Are we all awake yet? Are we awake yet for the planet, for democracy, for kindness, respect and love? It is not too late but it very nearly is. If not for you, for your children, grandchildren, for this planet and all sentient beings. Awaken, vote progressive, know who is funding each candidate. Know how they will vote for the individual over corporations, for the masses over the elite, for the planet over profit. Vote in November. Demand the opposition to the current tyranny tell you who is funding them. Hold them to the fire to make the right choices. Are there politicians free from corruption? Likely they are few, find them. Support them. Turn off the mass media that is all funded by corporations that will benefit from the status quo.
Do your own soul work, the necessary healing of the heart so that we can feel whole and connected again and not be ruled by fear. We are all on different paths but what has helped me in this work:
Soul work:
Return to Mother Nature! Spend time with her again, listen and practice being present with her.
Reclaim your birthright, be fully human, fully embodied
Practice being present in life, feeling with the heart over overthinking with the mind.
Dance
Practice yoga
Drumming
Chanting, Singing
Gift yourself the time to be creative again, play music again, paint again…
Restrict television and screen time
Check out depth psychologist Bill Plotkin and the Animas Valley Institute, consider a Quest with them, it was transformational for me.
Animas.org
Meditation:
What helped me most was to get away for a 10 day introduction Vipassana retreat. They are free and all over the world.
Develop a daily practice, even just a few minutes a day to start.
dhamma.org
Contemplative Prayer:
Thomas Keating, Centering Prayer at contemplativeoutreach.org
Richard Rohr at cac.org
Men’s Work & Right of Passage:
Illuman.org
Poetry of
Rumi, Hafiz, Rilke, Mary Oliver and David Whyte
Recommended books on diet and the planet:
https://drkyle.com/recommended-read/
Being whole is the goal. Read what Bill Plotkin’s words on wholing vs healing:
A New Paradigm for Human Development
Lunar Knowledge [Collage]. Doug Van Houten
We must be whole, we must find a community of support, we can not do this on our own. We must return to love. We must awaken. Awakened souls will not allow fascism, racism, sexism, animal cruelty and environmental degradation. Will rise above xenophobia, homophobia, white nationalism, the hypocrisy and false teachings of the religious right. It can be a dark, mysterious and frightening journey but we must go deep to heal, we must connect to our hearts, our souls, to community. We must feel with our hearts again.
“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.” — Rumi
“Love one another” – Jesus
And for the Christian mob out there, Jesus meant all humans, not just Americans, not just white Americans, not just people like you that share your beliefs. Remember his teachings, his commandment to love and follow his way not merely worship him and live a life contrary to his teachings. That is called the great hypocrisy which is our cultural toxic norm today, where we can hide in the club of Christianity, go through the motions, and never be transformed. We can hide behind the flag. And it is this precise culture of hypocrisy, of materialism, rapid distraction, superficial, back of the brain living combined with poverty and scarcity politics, wounding and trauma without the space, the infrastructure for healing and transformation that provides the growth medium for fascism. Here is the litmus test for those who attend a church. If you leave there being more afraid of other humans, afraid of those of other faiths, foreigners, you should run away and never go back. They are not teaching the gospel. They are teaching fear, to keep you in the mob, to line their pockets or fill their insecurities.
Do not allow our government to take away a woman’s right to her body. Do not allow our government to start another war in Iran. Do not allow them to strip our rights, our social security, our medicare. Do not let them open up more lands for drilling, fracking, and hunting of endangered species. Do not allow them to continue to gut public education. Do not allow them to continue to cut taxes for the elite and continue social welfare programs for wealthy corporations. Do not allow them to murder our children, our brothers and sisters, poor children throughout this world that are between them and corporate profits. Who could argue that our military is now mainly a global corporate police force, fighting to secure oil and other economic interests for corporations who have bought our politicians. This is nothing new, ask Bernie Sanders.
This is the light and the dark, the love and the justified and appropriate anger. The learned fear and hatred. Do not be afraid of the dark, awaken to it, love will always win but we must love actively, feel it with your body, we must show up, we must non-violently fight for our shared ideals of fairness, equality. Some of us have forgotten how to love, it is not our fault, effects of trauma that are not properly supported by the community, tended to by the individual, are suppressed, stuffed away deep inside, we lose our ability to feel our hearts as we once did as a child. We learn how to hate, how to fear those that are different, and it is stoked by many white men and some white women in positions of power with our president at the beasts head to further divide us.
May we return to love
(Read Marianne Williamson’s book of that title!)
We can not define health without the variables of community, fair government with equal access to health care and global ecology. May our choices for our individual health be in alignment with our community, our ecology. The science is overwhelming that if we choose to eat whole foods, mostly plants we will be our healthiest individually, collectively in community and environmentally. Read more on the science of a plant based diet and climate change below:
The urgency is now for great change. Our total whole health (human, animal, planet) demands it. May we choose politicians who work for the people, for education, safety, and fairness. That work and prioritize our health in mind and body, inseparable from our shared home, this planet earth.
I PRAY for the necessary healing and transformation of hearts to return to our birthright of fully embodied, loving human beings, living in symbiotic harmony with all of creation and in balance with our mother, planet Earth. May we also WORK for this every day with every person, every moment. May we present, listen and be kind to all those that cross our paths.