During the last week of January, 2005, the movie "Indigo" was
the 17th highest grossing film in America. A "home-grown," low-budget
flick, it is part of a new movement throughout our country for Spiritual
Cinema, movies that extol and up-lift the human spirit in positive,
transformative ways. There have been others, like "The Notebook," but
this is the first from the collaborative effort of James Twyman,
Neale Donald Walsch, and Stephen Simon – all luminaries in
the publishing field and entertainment industry.
I enjoyed the film. Many did not, complaining about the poor acting
and trite script, and the over-blown self-promotion of Twyman/Walsch/Simon
in a lengthy clip that preceded the movie. True. But what the complainers
miss is the message that underlays the film: that children today
are different; their desire for peace and reconciliation worth listening
to. This message, in a world gripped by terrorists and war, drug
lords, and earth changes of biblical proportions, strikes at the
heart of each person and each family.
Where I fault the film is the sensationalization of the label "Indigo." The
new children have been variously described as Indigos (because of
the supposed color of their auras), Star Kids (because of their purported
origination from other worlds), Crystal Children (because some say
they are highly developed), and so forth – none of these claims
hold up as stated with research, whether via scientific observation
or by studying mystical/esoteric traditions or through summarizing
visionary revelations. The label "Indigo," plus the others,
are now subject to serious challenge.
Professionals in the field of child development and education, parents,
even the kids themselves, are having problems with the idea that
certain character traits are the province of so-called "Indigos," when,
in fact, the majority of today's children match those traits – without
evidencing anything like a purple aura, or being a hybrid from another
planet, or possessing "god-like" wisdom.
Children born since around 1982 really are different, like no
other generation of record. If the movie "Indigo" makes
this point and no other, it has done the world a favor and hopefully
will
help to engender an overall transformation in how we regard and teach
children. Surely it will inspire a forum whereby the children themselves
can speak and be heard. . . for our youngest citizens truly have
something important to say that is worth hearing.
Already, though, I'm seeing the opposite, the "bandwagon" approach
to sales and marketing. Books extolling what respected mystics and
psychics once had to say about "Indigos," when nothing
of that sort was ever uttered; music just for Indigos; Indigo camps,
schools, literature, classes, toys, websites, business logos. The
hype is already deafening and it's just started. Far too many people,
most of them well-meaning, are exploiting the very children we seek
to celebrate. Claims that have been proven false are now accepted
as gospel by an adoring public un-willing to question or verify.
The affect this has on children is unfortunate.
We can learn something here from psychologists: there are so many
learning disorders present today in the younger population that
professionals no longer use labels to describe them – the various
disorders are simply called "quirks" and the youngsters
who have them, "quirky kids." I suggest that we call those
born since 1982, the "new" children. That's generic enough,
and it covers the territory without going to extremes or creating
exclusive "clubs" of specialness.
In my research of near-death experiencers than spans over 26 years,
I've discovered that the new children are a lot like any child
who has had a near-death experience. We can take a clue from this – refer
to The New Children and Near-Death Experiences (Inner Traditions,
Rochester, VT 2003). Other excellent books about the new children
are: The Biology of Transcendence, Joseph Chilton Pearce (Park
Street Press, Rochester, VT 2002); The Secret Spiritual World of
Children,
Tobin Hart, Ph.D. (Inner Ocean Publishing, Makawao, HI 2003); and
Upside-Down Brilliance, Linda Kreger Silverman (Deleon Publishing,
Denver, CO 2002). My study of these children in relation to our
changing world and the tradition of prophecy comes out September
28, 2005, (Inner
Traditions) entitled Beyond the Indigo Children: The New Children
and the Coming of The Fifth World.
