Smile, it is the Kali Yuga!

Let us be real and acknowledge the obvious, that the world is in trouble, and no-one is coming to save us any time soon. This is because it is the Kali Yuga.

The Kali Yuga is the Hindu term for the Dark Age in which we currently live. It revolves around the deep truth that time is not linear, but cyclical, which means that history is not a story of improvement toward new and better things, but simply the constant repetition of old things in new guises.

According to some Hindu sacred texts life moves through four ages, each one less spiritual and more corrupt than before. This transition takes place over thousands (some say millions) of years, until the final age, the worst of all, is reached – the Kali Yuga. This is the age we are in now. Some say that the Kali Yuga is simply a manifestation of the dual-natured Hindu goddess Kali, the divine mother, symbol of dissolution and destruction, slayer of ignorance, and liberator of those who seek true knowledge. Others say that the Kali Yuga is nothing to do with her, because the spelling of the word is different depending on whether it names a Goddess or an Age. Still others say that the word itself, kali, simply denotes the most unfavourable roll of a die (all the names of the four ages being derived from a game of dice).

Anyway, the Kali Yuga, the last, shortest, and darkest of the four great ages, is a time of conflict, ignorance and materialism. As the Kali Yuga draws to an end all things that are noble, true and good become weak, defiled and degenerate. Values are upended, money rules, people are selfish, everything dissolves into a chaotic soup and life just gets worse and worse as humans become more and more spiritually disconnected.

At the close of the Kali Yuga, the period we now inhabit, the outside world grows dark because our inner light has dimmed. Only in the first of the four ages, the Krita Yuga, did humans walk with the Gods. That was a time where neither hate, fear nor envy existed, everyone knew their purpose and did nothing else but selflessly fulfil it. From there it was downhill all the way. Right living declined in the next phase, the Treta Yuga, where people started to expect rewards for their actions and their sense of duty declined. This was followed by a further degradation in the Dvapara Yuga where only a few knew and practiced the ways of God. Selfish desires became the norm, disease proliferated and injustice grew. This eventually gave way to the current age, the Kali Yuga, where contemplative spirituality is eclipsed by constant busyness, true knowledge is lost and evil comes to dominate. Disease, weakness, lack of purpose, hunger, fear and despair all increase, and in the later years of the Kali Yuga all these trends accelerate until a fresh cycle is triggered and a new Golden Age begins.

Finding the precise date of the end of the Kali Yuga is a formidable, maybe even impossible, task. If you take the scholarship of those who translated and studied the original Hindu texts as a starting point then the Kali Yuga began around 3102 BC, which then produces a myriad of possibilities for its end date, such as 1899, 1912, 1939, 1999, 2025 or 2030. Perhaps we will never know the truth for sure, but the most convincing case, mythically, astrologically and numerologically, to my eyes, is that the Kali Yuga will be concluded around the year 2442. Yes, you read that right. I reckon the Kali Yuga ends in 2442 AD. Approximately. So not only have we not yet exited the tunnel, but we are nowhere near the end of it.

What to expect in the Kali Yuga?

Though there is truth in the claim that life is what you make it, it is also true that most people are finding it harder and harder to make anything for themselves, seeming to become more and more subject to impersonal forces, far outside their control. Public discourse is becoming harsher, individual interactions with people are more fraught and people more easily triggered, while more and more outrageous things seem to happen in our world. This is because one of the hallmarks of the Kali Yuga is violence, in the broadest possible sense of the word, from weaponry to fists to abrasive encounters with words. Everywhere, during the Kali Yuga, there is conflict between people, in one form or another. But, even more crucially, there is increasing conflict between People and God. This is the core of the Kali Yuga, disaster is brought about by our arrogant belief that we either do not need God, or worse still, that we are God.

This is because the whole basis upon which our society is constructed – religion – is itself distorted. All the world’s major, established religions, including Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, as well as Marxism and the modern religions of Science and Wokeism are deviations from, and imperfect representations of, the true religion of God and Nature. All these movements are part of an aeons long slide away from unity, toward separation, a process that culminates at the end of the Kali Yuga.

So, in the twilight of the Kali Yuga you cannot expect things to get better by themselves, for politicians (or voters) to come to their senses or for aggressors to voluntarily lay down their arms, because all of them are influenced by the downward pull toward materialism. Such people swing between wild religiosity (which includes the religions of Science and Wokeism) on one hand, and total rejection of any kind of meaning or purpose on the other. In the evening time of the Kali Yuga we should expect a quickening, an acceleration, of all the problems of the world.

From the Linga Purana, one of the ancient texts from which these ideas emerge.

