2012: What You Make of It
by Alan Cohen, Haiku, HI

2012 is here. Finally. After many years of anticipation, sensationalism, foreboding, titillation, and wild prophecies, we’ve reached the end of the Mayan calendar. The era of momentous astrological configurations. World upheaval. Apocalyptic destruction. Dissolution of the world as we know it. Mass landing of UFOs. The spiritual ascension of humanity. The dawn of a new age. And on and on and on. . .
     
Prophets, authors, soothsayers, shamans, and Hollywood have had a field day predicting, explaining, and dramatizing the events to come. Will this year be a turning point in human history?  Massive suffering leading to spiritual resurrection? The annihilation of evil and the restoration of virtue? The second coming of Christ? A redux of the Y2K dud?  Just another year?
     
I have a prediction in which I am quite confident: 2012 will be what you make of it. Your whole life is what you make of it, and 2012 is no exception. Your thoughts, feelings, attitude, words, and actions will determine your experience and the events you attract. What you want and expect to happen will happen. If you are immersed in the Hollywood terror version of 2012, watch out. If you value the upliftment of humanity, transformation will ensue. If you expect just another year, so it will be. Your pen is scribing the novel of your world. What will you write?
     
The universe is brimming with infinite parallel realities. All events and experiences that have ever existed, do exist, will exist, or could exist, already exist. In one reality, the 2012 earth will be blown to smithereens. In another, the planet will be transfigured to heaven. In another, it will be the same ole’ same ole. A dozen different movies are playing under one roof of the multiplex of life, and you sit in the theater that matches the ticket you paid for. In one room a love story is unfolding. In another, social and political drama keeps viewers on the edge of their seats. In another, bombs are exploding and the walls are shaking. One theater, many shows.
     
Just as in the multiplex, you are free to exit one theater and enter another. If you’re tired of the terrorist movie, you can watch a romance instead. If you’ve had it with drama, you can pick a comedy. If the horror movie gets too dark, try a kid’s feature. The theater manager will tell you that you have to stay where you have been sitting, but you can move if you want. Every reality is self-reinforcing, insisting that you keep playing by the rules it dictates. But the rules change from reality to reality. If you have the guts to change theaters, everything changes with you. A Course in Miracles reminds us, “I am under no laws but God’s.”
     
The Course offers a profound prophecy about how the world will end. “The world will end in an illusion, as it began. Yet will its ending be an illusion of mercy. The illusion of forgiveness, complete, excluding no one, limitless in gentleness, will cover it, hiding all evil, concealing all sin and ending guilt forever. . . The world will end in joy, because it is a place of sorrow. . . The world will end in peace, because it is a place of war. . . The world will end in laughter, because it is a place of tears.”
   
Werner Erhard noted that the world coming to an end would be the best thing that could happen, because the world as we know it has not been working very well. The institutions and systems to which we have looked for security are not serving their purpose, and need to be replaced by systems that actually help people. But we have to let go of what is not working before we can step into what would work better. We have to trust the process of transformation. Two caterpillars sat on the ground looking up at a butterfly flittering above the trees. “You’ll never get me up in one of those things,” one caterpillar remarked to the other.
    
The irony, of course, is that the caterpillar already is one of those things. While you and I envision a world transformed, we may be so steeped in the identity of who we have been and the “reality” of how things have been that the idea of living a better life in a new world may seem fantastic, even ludicrous or frightening. Yet the butterfly is so much freer than the caterpillar that any caterpillar in his right mind would be exhilarated to step into the dreamliner.
    
2012 will be the year of just such a transformation if we choose to make it so. Leave the hoo-ha to Hollywood and create the year you would have. Perhaps the end of the Mayan calendar signals that we will move beyond the limits of time as we have known it, and dwell in a consciousness free of time and space. Perhaps the changes we experience in and around us are the runway on which we take off to soar through skies we once only looked up at, but are now ready to explore.
    
All end times lead to beginning times. Now there’s a prophecy we can live with. 

Alan Cohen is the author of many popular inspirational books, including the just-released Enough Already: The Power of Radical Contentment. Join him for his Personal Mentorship Program beginning January 4, 2012, and on his weekly Hay House Radio show, Get Real. For more information about Alan’s books, programs, or his free daily inspirational quotes via email, visit www.alancohen.com, email info@alancohen.com, or phone 1‑808‑572-0001.