Everything is true somewhere, at some time, for someone – not because the content is ‘real’ or ‘accurate’ but because perception makes it so.
Now prone to being awake and ready to start my day anytime after 4:00 am, I am also prone to thinking in sound bytes rather than complete sentences. Even within myself, I am noticing that I explore my own thoughts in some kind of code. Seemingly incomplete thoughts, yet the whole picture presents. Few words yet complex perceptions. Staccato rather than flowing prose. I find myself in a place where I am often listening to a podcast, reading an article and watching a video, all at the same time… and can track for content. Like the rest of the world, I am speeding up. It would seem that when I trust my own inner cues, movement is effortless.
I live in a strange world.
A world where f*#k is acceptable but fuck is not. Really???? Who do we think we’re kidding!!!! Is this not one of the most powerful metaphors for the hypocrisy we’re willing to embrace?
A world where we (the frogs) have now been in the warming water long enough to begin to notice: Uh oh…. something’s not right. And yet, we find ourselves paralyzed in our efforts to leap out of the roiling, boiling mess we’ve allowed ourselves to create.
A world where it’s ok/acceptable/appropriate to look away from the ravages of violence and brutality perpetrated by the few against the many (i.e. women, children, animals… those unable to defend and protect themselves) but it is not ok/acceptable/appropriate to consider the evidence of our very own eyes/ears/senses/experiences and stare into the face of increasingly extreme weather events that are wreaking havoc around the world.
The last 30 years of my life have been devoted to the pursuit of… the discovery of… what makes it possible for us to recognize and move beyond our limitations, at all levels of body/mind. What it means, on a daily basis, for us to own that we are spiritual beings having a human experience and not human beings desperately seeking a spiritual experience. The only good thing that welcoming and embracing the impending devastation of climate change (whatever its cause) is that we now, in its most extreme form, have the opportunity to choose and live from what it CAN be, to be a spiritual being having a human experience…. of increasing devastation, advancing termination and eventual extinction.
In many ways, it is a momentous and privileged time. To be present for and bear witness to the end-game unfolding is not something that most will ever know. But we will. And we’re here for it because we know how to move through it. How we hold it will determine how we live it.
Our greatest challenge will be to not lose ourselves to fear. To the kind of deep, visceral, belly-twisting, body-engulfing, mind-numbing fear that presses for us to forget any higher order expression of who we are and why we’re here. The kind of fear that calls to us to abandon the greater truth we carry of who and what we are, and lose ourselves… surrender ourselves… to the most perverse, dense and gritty demands of matter, that it might perpetuate itself. That can be true – and it need not be.
My adult, professional life has been devoted to the exploration and expression of that which people did not want to know; did not want to face, accept, name, claim and take ownership of. In that sense, not much has changed as I recognize the degree to which so many do not want to know… do not want to face, accept, name, claim and take ownership of a world in rapid decline. In the past, we could pretend; we could dismiss, ignore or blow off many of the constraints or concerns about so many things. However now, the very biosphere that supports our existence is collapsing…. and that is the ultimate game changer. As Guy McPherson has long been sharing: without supportive and sustainable habitat, we cannot exist.
It never occurs to me that truth – whatever form it takes and whatever topic it pursues – is unacceptable. If I am not claiming the truth of my experience, then what I am claiming is an untruth. A lie. Like declaring our commitment to see yet unwilling to open our eyes. No future in that. The only way to make a difference that can take root and expand itself into a sustainable reality is to own the truth I carry. Seems easy enough….
My interest in explaining anything, wanes. Whatever line of enquiry I or another has awakened to, there are vast fields of information accessible: to read, to listen to, to watch. At this time in my life, I no longer hold myself called to influence the mind of another. Given the deeply intimate and personal nature of truth, we are each accountable – in all ways – for the truth we choose to embrace. It is what it is.
My truth leads me to choose as follows:
* Consider it all! The good, the bad and the ugly. The conventional and the outrageous. The socially compliant and the rebellious. The scientific, the esoteric and the deep intuitive. I trust that my body will know what to keep and what to eliminate from that which is digested and metabolized to become part of my being; from that which is expelled as not relevant to my evolution. But to deny myself the possibility of any of it is to perpetrate upon myself the greatest of all wounds: to demean my ability to discern intelligently for myself.
* Reduce consumption of all matters of stuff in my life. Do I really need 12 pair of shoes? Do I really need three shower curtains, two toasters and a closet full of clothes that I know I will never wear again? As I weed out what is no longer meaningful or relevant to my life NOW, my appetite to consume diminishes accordingly. Small is better… and less, better still.
* Create frequent pauses in my day. It could be as simple as a long, slow and deep inhalation and exhalation; as provocative as pausing to capture my own inner agitations; or as deliciously complex as an afternoon nap…. or a walk through the park…. or a conversation with someone I love. Whatever it’s content, its authenticity will be the truth that guides my day.
* When faced with any situation/opportunity/event, choose RIG… respect, integrity and generosity of spirit; first, for mySelf and then, for another. Choose kindness; patience; acceptance. Choose contribution. Choose laughter! And when I can’t find it within myself to do that? Choose solitude… being in my own good company… in quiet and stillness. I long ago hung up my halo and accepted that through the core of my being runs a deep, wide and tumultuous flow of the Fire that transforms. In this time, what I recognize is that I am The One who will most greatly benefit from the power of my own Fire, transforming. I leave you to your own, for yours.
On so many levels, we’re fucked (oops.. so sorry…. f*#ked). Somewhere along the long line of the history of our existence, we lost our Selves to an external truth… an external cue/power/force/other… that led us to slumber long and deep. Perhaps what is now required is the collapse of the very thing that we believe sustains our existence for us to be able to shake off the coma of looking outside our Selves, to be able to return to that powerful core inside our Selves, and choose. Choose mindfully. Choose meaningfully. Choose powerfully. Then, let go… and trust.
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