In the week that I have not written, not knowing what to write first, that has been the primary question. While taking a break from writing and yet continuing to read something every day, I felt divided. Much of what I read seemed important to write about, but too horrifying or sad to write because where would hope be?
Sometimes, a lot of the time, there are only questions without answers. But I believe that if we don't face what's going on, own it, feel it in our hearts, grieve for the damage done by us and others; then we can't make a shift to move in a new direction with conviction that we can, and will, do better to steward this planet and the amazing life forms on it.
While taking time to be with friends and loved ones, this question kept coming up, and I felt a paralysis in my soul, so wrote nothing. A break from the trenches is good; we all need to recharge our batteries with what matters. For me, that is the people I love and the Natural world and creatures in it. But there comes a time to realize that a break can easily lead to avoidance.
Remembering why I started this blog (because I felt it was ONE thing I could do to counter the despair felt at what I've been witnessing), and wanting to balance the painful truths uncovered and discovered daily with something RIGHT that humans are doing in the world, I am finding it is harder to suss-out the stories that give hope, give strength. I want to give this blog link to friends and acquaintances, but hesitate, since many don't want to hear bad news or anything "negative." Being a canary in a collapsing coal mine sucks. I don't want to drive potential readers away with only the bad news; I need to try to write about what can be done, what is being done, to counter the bad news, which is grave on most counts.
All anyone can do is be true to oneself, and what we all do is going to look different. For some, it will be avoiding national and world news and doing what they can within their communities. Some will find ways to look deeply into the self with inquiry. There is no wrong way. But I do think the luxury of being asleep is forever gone, whether we want to face the outer facts of what's happening to the planet that sustains us, or not.
At this point, I firmly believe that, for me, sitting on my hands would be akin to colluding with the crimes perpetuated by mankind. Do I want to turn my face away? Every day; many times a day. And sometimes that is exactly what I have to do. But not for long. I would rather know the hard truths than go on in some false comfort zone of sleepwalking. The past is done. We can never go back and shut our eyes again once they are opened.
Such a major shift needs to come to our consciousness that often it seems absurd to hope that we will ever be able to shift from this acting-out of violence against life, so prevalent with our human species. In many cultures, violence is equivocated with "fun," "sport."I don't know how we can turn that around. So far, the civilizations that have succeeded in living close to the earth with the least amount of violence have been annihilated by other civilizations who would have power and are completely cut off from their hearts. But the nature of hope is to keep trying, keep loving, even when it seems most hopeless.
I am an American. I love my country, but I loathe our history record, which is one of megalomania and wanting only to win and dominate, at the expense and incomprehensible losses of many other peoples and most of life on the planet. The oligarchs and plutocrats have been at this game for as long as there have been homo sapiens. America is young, and for its entire history, there have been the ultra-rich powerful families; the bankers, the moneylenders, the land grabbers, who have tried and tried to gut this country and only now have succeeded in implementing the final part of the sinister plan, while we all go shopping some more and eat the food that big agri-biz has poisoned for us.
The spoiled, gimme-gimme consumerist phenomenon, beliefs of entitlement and not wanting to share a piece of the pie, were created partly by the oligarchs and partly by our willingness to choose the path of comfort over that path of awareness of what's going on in a greater sphere than our own little self-absorbed worlds. Where, and how, have each of us colluded with the destruction, both inner and outer of our supporting earth? What things (starting with the simplest) can be done to help counterbalance the destruction, rage, (appropriate but misplaced) and coldness that is epidemic, in the outside world events and within ourselves? I have to write from where I am, from the American culture I observe, from my own part in that culture. These are just a few of the questions that are with me daily.
In two weeks' reading of news stories and opinions from various media sources and bloggers, I don't know what to write first; it all seems so pressing. For now, I just want anyone out there to know I'm still here, and intend to keep going with wherever this leads.
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