“It is the lowest instincts that spur the men of the Kali Yuga on. They prefer to choose false ideas. They do not hesitate to persecute sages. Desire torments them. Slovenliness, illness, hunger and fear spread. The different regions of countries will be in conflict with each other. Men will be without morals, irritable and sectarian…. False doctrines and misleading teachings spread….  heroes will be assassinated. Thieves will become kings, and kings will be thieves. Rulers will confiscate property and use it badly. They will cease to protect the people. Base men who have gained a certain amount of learning (without the virtues necessary for its use) will be esteemed as sages. Scholars will be in the service of mediocre, conceited and malevolent men. There will be many displaced persons, wandering from one country to another. Ready cooked food will be on sale. Young girls will do trade in their virginity. Shopkeepers will run dishonest businesses. There will be many beggars and unemployed people. Everyone will use hard and vulgar language. No one will trust anyone else. People will be envious…the censorship of hypocritical and moralising puritans characterises the period of the end of the Kali Yuga. Wealth and harvests will decrease. Groups of bandits will organise in towns…many people will be treacherous…thieves will steal from thieves. People will become inactive, lethargic and purposeless. Unqualified people will pass as experts in matters of morals and religion.”

Then, from the Vishnu Purana,

“The richest will hold power. People without assets will be their slaves. State leaders will no longer protect people, but through taxes will appropriate all wealth. Through the fault of the public authorities many children will die. Men of little intelligence, influenced by absurd theories, will live under delusion. They will ask: what use are these gods, priests and holy books?”

Then returning to the Linga Purana, the story concludes

 “They will be hungry and sick and will know despair. It is then that some will start to ponder over fundamental values.”

So, what can be done?

I never take religious texts literally, but I have long thought that things will get a lot, lot worse before they get better. However – and this is important – I also think that all is not lost.

Broadly, there are three paths which might be walked during the Kali Yuga. You can go with it, fight against it or try to rise above it.

Going with it is easy. Just support the current thing. No matter what it is, you do not need to know the rights and wrongs, just align with whatever hysteria, moral panic, movement for change or trend is currently on the up. Just hop on board and reap all the benefits that come from standing with the masses. Though my tone might sound sarcastic this is an option if you want to have a reasonable life. It will not work of course, long term, because the current thing is not, as we are told, an improvement but a worsening, simply the next phase of the decline known as the Kali Yuga.

Fighting against it is also quite easy, though in the long run equally unproductive. Every trend must have its opponents, every movement its resistance. Short term gains may be possible by opposing the current thing, and if that is what you are called to do then you absolutely must respond to it for your individual Life Path must be honoured. But no-one can swim against the tide forever. Subtlety and smarts will be required, for direct action against the chaotic forces of the Kali Yuga will always, eventually, overwhelm you in some way.

I am interested in going neither with it, nor against it, because rising above it is a far better thing to do. I do not mean disconnecting from, or ignoring reality, or pretending that everything is fine when it is clearly not. I mean getting perspective and placing things in context. When railing against the system becomes your entire life then you risk becoming part of the problem that you were fighting. Back in the day the conflict between the USA and USSR seemed simple, but in truth both countries were two cheeks of the same backside. Now it is the political Left and Right which act as two faces of the same broken system. Rising above it all means that you stop seeking external rescues, and that you tune into the answers that are available to you internally, beyond the level of your thoughts and feelings. Rising above it is not for everyone, but it may be the answer for those who never felt that this world was their home in the first place.

But the Light is Bright

Here is something very important from the Shiva Purana

“The end of the Kali Yuga is a particularly favourable period to pursue true knowledge. Some will attain wisdom in a short time, for the merits acquired in one year during the Treta Yuga can be obtained in one day during the age of Kali.”  

All the many writings about the Kali Yuga say the same thing: that the seeds of the Golden Age to come are sown at the end of the Kali Yuga, the time we are in now.

In the Kali Yuga, degradation of our outside world is caused by an inner spoiling, a weakening of our soul over long periods of time. As a result, the only sensible course of action is to tackle the problem at its root – at the level of the soul. Of course, in the Kali Yuga most are bound to ask, “what is the soul anyway?” But despite mass apathy and ignorance a few will still be able to see that whilst our problems are often external, our solutions rarely are.

A Mindset Shift

The story of the Kali Yuga has many parallels with the Christian Book of Revelation, which foretells of a darkening which culminates in a final event before a glorious new era is inaugurated. Similar ideas can be found in Ancient Greek, Chinese and Norse literature.

