As of this post, the media has been salivating over the polls that indicate that Americans neither want Joe Biden or Donald Trump to be President. Also that democrats are freaking out over Uncle Joe being too old, or not doing enough. They believe that too many Americans would rather have racist, sexist, multiple timed indicted, now convicted, wanna be fascist Uncle Trump driving the car instead of good Ole’ Uncle Joe. Why are we here in America and also the world, why is there a need for a Donald J. Trump? I would argue it is because most Trump supporters don’t see themselves in the multi ethnic, open armed world that Uncle Joe seems to be a proponent for. That shipped sailed when Barack Obama became president, and they want a world where they are deferred too simply because of their race and gender. They being white American males, well mostly. For so many generations the American White Male was always at the center of the American narrative. Of course the American ideal wasn’t the American reality, it was a dream. If you seem to be at the center of the universe because of your race or gender you probably don’t want to wake up from said dream. In other words you don’t want to be woke.

The choice now is about America’s pending reality who is a sleep, who controls the dream, and yes again who is woke. Martin Luther King Jr. Once stated that “America is essentially a dream.” So we have to ask ourselves if Martin Luther King Jr. were a live today would he woke now or was he woke then. The implication of the American dream is that everyone who is or becomes an American can participate in said dream. And as “enlightened” as the American forefather’s were they could not have envisioned this America, however maybe the constitution they wrote, did. It is a living document and documents don’t sleep, they are always woke.

I am Taoist and Zen enthusiast, I am also African-American and I have heard the word woke in both of these circles and they mean two entirely different things but I may try to tie them together, in not too tight of a knot. Before “woke,” became some republican dog whistle, it was used in the African-American community as a phrase of encouragement and caution. “Stay woke,” meant to be aware of the world your are in as well as to be aware of how you, meaning we African-Americans got here, and where we still must go. “Woke-ness,” was awareness.

In Buddhism, Zen Buddhism in particular to be woke means having the awareness that this is all an illusion or a dream. That this reality you see is a construct of your mind and to be awakened/woke is to experience what is behind the veil of illusion, or in this case the dream. I find myself in a very strange place personally dealing psychologically with the two. However for the purpose of this post I will mostly deal with the aspect of political “woke-ness,” and the need for authoritarian leaning white men, again mostly, feeling the need to tell Americans how to think and what about half of the population should do with their bodies. Scared racist men who want to delegate the “dream,” to us based upon their fears of the future and their loss of control. When one pushes towards a reality there is a certain challenge, also a relative hypocrisy that we have to contend with. Do we portend the goal of the American dream is to push it as close to a democratic reality or do we acknowledge the reality for what it and is not? Do we look at America wide awake for what she was and what she promises to be?

So I guess the obvious question is, what is America supposed to be according to the dream, or the constitution? Let’s take some slices of this American pie. “We hold these truths to be self evident that all men are created equal.” What a wonderful way to start a dream, but obviously in the “reality,” of this dream there were a lot of people left out. These words were written for the dreams of privileged white men, who stole land that didn’t belong to them, enslaved people to do the work they wouldn’t, men who raped women, their “own,” and so many others for their “base,” needs and dehumanizing derelictions. No, the founding father’s could not see or dream this America. And many of us grew up in different America’s and now even though digital boundaries are falling some of us want to hold on to those boundaries of the past metaphorically and literally. Some want to define the other and scapegoat the different, for the simple fact that what was the majority may become a minority and some don’t want that to happen. They essentially don’t want to lose power and or influence. Some of the best ways to do that are, one to deny a past and two to socially engineer a population. Realistically neither one can be done completely. That doesn’t mean that those in positions of power won’t stop trying, and if that means that there is spiritual, physical, or collateral damage in the process so be it.

We are watching two things unfold at the same time, the denial of a history by one group of people because they don’t want their kids to feel uncomfortable about America’s past. Then on the other side of the world a people collectively punished by a group of people who are occupying their land based upon a book. And those same book banners in America are accepting the blood shed on one side of the world again based upon a book. These are strange times indeed, but no stranger than any other time. How do we know they’re not stranger we recorded history and one of the ways to record history, is to write books about history? That is all for another post, forgive me I digressed a little bit.

Essentially I believe to be woke isn’t a choice, in our lives or in our lifetimes, more often than not we are forced to be pulled out of our stupor and to see the world for what it is. Yes, some of us will deny history and deny the present, we will try to manipulate the reality of others in order to maintain the perception of ourselves. For some it is a lifelong pursuit, they have made their names and their lively hood off doing so. They have known that so many want to stay asleep in the America, that they want the wool pulled over their eyes. No to be woke in America is not a choice, it was something that was thrusted upon the aboriginal in America, it was something that enslaved the African, and it will be something that will leave us all without a democracy if we don’t, well, wake up. To be cognizant of our history is to lay a path for the future. To be cognizant of the past means to alleviate suffering, to protect the planet, to liberate our collective consciousness. To look at what we’ve done and not do it again. To be woke is not a choice because we must all come to the understanding that it is better to be woke and know that we are interdependent that to be asleep and codependent.