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As easy as it is to see when someone else has fallen for the quick fix, the magic pill, it is much harder to catch ourselves while we are under the seductive spell of the quick fix: This might really be Mr. or Ms. Right, the diet that will really work, the answer to financial worries, the age reversing elixir. A few years ago I heard a talk by Stephen Hoeller, a great Gnostic scholar, who was talking about the tendency in our society to give divine power to every new idol. Speaking in his heavy Hungarian accent he said: “And every time a new pill of vitamins comes along it is greeted as if it is a god.” This is such a classic tendency among people hungry for meaning and transformation — the search for that golden idol that will provide all the answers, fix all their problems and take them out of their lives of quiet desperation. Our culture sometimes seems like a giant buffet of such idols and quick fixes — fundamentalist religions, diet schemes, the perfect hottie, the ultimate super-food, the New Age magic secret to get whatever you want, the shiny new gadget, the makeover, the get-rich-quick scheme, the lottery ticket, the chance to make it big, the Hollywood talent scout lurking around the next corner, that perfect life just up ahead. Some will spend whole lifetimes bedazzled before the buffet of idols. Even as they suffer the disenchantment with one idol, they are busy reaching for the next one.
One of the key things the quick fix does is suck power, aliveness, and presence out of today. As you anxiously await the quick fix to deliver on its false promises, you are sadly deprived of what life is offering you right now. Consider the occurrence of this card a challenge to locate the quick fixes you still find seductive and reclaim the power and aliveness they hold captive. Sacrifice a quick fix and rediscover the unfixable beauty and complexity of life. Embracing the unfixed life means you aren’t anxiously trying to yank out the dark threads woven into the tapestry. Embracing the unfixed power of what life is offering you right now reveals your hidden metamorphosis.
For more thoughts on this theme see:
Imagine Getting More