Amid this darkening many people will not even be able to see that things are getting worse. Such folk are held back by their unquestioning faith in progress, that pain can be eradicated, death stopped and society perfected, by imperfect people just like them, who know next to nothing about the things that matters, their time thoroughly absorbed by things that do not.

All is not as it seems. People run around trying to make the world a ‘better place’ without understanding that inequality and injustice are, more often than not, the results of individual karma, not group oppression. Whenever we choose not to learn from our actions then we find ourselves, in this life or the next, in difficult situations that force us to reckon, not with external forces, but with ourselves. No amount of progressivism, inclusion or equity will remove the need for each individual to self-examine and atone for what they have done. The only progress that sticks is that which takes place deep in our soul, and the Kali Yuga, with all its insane drama is a perfect time for rapid soul development.

We are not here, in this life, on this planet, to master the forces of nature, or to build a ‘better world’ according to our own whims and desires. We are here to live in harmony with nature and act in accordance with higher guidance. We are not here to be limitless, but to respect the limitations of our human form. In these matters, as in many others, we have failed woefully. But this is not the fault of late-stage capitalism, technocracy, the population explosion or some shadowy cabal in Davos, for all these things are merely symptoms of the fact that we are in the twilight of the Kali Yuga, the time of conflict and degeneration.  

Species extinction, ecological collapse, climate change, crime, war, disease, government corruption and incompetence, political extremism, global influence peddling and shady supra-national organisations, the march of Artificial Intelligence, social justice hypocrisy, populism, nationalist politicians and woke madness are all symptoms of the Kali Yuga. Even little things like your boss being an arse and your train being late, again, can be manifestations of the Kali Yuga. Anything at all that you didn’t yourself have a direct hand in and which is happening to you, could be a result of the Kali Yuga and to say this is not to deny your agency but to help you to recognise the magnitude of the forces you are up against, and to smile in the face of them. This is the path of being above it.

By shifting our mindset our smile can become even bigger. See progress for what it always was, change that benefits some people and always, without exception, harms others. Watch while the Kali Yuga burns on and do your best not to be dragged into it. Hope exists, but it will not be found inside anything that is commonly known as progress. Modern mainstream culture, in the dusk of the Kali Yuga, is bi-polar, presenting humans as Gods, before five seconds later presenting those same humans as savages. Rise above this.

By keeping your distance from all aspects of mainstream culture and rejecting the trivia of everydayness you give your soul time and space to grow, and that is the place where you can draw real strength. The modern world is a disgrace, but this was true long before it started to collapse. All our systems of government and society are rotten to the core because the people who inhabit them have fallen so far from true spiritual values.  

In these times the wise person will free themselves from the trappings of the modern world, but most especially they will stop believing in the perfectibility of this world or in ongoing human progress. There is no such thing as progress, simply opposing interest groups vying for power. Once you exit the game the Golden Age will start to appear right before your eyes.

The Kali Yuga is the place inhabited by those who worship the material, who are pulled around, like puppets on strings by their out-of-control feelings and thoughts. The Golden Age is the place enjoyed by those who have re-orientated themselves to the timeless truths and sacred living demanded by their soul. This is a high-level goal that everyone, once they become sufficiently aware of it, can attain. Whether widespread adoption of spiritual practices can forestall the worst effects of the Kali Yuga for the world as a whole remains to be seen, but this much is certain, spiritual practices can definitely lessen its effects upon you.

“The desert encroaches. Woe to him whose desert is within!”  Friedrich Nietzsche

Just because our world has fallen and is set to fall further it does not mean that everything is hopeless. In fact, it now becomes more important than ever to discern and pursue your unique life purpose, not for what it will bring you materially, but for its spiritual benefits.

In the Kali Yuga we should expect much less from our fellow humans. The vast mass of people are asleep and will remain so. They do not know what is going on because the Kali Yuga has darkened their vision. To live for a short time without the intervention of an oppressive government might be considered a blessing, for under the Kali Yuga governments can only succeed as positive forces temporarily, before reverting to their true nature, as corrupt, repressive and unjust institutions. It is true that leaders can set the tone for the rest of society, but in the Kali Yuga all leaders, like their citizens, are drawn from the same poisoned well. Even the best of them can do nothing more than slow the inevitable decline.

Everything is collapsing because it is the Kali Yuga, so smile, because you certainly cannot stop it. But you can rise above it, and do the only thing that has ever brought lasting improvement – spiritual development, and by development I mean practice, not just knowledge. Your happiness is your own business, keep it that way. Do not make it dependent upon the illusion of progress. Use every crazy world event or absurd human encounter as an opportunity to review your fundamental values. Because there is no way out of this until the core assumptions that underpin our civilisation are renewed and updated.