I, Drew Fisher, have been inexplicably and irresistibly attracted to messianic characters my entire life. For those of you who may not be used to hearing the term "messianic" I will tell you that it has the root word "messiah" within it, which comes from ancient references within the Judaic religion. From Hebrew, messiah, literally, means "the anointed." It has come to be seen as a saviour or liberator of a group of people, most commonly in the Abrahamic religions. Jesus of Nazareth is called "The Messiah" throughout Christian literature, but the term has since been absorbed into languages to refer to any larger-than-life, selflessly heroic figure--in both history, folklore and literature.
As a child this attraction was served by contact with cartoon and comic book superheroes. Superman, Batman, The Green Hornet, Green Lantern, Iron Man, Aquaman, etc., etc. Before puberty I found great awe and inspiration in the religious heroes of my parents' Roman Catholic lore. Jesus of Nazareth, Saint Francis, and many of the angels, martyrs and saints. As a teen my worship was transferred to historical heroes. Siddhartha Gautama (The Buddha), Mohandas Gandhi, Martin L. King, Jr., Anwar Sadat (and, later, to Vinoba Bhave, Nelson Mandela, Mikhail Gorbachev, Ralph Nader, and even sports heroes like Sandy Koufax, Magic Johnson, Wayne Gretzky, Roger Federer and Derek Jeter). In my twenties my inspiration came from characters I encountered in film and literature, for example, Chauncy Gardiner from the film Being There, Michael Valentine Smith from Robert Heinlein's A Stranger in A Strange Land, Paul Atreides from Frank Herbert's Dune series, Hermann Hesse's Siddhartha, Prince Myshkin from Dostoevsky's novel The Idiot, Donald Shimoda from Richard Bach's Illusions, and many others. And still later, as a fledgling writer, the protagonists of my own writing seemed to always reflect these same altruistic ambitions and aspirations. Humans making choices to do or think extraordinary, one might say, "heroic" things, in mostly natural, self-less and unegotistical ways.
I believe that there are people doing heroic things every day in every country, town or village around the globe. There are many, many people who stand fast to high-minded, altruistic, one might call, "spiritual" principles. Admirable, life-affecting deeds are accomplished, words are spoken and written, and prayers and benevolent thoughts are forged every day. The planet is not short on heroes. But I think at some level I really wanted to be a saint. Like Thomas à Kempis, I really thought it possible. I feel that past life patterns--the work Journeyman Paul has done and the goals he and his team have set forth--have all served to create a natural yearning within me, Drew Fisher, to aspire to saint-like, or messianic-type life choices. And yet I have made many un-saintly life choices.
My journey into marriage and parenthood was truly prompted by the continually nagging voice within that kept telling me that the solitary, monastic, or lone-wolf life style to which I gravitated and within which I felt so comfortable was due to familiarity and comfort--because I had done it so many times before. Though I had often chosen this path from a place of sincere selflessness and sacrifice, more often it was out of self-pity, self-doubt, lack of confidence and low self-esteem. Journeyman Paul had made choices that led to lives lived on the fringes--cooped up safely in monasteries, or living the nomadic, anchoritic life in the wilds, or as the self-imposed outcast--because I had thought that was all I was worthy of, that I was unworthy of human love and companionship.
As Drew Fisher I have often found myself filled with convicted thoughts and impulsive desires to run way, to choose solitary life scenarios. In art I am always drawn into similar fantasy worlds, into the strongly self-sufficient characters. But a far deeper voice--a far more constant and sensible voice--has always counseled me, almost confidingly, that the reason I feel so drawn to those choices, those impulses, those fantasies, is because they are easy, they are comfortable, they are familiar. But, I am counseled, those are not the choices that will bring me the greatest opportunities for growth; it is in the choices that seem difficult and fearful that I will find the greatest opportunities for self-improvement and growth--and this is, after all, the kind of growth I had designed for my Self when planning this foray into the Earth School emotion-based human experience.
Every choice yields a learning opportunity. Every choice reveals some aspect of yourself that could be reflected upon, learned from, improved upon, expanded. The events of having to make choices while interacting with other humans are the most potent. Interactions with other humans are less predictable, less controllable, and, therefore, more risk-inducing than those with less animated consciousness.
And my model for participation within human society, my hero, has been the benevolent angel, the self-sacrificing saint, the brave, selfless hero, the Christ-like messiah.
