I have been digging the garden beds when I’ve had an hour or so, over the last week getting ready for spring. We are lucky that our home’s previous owner practically had a market garden out the back, with the soil enriched by years of generous composting. Cultivating the earth feels like fitting work for this time and season as the days slowly warm again. As I dig, I offer my respects to this land’s first people, the Wurrundjeri people of the Kulin Nation, their elders past, present and future - while also conjuring visions of this slope of land rolling down to the Merri Creek pre white settlement. And then honouring those that have cared for it since.
Using my grandmother’s old garden pick to dig, I cannot help but be reminded of my mum, my grandmother and my great grandmother who were all keen gardeners - both for pleasure and in some cases, their livelihoods. Sometimes sensing into the relentless hard-work that these women (and no doubt the many generations before them) have endured is overwhelming. Gosh the work of mothering, of caring, feeding and nurturing is intense! And this is not to deny the role of fathering - parenting itself is full on. Lockdown magnifies this for sure. Creates a strange fog.
Despite the inclusion of the rather beautiful romanticised vision of peasant life in the Breton painting The Weeders below, I hold no illusions - the daily toil just to put bread on the table would have been exhausting - and yet it seems something has indeed been lost given most of us are now essentially removed from working the land.
Jules Breton, The Weeders, 1868, oil on canvas, Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY.
Part of the blur of the last month or so has been compounded by our toddler being really sick over the past week with a high fever and vomiting - stressful! And for the week before that I was sick, and my partner was too. Not COVID-19 obv. but really debilitating and exhausting - such a timely reminder to not take our health for granted. It seems I have lost a month to all this - the flow and flux, the caring and being cared for. Stressful until I just went with it. This is how it is and then it too passes. Phew.
But to get back to gardening - all my ancestors lives, as far as I can tell were inextricably bound to nature’s cycles. I personally feel so grounded and nourished working in the garden - so grateful for the privilege of space/land (and that it is not a necessity - rather a pleasure - well for now at least)! How much have we lost in our ‘advanced economies’ by not being connected to these cycles and seasons of our earth? I suspect we are only just beginning to understand this - reconnecting to this knowledge feels necessary if we are to find a path out of our current global calamity.
Soul work
For me like my art or journaling, digging in the earth is soul work. Walking/ spending time in nature is soul work - if I allow it to be - by actively being present and in the quiet of the moment. It lifts me up. Even here in the city - within my 5km radius I am often surprised at the beauty and wonder nature has on show for all who care to see. What a gift. I do hold a deep ecocentric belief that we are intrinsically one and the same, of the earth, inextricably entwined with this more than human world. Many have cut themselves off from this awareness, this connection to nature not seeing it as necessary or desirable. Desiring to feel above it, beyond it, better than in any case.
What practices might you work with to nourish your soul or your heart’s longing? Where do you find beauty? What healing rhythms are you listening for? Might these be shared with others?
MUYAN, Silver Wattle or Acacia dealbata, is endemic to this area and starts to flower mid July. A sign of Early Spring and the days beginning to warm for the indigenous Wurrundjeri people. Such a lovely bright lift amidst darkish days and everywhere along the Merri creek near me.
As part of my experimental practice I have been working with holding to a sense of longer time and meditating on this a little - a century or three: the life of a large eucalyptus or an oak tree perhaps. Within this frame there are many seasons and many moons. Our human experience can be so intense that we experience cycles on an ever more frequent turn - weekly, even daily (hourly!) as we work to survive hectic schedules and intrusive media, work demands, changing conditions and family life. It seems that we need to sit with knowing that there are cycles within cycles and creating space in and around these.
Zooming out, at the collective level we are being asked to hold that the notion of repetitive rhythms/cycles/seasons are in one hand true, while we also acknowledge that there is a more linear change at play as well - as is the case with the climate crisis, a heating globe and the degradation of biodiversity through human extraction and pollution.
If you are paying attention you will know that we have overstepped the earth’s boundaries on multiple scales. If you missed the latest IPCC report which came out earlier this week (not to mention the eleventy million other memos from the past 20 years that were trying to prepare you) David Attenborough doco is a great overview of our current predicament. Our nation’s leader knows this stuff - or at least his advisors do - but still fails to willingly initiate meaningful action. We are quite literally in a hijack situation for the profiteering of the greedy few, but it doesn’t need to be like this.
