And so, finally, adieu 2020. It’s been a long year and a long time since a year acquired such a bad reputation so quickly. Well, 1939 probably wasn’t a cracker, or 1914 to be honest, but still. We leave it behind in the hope that, more than ever, a change of number will bring a change of fortune. It undoubtedly will, although of what kind is impossible to even guess at. I, for one, will be returning my 2020 diary for a refund. Meanwhile, we peep over the duvet back at a year so anomalous as to defy meaningful analysis – as if that has stopped anyone.

2020. Had a clean kind of ring and a symmetry about it. No more of those pesky teens, right? How naïve. Christmas last year now shimmers like a mirage, a distant, receding shore we can never get back to, and in a way it is and we can’t. Then there we were last January, like turkeys in November only dimly aware of a certain unease in the air. And then, out of left field it came: entirely warranted global discombobulation and a real sense of the fragile interdependences upon which our laurels rest. 

You can’t second guess Ma Nature. The coronavirus and its toxic entourage shone a harsh light on our centuried complacency, taking us entirely by surprise even though we saw it coming. Usually, when people are under threat there is a tangible sense of Other. This time, however, there was no Other, only ourselves: the enemy within, hard to spot and even harder to deal with. What we got were lessons in dark consequence and warnings of the starkest variety. 

During the initial lockdown, when time itself seemed stretched out of shape, it’s hard to say whether there was a slowing down or an acceleration. Perhaps both. The slowlong hours and days blurred into weeks, and before we knew it an entire season had vanished. In a parallel universe somewhere the spring of 2020 lies abandoned and unused, perhaps along with the autumn, which turned out to be pretty unusable. As is the winter, come to think of it. 

Conversely, the natural world must scarcely have been able to believe its luck, luxuriating in the absence of us. Skies blued, mountains hoved into view, birds sang, animals got their gladrags on and ventured into town and, as cities around the world fell silent, you could almost sense the relief and disbelief across the natural world. You have to wonder what their headlines looked like during lockdown.

Humans were, finally, forced to be relatively still and perchance peer into in the dark (black) mirror for a while. This, it has to be argued, was no bad thing because there was – and still is – an urgent need to reflect on whatever it is we think we’re doing on this planet. Howevs, most of us just wanted to fumble for the snooze button and turn over again. This, unsurprisingly, included those half asleep at the helm of spaceship earth and who appear comically unsuited to the magnitude of their task, unless of course that task is to facilitate global collapse and an ill-advised stand-off with Ma Nature. 

Whatever the eventual ramifications and dramafications of 2020, its deeper, crumbling function has been to accelerate long overdue change, and now the old paradigm is finally cracking under the weight of the impending inevitable. As with other species, we humans have waited and waited until the pressure of our own execrable, inexorable evolution has become excruciating enough to force a shift. 2020 may have made for ugly viewing but it has, at least, given us a small idea of the scale of the undertaking that lies ahead.

There are two opposing elements at work now: tooth and claw resistance to the inevitable collapse of a self-interested, outdated system, and the tiny green shoots of a new, upcoming world civilisation. We may be feeling the squeeze down on the ground right now but the larger picture perhaps offers a clearer perspective. In a time when reference points are few and far between, trying to see things in a larger context makes sense and can also take the heat off.

One angle, recently in the news, concerns the planetary events on and around the 21^st of December. The astronomical alignments made a few headlines – Saturn and Jupiter doing their rare thing and a most portentous alignment with the epicentre of the Milky Way, to name a couple. However, we might also take into account the deeper question of planets and people – astrology – often dismissed in the west, and not without good reason. But elsewhere, the ancient science is far better understood and appreciated, brings to mind again Swami Sri Yukteswar’s observation on the utter irrelevance of personal ‘belief’ in such matters and that the only correct scientific attitude one should take is whether or not something is true. And he, of all people, would know. 

The winter solstice saw all kinds of shenanigans in the heavens. The general consensus is that we are at a turning point – something perhaps we are beginning to feel – and that whatever moves we make now will have long-lasting consequences. Some ways of being are ending because they must, others imply a necessary changing up of gear. Precisely how we do this is another question, but it’s hard to understate the seriousness of where we are at. This era has been talked about for a long time by so many cultures. In the very short term, though, there are indications that the general situation may improve in the spring. Good news is in such short supply at the moment that, thank you very much, we’ll take it.

It is worth keeping in mind that, according to the great cycle of ages (yugas), we are still only 300 years out of the Iron (material) Age, but 120 years into the ascending Bronze (electrical) Age. And there’s the tension. Basically, we are still crawling from the wreckage of the last few millennia, and the dark mindset won’t give up without a real struggle, as is becoming clear. Ecdysis is a tricky business – ask any snake.

Hindsight may be 20/20 but foresight certainly isn’t. We need a new story, not news stories. We need change – whatever that is – not placards. The question then is how loud the alarm will have to ring before we wake up. The extent to which we can assimilate the lessons of 2020 and find a new, positive momentum will determine the nature of upcoming decades and centuries. And it may even be that 2021 will be better than it looks from here. Mind you, that wouldn’t be hard. The cracks may be widening but there is light emanating from them too. 

Happy New Year? Possibly.