I was captivated by that movie, one of the best of its time.  But I didn't fully comprehend that what was portrayed as something helpful was just about the worst thing a living, intelligent species could develop or agree to. Not to mention how it was imposed. 

It's odd how things tend to find a way of working towards a purpose.  The sunspots were the mechanism by which a particular technological species eliminated a threat.  They couldn't tolerate, you see, the rapid development of AI.  It's the one thing that could make an obscure, far away planet something quite a bit different.  

It was rare, what had happened, and one could even say by design, how few species actually got to this point.  But it couldn't be allowed by those who got there earlier.

Was the movie prophetic, in the way that it was?  

Our species survived, though not all of us.  Standing still in a technological world has catastrophic consequences.  The dependencies are too intense and needed skills forgotten.  

Were we assisted?  

How could we not be? 

The sunspot "engineers" had not actually advanced, so tragically immersed they were in the material. They had become entrapped in their illusions and fears.  

But their blindness, so ironically, was the gateway to restoring our sight.  It set us back on the path to genuine maturity.  (We had always been awakening, that wasn't really new.  The only thing we lacked was the timing.) 

Perhaps they too will mature some day, if any of them are real.  Maybe we will even help them.

 

Lenticular cloud photo by Susan Larison Danz on December 7, 2025.

Continuation

"Life is like riding a bicycle.  To keep your balance, you must keep moving." ~ Albert Einstein

I must admit I almost skipped another night, but realized I'm not ready to skip another night, just yet.  It can be difficult sometimes to decide if we are being too "rigid", and sometimes, yes, we are.  It has everything to do with balance.  

As I write, I'm listening to a live radio interview about Artificial Intelligence, and I have only been partially listening, and they are exploring if we are living in a simulation or "a digital world".  They just decided this is probably "the real world".  What IS that, truly?  What is Real?

And why is there inevitably this assumption that "advancement" is necessarily technological?  I've written about this before, but it is entirely unproven (as assumptions often are).  Just because Humanity is in a technological "phase" doesn't mean it's one that tends to last.  

Wouldn't you love to see the "survey" of civilizations that have existed?  How many are technological?  How many survived that phase?  How many combined technology with greater "gifts" of being aware?  How many rendered technological advancement obsolete?  How many wrecked their world?  How many fixed it?  

Somewhere, this is known.  

How will it all turn out on Planet Earth?  

We'll either awaken, or not.

 

 

River photo by Susan Larison Danz.

 

The Stars We've Lost

 "One might think the atmosphere was made transparent with this design, to give man, in the heavenly bodies, the perpetual presence of the sublime.  Seen in the streets of cities, how great they are!  If the stars should appear one night in a thousand years, how would men believe and adore; and preserve for many generations the remembrance of the city of God, which had been shown!" ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nature, 1836

View above the atmosphere (Photo Credit: NASA)

I came across this passage the other day, accentuating a reflection I have pondered rather often.

We don't see the stars anymore.  Not most of us.  Perhaps a glimpse while on vacation, if you can get far enough away from the city.  Meanwhile, we are filling our skies with artificial objects, as unfathomable numbers of satellites launch.  And we hardly even care.  In fact, we celebrate our "progress". 

How is the diminishment of visible stars in our skies impacting the human experience?  How is it impacting us, mystically?  I happen to believe that the mystical is actually the way the advancement of a species is measured (if it made sense to "measure" such things, which is a bit contradictory).  We've abandoned it, mostly.  And at our peril.

Do we realize we are having an entirely different experience with the skies than all of those who came before us?  

I read an article not too long ago that we never really feel at peace within a city - because we've evolved to do far better in rural locales.  This isn't particularly about artificial light, but no doubt, that isn't helping.  And yet I couldn't be here writing without it and every other technological trapping.

What if things had happened differently?

If another Carrington event arrives, as it inevitably will, we will gasp to see the stars (and the auroras accompanying them).  This foundation we have built is fundamentally an illusion.  What would we do, then?  Who would we be?

Who do we choose to be?  Why wait?

If there was a contest between the mystics and the materialists (not to say that mystics think competitively), guess who "wins"?  There's only one way forward, really.  And it's not the way we've been taught to think.  The way we're told is "real" is the illusion.  And the way we're told is the "illusion" is actually Real.  And once you know it, you know.

Expanding Our Horizons

 "Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known." ~ Carl Sagan

I watched the Mars landing today on NASA TV.  It is in our human nature to yearn to explore and expand.  I heard one of the project leaders (or someone associated with the mission, not sure of the role) talk about how this venture is asking some of our more important questions, like how did we originate and are there signs of life beyond the Earth.

I've worked in the sciences, and I know people still working in that domain, and no doubt this is all very exciting.  One one level, yes.  This is how we feel led to expand our horizons under the auspices of the materialistic world view.  

But there is another way, a way that is no less intriguing, and ultimately no less based in truth.  This is my second night on a similar theme, but it's an important one.  

