You and I are on a journey. A journey requires a person, space or spaces, and duration of time. Except that the internet has diminished our need for two out of three of those requirements. We no longer feel the need of space and time. We can "be there" at a moment's notice. (And I'm not anti-internet. I appreciate the fact that you couldn't be reading this without all those little green guys endlessly running through tiny cables from my house to yours carrying cute little attaché cases of information. Which is how I assume the internet works.)
John Donahue writes that our digital age has, "marooned us on each instant. We have forfeited the practice of patience. The self has become anxious for what the next instant might bring. The single desire for the instant obliterates the journey."
You're battling the "single desire for the instant" right now. Attention spans, neurochemicals, and desires are careening and coursing in and through you with every word you read. You wonder subconsciously, or now that I'm bringing attention to it, consciously, is this really worth it? What's the payoff? Down deep somewhere, you know you won’t experience an endorphin-hit like you do when you watch that cat video, so why bother?
But Earth Day is a great excuse to slow down, to read something, to walk somewhere, to wrestle with thought and discernment: to be on the journey.
Real journeys take real time. Yes, clarity can emerge in a singular moment, but it's usually preceded by five years of unclarity. Five years might seem like a long time, but what do we care? We've got the time. Who's telling us that we don't have time? Ha, time is all we have. Five years is coming whether we are ready or not, so slow down, gather up the little tyrannical impatient desires trying to run your life, put your arms around them and tell them, "It's going to be okay." Then pat them on the backside as you gently encourage them to let go and walk away.
Receiving is so often, maybe always, symbiotic with letting go. Receiving and letting go are two sides of the same coin. And I, for one, do not know how to flip the coin without getting out of the house and into nature. There's not one healthy decision I've made that wasn't preceded by getting lost in the solitude of forest, or the rhythm of water, or the depth of mountain. And it appears I'm in good company. Whether Emerson, or Annie Dillard, or Howard Thurman, or Jesus, who often withdrew to lonely places and prayed, it seems many who have led lives of depth have had an appreciation for the outdoors.
Being in the wilderness is a type of going home for me. Home in the sense of my best childhood memories are of me hiking with my family in the mountains. But now I see it also as a type of home preceding childhood, preceding even my existence. Getting outside is type of clay returning to clay. It is where I come from. I am human from the humus. (Note: that's different than hummus. No, I do not come from a savory dip made from mashed chickpeas. Or do I?)
The soil represents the bookends of where I come from and where I am going. Its absoluteness is terrifying. I'm not ashamed to tell you I have grieved its limiting power. To grieve is to vocalize the recognition of being out of control. Genuinely contemplating being out of control is terrible. And heavy. But it is also beautiful. And freeing. The humility of the thought somehow gives me strength to let go of the way things were... and to receive the way things might one day become.
I stumbled across a quote from Ram Das a few weeks ago that I cannot shake. He said, "We're all just walking each other home." Irrespective of our religious backgrounds, his phrase evokes so much beauty. The beauty is as true as anything in the cosmos.
And irrespective of our religious backgrounds, nature could be the one to "walk us home." That is, within creation's solitude, loneliness, and limitation, it's possible we might find something or someone as elusive as God.
It's the 50th anniversary of Earth Day. There's no better time to be in nature. To "return to the clay." To ask the Earth's forgiveness for our impatience. To remember we're on a journey that requires space and time. There is no rush. This biosphere we live in was here long before we arrived and will be here long after we leave.
Tell the politicians. Tell the bankers. And for sure, somebody, please tell the preachers: Immediacy has been given too much power. Let's show our 3-year or 5-year plans to the Redwoods (or our 6-week plan to get the economy back up and running) and see how they react.
Let's allow the wilderness to walk us home.
Thank you Richard, well said.
May the earth heal a little as we are stilled.
Cat
Posted by: Catherine Anderson | April 22, 2020 at 01:24 PM