Today’s podcast interview is one that is especially close to my heart at this particular time. You see, October 26, 2013 marked the commencement of a new chapter in my life. It was the symbolic day that my partner and I along with our furry family of 8 cats and 2 dogs left the comfort of our family and friends in Ontario and embarked on a cross-country journey towards a new life on the west coast of British Columbia.

It also meant that for the better part of a week during our cross-country journey, I would need to leave the security of my bubble of compassion and venture into the world of the collective coma comprising today’s prevailing cultural paradigm.

I knew before embarking on this lengthy journey that I would see some of the most beautiful sights that nature could offer. I also knew that I would witness some of the ugliest realities created by humanity. I’ve done this trip before. Three times to be exact. And it’s always hard on my soul. But stay with me here because there is much light at the end of this tunnel.

As expected, only 3 days into the journey, the low vibration of the collective energy field rattled me to the core. Forests, transformed from their initial beauty into ugly barren moonscapes – demolished by clearcut logging. An ongoing barrage of men in pickup trucks carting guns, crossbows, ATV’s, and the bodies of murdered wildlife. Most upsetting of all was the relentless, endless convoy of cruelty in the death trucks transporting countless terrified sentient beings to a premature, violent and mechanized ending. I’m talking about the transport trucks shipping innocent animals to slaughter. There was no foreseeable end to the trucks coming and going in every conceivable direction from sunrise to sunset and likely well into the darkest hours of night. It highlighted for me the sheer magnitude of the illness that is the voracious appetite for the suffered flesh of innocent beings that has been rationally normalized in today’s society. The desperate fear emanating from each and every death truck was palpable. It was haunting and it was heartbreaking.

Interspersed amongst this unconscious violence was signage for hunting camps, baited bear hunts, and billboards advertising women’s shelters and other forms of help for female victims of violence. Even writing this two weeks later hurts my heart.

Animal feedlots, auction houses, and slaughterhouses were also in plain sight of the main highway as we made our way westward. Admittedly, there were days where it was utterly impossible to find the beauty in our species.

It’s not often that I throw myself into the world of the collective coma because it creates despair. And it hurts – it really hurts. I much prefer to surround myself with people who live from the essence of their compassion and a higher level of consciousness. This trip left me feeling broken – and dumbfounded with the extreme level of unconscious violence still prevalent in today’s world.

But just as I feel myself plummet into the depths of despair, the Universe shines her light – to remind me of who I am at my core – love…and hope. Two red foxes playing off in a field. An eagle majestically gliding in the sky. A beautiful sunrise. A gorgeous prairie sunset. The rugged, majestic beauty of the Rocky Mountains. A funky dude at a full-serve gas station in the middle of nowhere whose smile lights up the sky. Yes, I take notice. And I feel the healing influence of the natural world in my soul.

Despite the heaviness I feel about the insane reality of the rationally accepted violence that includes the consumption of animal flesh and secretions, I have a strong belief that one day we will look back on this paradigm with disgust and horror – just as we have with previous historical paradigms of extreme rationalized violence. And I have a strong intuitive feeling that I’ll witness this massive shift in my lifetime.