Lahiri Mahasaiya was a renowned Indian saint who lived and worked his spiritual work from within the structures and confines of social constructs. He held a desk job in a railway company by day, went home to a wife and children by night, all the while pursuing an extraordinary practice of meditation and teaching. One of his students, Sri Yukteswar, was the teacher of Paramahansa Yogananda, author of Autobiography of A Yogi and founder of the Self Realization Fellowship.
Lahiri Mahasaiya has been an inspiration for me. His example gave me the final impetus for me to feel committed to my life choices within family, within society, within this time of peak materialism. His example made me feel confident that it was indeed possible to lead a saintly life, to offer spiritual example to others, while living within the mainstream of modern society.
The characters, legends, and personas that humans have created, shaped and preserved into elevated, revered heroes have always felt to me as very real examples of true human potential. To my mind, heroes are models that we can and should emulate and aspire to. Joseph Campbell spoke of the "hero within" or the "hero with a thousand faces." That's what I'm talking about. These heroes come from stories that feed or serve the hero archetypes that are within all of us. Campbell and psychologist Carl Jung believed that these stories are actually necessary to us--that it is through these stories, through our dreams, that we awaken these archetypes, that we awaken the hero within. What they're saying is that each of us is attracted to heroic figures precisely because we believe, at a very deep level, that we can be--that we are--these heroes. The potential to be a hero--to do heroic things--rests within each of us. Stories and examples 'outside' of us merely stir this 'knowing'--remind us of another one of our infinite potentials. I believe that awakening or acquiring a spiritual perspective is another way of unleashing our "hero within." The recognition and heart-felt understanding that we are Spirits merely using these human bodies and our Earth-based physical surroundings is tremendously liberating in terms of being able to detach from the basic fears that usually prevent us from taking the risks that one associates with heroes and messiahs. When we can remember that we come from The Divine, that we are animated by a spark of The Divine, that we are, in fact, co-creators of our universe since we are truthfully a part of God, then we can do godly things.
A problem that modern humankind is faced with is that we need more examples of cultures and societies that have raised consciousness to a level from which life could be and is lived out of love and enthusiasm rather than fear and trepidation. As Paul Atreides was taught to say, "Fear is the mind killer." This is exactly what I see in every day life in the majority of people around me: the fear of all of the threats and implied threats that are bombarding humans each and every day is killing the "mind," distracting us from hearing the voice of Spirit--the voices of Truth, Beauty, Joy, and Love--which is constantly being whispered to us--which is, in truth, animating us, giving us Life itself.
Where did all these fear-based thought, motivation, behavior patterns com from--and why? How and Why have we bought into them? Why have we accepted and allowed these paradigms to take hold? Is it because our shadow side has been so repressed, so denied, that we have succumbed to a disease of guilt and shame--to a pattern of numb somnambulance? What is the meaning and significance of the fact that fear-based behavior patterns have been so convincingly proselytized and that the masses have listened and succumbed? What will it take for the loving, spirit-minded side of human nature to reawaken and reassert itself? When will fear have been served?
The hero-savior or "messiah" figure is the personified metaphor for the rise and ascendance of Light, Love, Truth, Beauty, Courage, Wisdom, and Sacrifice. It is also the projection of those very powers and purifications that reside within each one of us. The best we can do in the present place in human history is to learn and practice (and, hopefully, master) detachment. Detachment from all things attached to the "physical" "material" world. Detachment from expectations--from expectations of any and all outcomes. It is a tough battle, though in fact it requires merely the flip of a psychic switch. No more expectations, no more disappointments. Detachment.
Messianic figures are usually very good practitioners of detachment. They are even fairly masterful at detaching from the ultimate fear: death. Most heroes know full well that they are risking bodily harm and even death in making the choices they make. Many of them have learned to not fear death, to not only accept it as inevitable, but to have "risen above" its hold on them--which is to say, many heroes or messianic figures have found a spiritual, metaphysical, or aphysical perspective which allows them to even detach from their bodies, their surroundings, the so-called 'physical' element of this Earth life. With the strength of this perspective they are able to confidently go into any dangerous situation, detached from all outcomes--even death!
With that in mind, I hope you are all able to awaken and realize the messianic hero within you. I wish you all the heroic powers that detachment can avail to you. Potentially, we are all Christs, Buddhas, Mohammeds, Gandhis, Martin Luther Kings, and Michael Valentine Smiths. In order to become such we must use Love and Spirit while learning to detach from Fear and Ego. Good luck! We're all counting on you!
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