This morning, Monday, Nov. 7, I read another article about Steve Jobs, this one by Tracy Grant of the Washington Post. If you’ve never heard of Jobs, then you’ve probably not been living on this planet during the past month. In the aftermath of his death on Oct. 5, probably more has been written about the Apple Computer founder than any other person alive or dead.
Grant’s article meanders from Jobs as a parent to his hatred of buttons on computers and other gadgets, his poor showing in college to his 15-minute commencement lecture at Stanford University. She even touched on his notable arrogance.
She left out what the mainstream media in general has avoided…the ending, his last words…”Wow…wow…wow,” uttered as he looked past his family that surrounded his bed. Those words were reported, because they were mention by Jobs’ sister Mona in her eulogy. But little of anything was made of his hint of an afterlife, of something astonishing coming his way. It’s worth noting Jobs was an atheist, which makes his utterance more curious and should’ve garnered some interest for a discussion of life after death in the media. In spite of all the words written and spoken about Jobs – his life and death – the talking heads, the columnists, the investigative reporters aren’t exploring the possible meaning of his final words.
The day before Tracy Grant’s article appeared in our local newspaper, I read a related post by our blogging friend Marcus Anthony, Australian futurist and author of the upcoming book, Discover Your Soul Template. As usual, Marcus’ post is detailed and well thought out.
Referring to the silence of the media on Jobs’ point of departure, he writes: “Ironically, that silence spoke of the forbidden country where few in modern mainstream media dare to venture: the spirituality of death. No doubt most of the general public were thinking exactly what I was thinking when I read the words. What is it that Jobs was feeling, perceiving, seeing in those final moments of his earthly existence? Was it something transcendental, spiritual, or dare I say, divine?”
Marcus asks, “How has it come to this point where the spiritual has become so denied, so absolutely taboo, even where it is so blatantly, poignantly present?” He goes on to provide a historical summary of the split between world of spirit and the world of nature – the physical realm – brought on by the Renaissance, influence by the ancient Greeks. As a result, he notes: “…mainstream science and education closed the doors to spiritual experience, and politics and education became bereft of intuitive knowing.”
One reason for that separation is that religion has dumbed down spirituality, and made it so transparently questionable that anyone whose thinking lies outside the dogma of religious belief finds many of the basic teachings to be nonsensical. Of course that view overlooks the fact that without religion there is still spirituality, that our spiritual nature is the core of our existence, even if it’s not recognized as such.
For many of us the unseen world is closely interwoven with the visible world of our everyday reality. For instance, this post came about as a confluence of three related events that came together in a way that can’t be explained by cause and effect and they were meaningful for me. In other words, synchronicity.
First, I read Marcus’s post, then that night as I went to bed, I opened up James Redfield’s new book, The Twelfth Insight, which is all about synchronicity. The three-page passage I read was a reiteration of what Marcus had written about the history of the split between spirit and the material world. Then this morning, when I read the article by Tracy Grant, I was nudged to sit down and write this post.
Of course, not all aspects of the media ignore life after death. A few hours after writing the above paragraphs, Trish and I were interviewed by Whitley Streiber for his subscriber section of the Unknown Country website about our book, Synchronicity and the Other Side. It was an interesting conversation because Whitley’s next book will be about another ignored topic, the link between UFOs and the dead. Can’t wait for that one.
