And The Oscar Goes To…
I was watching the Oscars the other day, and it got me thinking…Isn’t it the epitome of Western civilization’s dreams to be Brad Pitt or Angelina Jolie - beautiful, rich and famous Hollywood actors?
I guess being Kate Winslete or Natalie Portman would also do for me and what about Meryl Streep with her fifteen Oscar nominations?
Craving took me hostage. Why am I not a rich and famous actress? I could look really good on the red carpet, with everyone flashing the camera at me and talking about what I chose to wear. 
This is such a strong temptation for my western ego-
mind that for a few moments I am really, deeply hungry to be there myself.
Hollywood Attraction
And then I stop and reflect. What is it really that attracts us to Hollywood fame? Is it that knowingness that we have succeeded, that we are admired, that we have everything we could want, that everyone envies us.
I don’t feel comfortable with jealousy, I never have, but what good would being a celebrity be if there weren’t people around to know you? To be a celebrity means you have been acknowledged for being somehow above the rest for something.
These days I suppose you don’t have to have any outstanding qualities to do so, and yet it is still in some way interpreted that way in our mind. If you are a celebrity, you are special.
Why do we need to be celebrities to know that we are special? Why do we need everyone else to think we are special and look up to us in order to feel that we have succeeded? What is so lacking within us that we need that?
But there is a good side to stardom. The most obvious thing that comes to my mind is that one could use stardom to be a good influence on people.
Utopia
Let’s imagine for a moment a world where, not only that stardom is not accepted when a person has nothing to offer but their looks and show-business skills, but that each person feels that they are uniquely created and therefore equally necessary in the evolution and prosperity of the world.
In such a society, no one is better than the other, no one is elevated above others. Rather it is those who need to be in the public eye in order to support the public, who take this role, and those who wish to inspire others to do good (this good can also be entertainment).
Even then, it does not look like Hollywood, but more like a team sport, because everyone is visibly dependent and connected to each other. In this scenario, people are respected for their ambition to assist the whole in creating a better humanity.
People find their individual fulfilment in achieving their roles as healers and helpers to the world. In this scenario people don’t need to be famous to know their worth, they know that they are loved and that without them nothing would work or be possible. People actually compete (if at all) at being the most altruistic, kind and giving!
I wonder what the Oscars would look like in this society.
But, who am I kidding? What enjoyment would there be in such a society?
It would take a miraculous transformation for our enjoyment to actually come from harmonious sharing and altruistic expression.
Because I don’t mean that we would give because we think we should. I mean that it would actually make us
happy! Happier than anything we knew before…happier than being the most beautiful Hollywood actress receiving an Oscar, and wearing a designer dress.
True Happiness
I believe there IS more than Hollywood out there to make us happy. I believe Hollywood stardom happiness is but a faint, insubstantial, inconsistent, fleeting pleasure in comparison with what is really in store for us at the culmination of our
spiritual evolutions.
For there, at the top of our human potential we are united with bliss, with
love that is beyond words and descriptions, and certainly beyond comparison or measurements of our world.
Even the Oscar committee, the Academy or whatever, could not give such a prize, such a gift.
And to be worthy of such acknowledgment and honor, all we have to do is believe, and ask, and search for the answers to our heart’s questions and desires.
All we have to do is trust that we are already the most loved star in the universe. And from this understanding we will have embarked on the role of our life, being exactly who we are meant to be. Congratulations!