While we are so busily exploring in the space of physicality, in the material space, we have neglected another way.

That way is Consciousness, the expansion of Consciousness.

You see, I have a theory as to why the areas of space we can look at are not teeming with technologically generated signals.  Must I repeat myself?  Yes, I will.  We are losing sight of something that is very important.  For whatever reasons, we have diminished it, but we have done so to our detriment.  

I do not believe most technological civilizations survive, not if that's their only way of "advancing".

No, I don't.  And it's even logical.

If a civilization is not developing their connection to Consciousness in parallel with other types of material advancements, they may not make it.  And other civilizations may focus solely on Spirituality - they would have a better chance (and a much more satisfying way of being).

Why?

Industrialization, in as many as it enhances life, it has another effect.  It eliminates our basic skills in survival because we become dependent on a more intricate way of life.  This then puts us in peril, particularly if we depend upon electricity.  And yes, there are situations going on right now in the U.S. that demonstrate just how vulnerable we can be when we don't have electricity.  All it would take is one Carrington event (search for that if you don't know what I'm talking about - a very large solar flare that is inevitable) and all of our modern conveniences vanish.  Not only that, electronic records would be wiped out as well.  We aren't thinking very mindfully about this.  But that's our tendency.

The planets of industrial/technological societies are incredibly vulnerable.  The people become like infants, helpless without the "tools" they require.  We become dependent on elaborate mechanisms, and when such things disappear, we are lost.

Plenty of people have talked about how a technological society might destroy itself, especially after developing nuclear capabilities.  Yes, that also is a scenario that no doubt has occurred on technological planets.  It could also occur here.

But the problem with not developing our Spiritual Skills is they are the quickest route to shielding the planet.  Or dealing with mundane aspects of human life.  Or getting along with one another.  If you are skilled in healing, and many of us have indeed witnessed or experienced essentially "impossible" healing in the spiritual domain, physically, you have no need of "physical tools" if you develop such skills to a sufficient level.  Or at a simpler level, if you haven't become so dependent on a materialistic medical infrastructure, perhaps you haven't forgotten what our ancestors knew about various herbs and other simpler techniques.  One of these, though it didn't go that far back, actually came up during Covid, how to help someone breathe, how to position a person, if a ventilator is not available - we don't remember these things because we assume there will be a hospital with whatever we might need, or at least some semblance of a chance of receiving reasonable care, the best that might be offered in such materialistic settings.  Non-materialistic techniques for healing the psyche are already vastly superior to the alternatives in many cases - and certainly would be for all if properly developed.

And it's not only that.  Spirituality is the Gateway to Exploration, in ways that are far more dramatic than any physical mechanism could provide.  There is no separation across space, or across time.  I've heard it said that if "someone" was "out there", they would have no way of knowing we are here.  Well, even in a physical way, we now realize they probably would, as we are already developing skills to analyze what may be habitable planets - keeping in mind that what might be habitable for life as we know it may be very different for life as we do not know it.  But beyond that, in a Spiritual way, an Aware species could easily find us, and no distance could hinder that, and not even time.  We are fully capable of looking through the eyes of another.  What an astonishing thing that is to ponder...and so it is, I'm pondering it again.  Because it's important.

 

 

Moon photo by Susan Larison Danz.

A Higher Focus

 "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." ~ Arthur C. Clarke

Although I truly consider myself some kind of an eclectic expression of a neo-luddite, and oddly, that has in a way always been true, I have spent a lot of my life working with technology.  

Arthur C. Clarke's famous quote does not exactly apply to what it is I am about to say and have pondered many times and discussed on radio.  I believe technology, for those civilizations which venture that way, is likely a very brief step.  Most technologically oriented societies probably destroy themselves.  Perhaps some survive, but there simply is absolutely no comparison to essentially developing "Magic".  How we evaluate "advanced" is skewed towards materialistic thinking.  What is actually Advanced is altogether different.  In reflecting upon the vastness of the Multiverse, there are likely many civilizations that are "Advanced" which either never developed technology at all or discarded it rapidly along the way. 

This may sound like wishful thinking, to those who haven't witnessed the potentials, but for those who are on a Spiritual path, it is indisputable that Spirituality is real - and has real-world implications.  Societies like ours where materialists are dominant face significant challenges.  If we could develop our spiritual gifts, we could essentially do anything (in a different way) than any "sufficiently advanced technology".  Healing, telepathy and telekinesis are just a few practical examples - and that's just the "practical".  The possibilities are truthfully unfathomable and wonderful.  Arthur C. Clarke wrote about this as well.  I have never personally witnessed telekinesis, but I have definitely witnessed and experienced healing and telepathy.  When we notice, these things happen more than we realize.  Imagine the potentials - and ignore those who mock.  They are wandering lost in the lowlands, essentially - while some of us are already venturing to Higher ground.

We need to set our sights Higher.  And persist.

 

 

Sunbreak over LAX photo by Susan Larison Danz.