In virtually all the commentary I have read re the this IPCC report and the responses called for - most are holding to the belief that a plan with technology solutions will save our world as we know it. Surely it is clear that what is being asked of humanity is nothing less than a wholesale transformation of life on earth? This is vastly more than something that can be solved with technological solutions. We need transformation at every level and we need an entire reimagining of how we live, plus a vision of this future in order to start making our way there.
Joanna Macy describes what we are witnessing globally in the overlay of the climate crisis, heat waves, wild fires, floods, pandemics and struggling democracies as part of The Great Unravelling. Systems don’t just collapse she suggests, “they fray, progressively losing their coherence, integrity, and memory.” This sounds true to what we are witnessing and it has been happening progressively over a very long time now. An alternative is to embrace active hope, and start seeking out/ making the steps towards a life sustaining society all part of what Macy terms the The Great Turning.
Drastic action is required at the personal, collective and global levels. This is possible.
Inner context - where do we orient from?
Feeling helpless is unsettling. Yet I hear and see it everywhere. Many are struggling. I feel steady - perhaps being sick for a while gave me some extra ballast?!
First do not fear. Remind yourself that you have many choices that are yours, and only yours to make. A simple choice (but not necessarily easy choice) is whether to act from a place of love, care for others and our more than human world or indeed to act from a place of fear and self absorption. Many will hang in the liminal space somewhere between the two, never committing either way. But you do have a choice. You will see others that might take a stand and then retreat to the in-between zone. You too may find you do this dance. It is not easy but it is a choice. I have also been experimenting with holding even my own inner fears within a larger concept of love and acceptance.
It strikes me that this underpinning context of our mind state is so important - yet often not readily apparent even to our own selves.Where are we coming from? What is our internal context in this moment? Am I coming from a place of love, of being enough or am I acting from a place of fear, of lack? Presencing, meditation, journaling and drawing/painting plus time in nature really help me to settle in and listen in to this larger/deeper aspect of Self. These are my practices. And of course all of these (meditation, introspection, quiet time) things can be challenging in a locked down state as we are here in Melbourne (#6) with a full house and limits on travel!
Navigate with care and fortitude
With the madness of our world now readily apparent, I do at the same time, see patches of new possibility like seeds emerging, twisting reaching for light. Sanctuaries - even islands - often not fully seen, certainly skipped over by the mainstream media. These are tendrils of future beauty and connection. I have been thinking about the Greek myth of Ariadne and how she helped Theseus out of the labyrinth with a trail of thread, so he could escape the minotaur. What/where are the threads that if we seek them out and follow, just might lead to a better world?
I keep rounding back and seeking these stories, these threads, different teachers, wanting to ensure the I am gathering these glimmering possibilities to weave into my own new work, way of being and the love I have for this world.
Pablo Picasso, Minotauromachy, 1936, etching, 49.8 x 69.3 cm, Museum of Modern Art
Co-imagining a new and more beautiful world
“All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once one grows up.”
Pablo Picasso
It truly seems that our Leader’s incapacity/unwillingness to both imagine/envision and communicate a better more beautiful world for all is causing great harm. How can it be that more of the same is in any way acceptable? And yet then you hear that the Billionaire’s in our midst are indeed crafting visions for future worlds (or at least their own) and rapidly taking steps to ensure they have secure and comfortable futures, off away in their luxury retreats, complete with underground bunkers - if not off in space entirely.
What can we do? As a start, I find Joanna Macy’s spiral model that underpins The Work the Reconnects incredibly powerful, deeply soothing and motivating and have begun to weave this into my own practice and facilitation. We go from being grateful for what we have, to acknowledging what is going on in the world, honouring our emotional response, our anger, grief and suffering and then up and out through imagining and co-creating a different more beautiful and sustainable world working with community. This is active hope. It is as a part of this process of both navigation and adjustment which also allows us sense into signs of emergence.
We know how to imagine a better world, or a different world and yet so few do or seem willing to try. Or maybe this capability has indeed been left behind due to trauma and the effects of our Industrial Growth Society? Indebted as we often are to individualism, consumer capitalism and instant gratification. This is the only way, we drone as increasingly desperate, we numbingly pursue more of the same - leading to greater extraction and degradation of all that nurtures us! Perhaps many dare not for fear of disappointment? Letting go of that which creates our sense of safety today can I know be terrifying, but this is wha we are being asked to do.
