Sending love and care to all my dear friends in Australia…
Our hearts ache with you amidst these awful bushfires!! And the smoke! The lost lives, human and non-human, the lost homes, the charred wild lands.
Wildfire is natural and ancient, but the climate is chaotic and violent now, changing the land, perhaps beyond our recognition. Some places will become uninhabitable. Our house is on fire, and yet we can’t seem to make intelligent collective decisions. We elect leaders who cop out, deny, collude, defer. And the problem intensifies. So we join you in grief and rage. Yes, the dark emotions demand to be felt.
No “spiritual bypass.” This is horrifying, hellacious, deeply humbling… I haven’t felt able to reach out to you, my friends down under, about this until now, because it’s so obvious that words fail… So I begin by acknowledging the dark realities that are pressing upon you.
Here in Northern California we are subject to similar threats. In the last few years, many friends have lost everything. I myself lost a cabin and choked on heavy smoke for days and days and days.
But then the rain came. And new green shoots appeared. Green life returned, and so did the animals. The land was changed perhaps forever, but life is resurgent and vibrant.
People all over the world care, and hurt with you, and are holding you and sending love and money. You are not alone. And sometimes we are each very alone. Both.
Many of us are taking stock of what is happening to our world. We will prepare and we will adapt, perhaps deeply, to sobering dark expectations. And yet we will choose life and joy. We will find a deep “yes” to our lives, now in 2020, and beyond. We will step up, participate and we will change this world. We will try and succeed and fail and learn and try again. We will each make unique choices. No path will be perfect. Every path will be perfect. And we will forge deeper more meaningful friendships and alliances.
May we let this searing experience help us find our way into deeper contact with reality, and therefore into deeper contact with ourselves and with one another.
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