So, here we stand at the start of a new year, and the dawn of a new decade.   

A fresh page, a new leaf.  Out with the old, in with the new!

Ahhhh….the collective exhale is almost palpable, as we begin to ‘get back to normal’, and issue the usual “never again….” assertions, resolving to somehow do it better in the next 12 months.

But is it just me, or is there a bit of an edge this year…?  2012, long prophesied by visionaries past and present as being something of a landmark, looms ever closer, and it seems that collectively and individually, we’re not quite sure what to make of it.  Of course, the ubiquitous Doomsday merchants are on red alert;  Hollywood has already offered us it’s rendition in standard disaster-movie format, and to be fair, this version of the possible scenario is not so far removed from what a lot of people in the past twenty years or so have also been describing.

For the uninitiated, the culprit for all this doom and gloom is the Mayan calendar;  the Maya were remarkable mathematicians, and their system of recording linear time was legendary.   What has many people worried is that their complex and elegant calendar ends on 21^st December 2012. 

Some interpret this as meaning it will be the end of the world;   other people feel it carries the promise of a new beginning;  and still others see it as an explanation for troubling new realities – environmental change, for example – that seem to go beyond the control of our technology, and are impervious to reason.

It would be lovely to assert with some confidence that this is all poppycock….those of us who remember [and made plans for....] the Millennium Bug could be forgiven for the odd arched eyebrow and wry smile, but with ancient sources such as the Hopi Indians and Nostradamus also telling us similar stories about these ‘end days’, such nonchalance is difficult to pull off.

So where’s this blog going…? I hear you asking me.

Isn’t it depressing enough that Christmas is over, and the dreary winter slog is shortly about to resume….?

Well, I might just have a little chink of light up my sleeve.

The only problem is that accessing it might entail losing your mind….

Stay with me here, good reader.   I appreciate that whilst all this psychological stuff fascinates me, this is the point where the vast majority of people switch off. 

However, I’m not actually advocating that we surrender to madness;  the mind offers us an amazing key into a different reality…..as – of all things – a daytime TV programme has rammed home to me.

I flicked the TV on randomly one afternoon just before Christmas, and watched transfixed at the most amazing documentary which re-ran an earlier Harvard experiment which basically suggests that reliving our youth can turn back the physical clock;  I’d read about the original experiment in one of Deepak Chopra’s books (Ageless Body, Timeless Mind) but actually watching it being put into practice was nothing short of astonishing.

Six well-known and ageing celebrities in various stages of mental and physical decline were transported back in time, and placed in a house which was meticulously styled as it would have looked in the mid 70’s [think Del Boy’s gaff]…..with the newspapers, magazines, music and the clothes they wore all from the same era.  In the beginning, watching it was all more than a little uncomfortable, as these lovely, frail people were expected to fend for themselves, and – for example – haul their own suitcases [and themselves] painfully up the stairs, and I almost switched off. 

But then the magic started to happen, and slowly but surely, the atmosphere in the house changed from being a slightly sad retreat for some very nice old people into a dynamic, living, breathing space where collectively, everyone was living as their younger selves.  And this was backed up by a battery of before and after physical and cognitive tests, which showed dramatic and very visible improvements across the board. 

And all they had done was to live as their younger selves.  For just one week. 

The experiment completely endorsed the findings of the earlier study, and proved that we all have the potential to think and behave differently about who we are, and the way we live, regardless of our age….that we all have the ability to change – we just need the right motivating framework.

So, how does it work …?  The volunteers weren’t subjected to any lotions, potions, injections, exercise regimes or drugs.  According to the Professor who conducted the original experiment, it’s simply about allowing the fertile soil of the brain to re-engage with a time in our lives when we’re at our most ‘vital’, allowing the mind, body and spirit to shift up a gear and follow suit.  And according to actress Liz Smith – the oldest member of the team – what it’s taught her is that she needs to keep pushing her own boundaries, experiencing new things and challenging herself.  As a result, she’s starting painting again and has joined a ballroom dance class.  And she is 89, and the survivor of three strokes.

Where, then, does so-called ‘reality’ start and stop?  Double-blind medical trials exist because doctors know without doubt that placebos work….sometimes more effectively than the drugs they are designed to replicate.  And hypnosis, for example, can be used to cure irrational phobias, stop unconscious behaviour like snoring, and even increase the size of a woman’s bust.

And so if the brain can be so easily and effectively duped, can this knowledge be used to overturn anything that we want to change…even something as haunting as the spectre of 2012….?

The answer, I think, is that it can.

We’ve long been told that our inner world creates our outer world, but never have I seen that so clearly demonstrated as in that TV programme, and I think the way in which the new paradigm will come into being will be dictated by our own thoughts and feelings about ourselves and about the world in general, and that what will ultimately unfold is that we all start to manifest our world on previously unprecedented levels.

And if this all sounds like so much new-age ‘Celestine Prophecy’ hogwash to you, then of course, you are right.  Our beliefs, in our own individual worlds, cannot be wrong.  But the point is that you do have the choice, and if the thought that somehow, you can create your own reality is remotely appealing to you, then what have you got to lose by trying it out…?

Have fun with it…play with it….!  What would you manifest today, this week, this year….if your future wasn’t based upon your interpretation of your current reality….? 

Who would you be, how would you look, where would you live, what would you do….?  It’s in your hands.  Or, rather, your mind.

But you can’t think your way along this path….you need to stop – or at least slow down – the mental chatter, so that the creative mind has some room to manoeuvre. 

How?

Let go.  Meditate.  Dance, walk, run, cycle or swim.  Paint, sing, cook, climb mountains or cultivate cacti.  Make love.  Stargaze, moonbathe or chase rainbows.  Do anything and everything to get out of your headspace;  you need to lose yourself…. and your over-worked and overwrought thinking mind. 

And with any luck, you’ll all smile indulgently at me in a couple of years’ time and tell me that all that 2012 stuff was as ridiculous at the Millennium Bug, and we’ll have a laugh. 

But at least you’ll still be mentally fit, and above all, happy….after all, you’ll have had a ball for the past two years.

 And, who knows, maybe if enough of us do it, any catastrophe will be averted by sheer dint of the level of our consciousness. 

After all, to return to an earlier question, what is reality anyway….?

This really is win: win stuff. 

And I offer most of it in various guises;   meditation classes, personal consultations, retreats or – of course – Juice. 

Happy New You, one and all. 

“Forget about the world and the utopias, and change yourself.  And this is the beauty: if you change yourself, you have already started changing the world.  Because with your change, a part of the world has changed.” ~ Osho