As a young child safely tucked in my bed, I would lie awake at night when my Mum headed out to yoga - for ages it seemed - keenly listening for the sound of her car changing gears as she headed up our hill. To help manage my fear that something might’ve happened to her, and that my siblings and I would be left alone - I would conjure up a world where it was ok: A world where we lived on a fabulous wooden sailing boat and I could take care of my older brother and younger sister. I imagined we were self sufficient with everything we needed to be happy and well on board - complete with chickens, vegetable garden, an orange tree and a tethered goat on the deck. This boat was a safe haven, a delight, sailing the calm seas in the sun. Perhaps I was 7 at the time.
It seems I’ve always had a deep desire to care for the collective - for my family but also my community and the larger collective - our broader more than human Earth community. Was it instilled by my parents I wonder or is it some deeper soul longing? I suspect it is the latter. I feel it in my heart and in my belly. No doubt it was amplified by my mum asking me to watch out for my little sister when we were playing outside. For me this is a deep longing to ensure that I am doing all I can to plant the seeds for a more beautiful world for our children, one where we are born knowing and never forget our connectedness. That we are all one, where we honour nature, Gaia our great mother and our more than human world.
I know my reflection above is a snippet of me (as a child) engaging in magical thinking as all children do - and today we certainly need to be mindful of the constraints of our present (and oncoming) reality. Magical thinking will not get us out of this mess, and yet our ability to imagine a more beautiful world is critical. Surely we can imagine a better way far beyond what we are seeing/hearing offered? To transform I believe we need knowledge and holding spaces that can provide nourishment for our minds AND our souls.
There is so much cynicism, propaganda and co-opting of language washing through mainstream channels - language that was intended to protect and lift up the marginalised and the powerless - all in the name of shielding current power holders. This can be confusing. How do we know the difference? We pay attention, we watch and always seek to find the inner truth of things. We feel our emotions of anger, grief and frustration at the ineptitude of our current leaders and focus on listening to our heart’s deepest longing. Then we step out and keep on going with active hope and a focus on building community and co-creating a vision of a better world.
My faith at this point no longer rests in the powers that be, and certainly not the market - lchange and transformation will emerge from connected communities, and the strongest of these will be grounded in a particular place.
Today, this is my work, my calling. I believe we can we can artfully weave these stories together, into a vast and intricate tapestry of possibility, co-imagining a future vision of a more beautiful, more than human world.
To get there I sense, like many others that we need to heal a great deal of suffering and trauma. I am reading Thomas Hubl at the moment and his work is really very promising in terms of transformative group work for moving through trauma - I plan to learn more so I too can work with these and similar methods. We need to collectively evolve on an inner level to get over our own individualistic ego driven narcissism. It seems that we have no scaled capacity to grieve for what we have lost, and what we will never have.
If you are feeling despondent, know that there are a small growing bunch of us keen to adapt evolve and create a new vision for the the future. We are passionate that we can weave imaginings of a new world, bringing together threads of worlds and cultures past and present with emerging strands of possibility. We must not shy from imaging a more beautiful and inclusive world for the sake of our children.
I heard a lovely notion from an anaesthetist turned holistic healer the other day who shared that in her mind each and every one of us has a unique medicine to offer the world. I love this. Consider this when you are out and about - that every person no matter age, stage or background, who passes by or who you come into contact with, and even those that don’t, has a unique offering for this world. I believe that this is true although many of us may pass without ever realising just what our gift is.
What might be your own unique medicine to share with the world and how might you share it with those that need it?
My intention is to create and hold spaces and hold where we can meet with compassion and connection, to imagine and act on sustainable futures, at an individual, organisational and community level for the sake of all in our earth community - providing an antidote to the fear and separation that is incited by many.
Tell me, what is it you plan to do.
With your one wild and precious life? ~ Mary Oliver
***
And I thought I would include this. I wrote it before the above - but it feels better to finish with it now.
Chaos and discontent
Misplaced freedoms fought for mistakenly
no sense of choice and consequence
attention diverted from pressing issues
double speak and hollowness amplified
power beyond reproach, menacing in greed.
No care for our Earth community, our children’s future.
Where is the heart of it, the centre, the unity?
Hidden, pushed aside, covered up for fear that it will be found
the grand deception will crumble if exposed
we are not meant to see/to hear
quiet, numbed/fooled passive observers.
Be not afraid dear ones. Wake up.
Feel the beat of human connection.
The light of compassion.
Be not afraid.
**
With a heavy yet open heart, much love.
x Becca
12 August 2021