Saviorism – Who saves you…and from what??
One of our greatest faith base deceptions and one that we all buy into in some form as humans is the mythology that something or someone is going to save us from whatever form of adversity we may face in our current experience. Throughout the ages humans have sought for outside sources to rescue us, or at least, to make fair what seems to be unfair in our existence. Judgment day and Karma are forms of this “making fair” scenario and most of our common mythological stories are that they may save us from forces we believe are rooted in the idea of saviorism. This idea rings in every aspect of our existence including our governments, local and national leaders, religious leaders, corporate leaders, etc.
No greater deception exists in human experience then the idea that we can and will be saved by some benevolent force that possesses power greater than our own. In fact, in our government and religious institutions we willingly hand over our own power to individuals who are unable to control anything and in so doing squander our own innate ability to express our own individuality. Did you get that? We give our own power away – literally!
Regardless of our own individual politics, all government is seen as bad or good from the collective standpoint. Some faction sees the current leaders as their saviors while another faction sees it as doom and the cause of social problems whatever they may be. Both claim their own political saviorism as the way out of whatever dilemma they choose to embrace and blame the other as the cause for their existing problems. It is a vicious cycle which we, collectively, will never get out of because regardless of your political view no one can save us.
It is a timeless condition of the human experience. “Somebody save me!” Religious institutions reflect the same kind of outward looking as well. Jews continue to look for another king David who will rise up and put down all the enemies of Israel and save them from a world that is set upon their destruction. At no time in history has any religious group looked more forward to a savior. Christians, too, look to the returning Jesus so save them and the world from those who do not believe in him, as their personal savior.” The great saving device of this returning God is his swift and righteous judgment, righting all the wrongs Christians the world over have suffered.
For Muslims, Allah, will vindicate the faithful and restore the birthright they, too, believe was taken from them. Hindu’s and Buddhists will cycle around in different forms until they have satisfied the requirements of God whose rules they subject themselves too. Their savior is time; endless time.
Religious institutions the world over whether they be large collective movements, small and localized, mystical, dogmatic, new age or old age all look to some force out there to equalize and make right what they collectively perceive as unfair or wrong. All that is asked of the individual is to believe that the unique collective perspective will be right. In other words, suffer now with patience and hope and ultimately you will be vindicated. There is no difference whether the collective institution is secular or religious. They all cry, “We are right and they are wrong.” People go to their graves with this kind of hope, believing everything they were taught was wrong will be righted!
Human history is littered with fallen saviors who came with the power of words and ideas but failed to provide any long-term solution to the plight of people or nations. In fact, history is nothing more than an endless parade of one thing not working but being overcome supposedly by something better only to fail and repeat over and over again. Winston Churchill referred to history as “just one damned thing after another.” How true.
If we can learn anything from history it is that we cannot learn from history! What we should gather from history is that nothing, no one, can or will save us. No president, political party, nation, religion, individual, philosophy or ideal can save us. We cannot be saved because there is nothing to be saved from!
Somehow the human mind, the ego has convinced us that we all need something outside of us to make us whole and complete. To protect us and make our lowliness or lack in the world a cause for equalization by some force that has power beyond our own. We are conditioned throughout our lives to accept some form of saviorism. It is as if the ego is hiding from some great unknown crime for which it must pay by accepting an outside force to resolve. It seems that the reality we all accept on some level is that guilt unworthiness, evil, etc. is the state of human awareness. It is not always aimed at our individual selves. These characteristics are often aimed at those who are not like us. Thus the collective finger-pointing for our own collective ills.
Saviorism is dependency. It stems from the fear we are taught throughout our lives that we are to be perfect even though no one can describe perfection without their own unique judgment of it. We convince ourselves that no one can be perfect and that being the case the idea of needing saving is automatically formed. The idea is so pervasive it inserts itself into every aspect of our lives. It lies at the root of the karmic idea that “what goes around comes around.” “Sooner or later you will get yours” even if we have to wait a long time for it to happen. God, e.g. savior will make it right in the end.
Our saviors, consequently, take on many forms. They are people, places and things. Even pills and plants save us. For instance, we look for a pill to slim us down or prevent us from overeating. Heaven forbid we simply take control of our own lives and stop eating or start eating in ways that are healthier! Instead, someone will create a pill that lets us eat anything we want and as much as we want without becoming overweight. Perhaps the pill will come along that will motivate me to work out so I can get that body I have always dreamed of! Perhaps our savior is this new job I’ve been expecting that will launch both a new career direction and greater prosperity.
I have a friend who is partially disabled who lamented constantly that he could not be whole until his government disability was approved. Now that his disability has come through, which was more than he anticipated; he now complains that he cannot live on the amount provided even though he does nothing to manage the money he does receive.
Can you see the subtlety of it? My friend was saved from a story he created and now he has created a new story that the amount of disability is not enough. He is now looking for a new savior to rescue him from this latest unfairness. After that a new unfairness will lurk into his awareness and he will turn to yet another savior. “If I can just win the lottery it would save me from my financial burdens.” I hold to my religious beliefs accepting fully my struggles, my faith will cause God to look favorably upon me and vindicate my lowliness.
We all do this. The greatest saviors we look to are governments and religions because they attempt to right all the wrongs on a much larger scale but the nature of saviorism permeates every aspect of life and it affects every one of us regardless of our situation or circumstances. The most subtle are our most benign daily wants and desires, particularly our relationships. How many times have we heard someone proclaim, “Oh I can’t live without him or her?” Or “I just won’t be able to go on if they break up with me,” etc. As if life without someone could save us from life altogether!
So many of our individual stories and dramas are played out because of the insidious control our minds play that we must have something or someone in place that will make everything better. This is saviorism! It even finds its way into new age thought that tells us that we can have anything we want if we put our focus and attention onto something even though the original premise is I can be saved from the lack I now have in my life by thinking about and working toward whatever it is I lack.
“Ask, and it will be given” is a common idea in our collective thought and yet at its core is that whatever it is you ask for will only come from some outside source to whom we are all beholden. That is saviorism. In fact, the subtle implication is that all you need to do is ask and something greater than you will provide it. This thing, whatever you call it, is the kind giver of that which you do not have. It will save you from what you do not have presently.
The only way out of this condition is to accept full responsibility for everything in your life. You create your existence and you, therefore, are your own savior should a savior ever be required, which when you take control of everything in your experience will never happen! There is nothing to be saved from in the responsible life. Taking responsibility for life is recognizing that nothing in human experience is personal to you even though it may seem to be.
We create our own experience and exist only as humans for a short while that will never be anything more than the experience. When we take this kind of control over our lives we see that everything that happens is unique and wonderful even if the collective world comes to our rescue and tells us “it’s not right or good.” It is said that “we must be the change we see in the world.” In other words, until we decide that nothing outside our own unique existence can or need save us this idea of saviorism will haunt us for the entirety of our lives. It never matters what the world thinks of us or how we view ourselves in it. Nothing that happens needs outside forces to square our experience with anyone else’s or with collective thoughts and intentions.
You are the hero of your life. I am the hero of my own. There is nothing that will save you simply because you are the hero, the savior and when we all remove our judgments of the experience we each individually enjoy something unique and special that no other can or will. That is the beauty of discovering the divine within us. It knows that this experience is nothing in infinity and is only to be enjoyed as only Gods can. It also knows that there is nothing in infinity from which we can or need be saved. We literally have it all. We literally are ALL!
Adapted from the book “On Human Being – Loving & Living Without Purpose”