Stability

Thursday 19 June 2008

This four days a week at a boring job thing is alright when you stay in the moment, when you tether yourself to here. To now.

Which is a terribly difficult thing to do in our culture. Everywhere I look are people living in a way which seems almost designed to send us whirling into space. I've been reading the latest issue of Adbusters. Got two copies free for writing something on their website, which was kinda a pretty cool deal. Reading about how they say that in 20 years' time, mental illness will be the number one cause of death in our society. They were surmising that much of the reason for that will be that our societies have removed themselves from the natural world to such a ridiculous extent.

It's no secret that I love trees and nature. I don't understand people who don't immerse themselves regularly in it. We need it. We need the earth. We need to sink our hands in it, or our bare feet. We think we can do without the earth like we think we can do without God, but really we can do without neither. Planting my feet on the earth grounds me literally. I think the past few years have forced me to this position. I'm so grateful. I have fallen in love even deeper with the earth.

It's a painful thing having your eyes opened (ever so slowly) to the reality of things. It is God's inexorable push, to draw us towards the light of reality. He knows anything else is polluted air for us. The air of Christendom is so dirty. Removed from her grounded earthroots, how could it not be so? It shows in her fruit and in her endorsement of wars and governments that rape the poorest of the poor in the name of economic and social models.

My health has stabilised. It's Winter, and at least once a week I am feeling the tug of my immune system downwards as it sets itself up to fight off cold or flu marauders. Every day, I drink lemon juice and sink into the yellow as I'm squeezing it by hand. Every day I drink olive leaf extract and two cups of neem tea. Those three things have contributed to being in this heady place where the colds and flus are held at bay. You don't truly appreciate your immune system until it's been a stuff-up for years on end. You don't truly appreciate having glands that work properly until you've gone through extended periods where they're standing up like painful golfballs on the side of your neck.

Man, my heart softens for people who are stuck in the hell of ill health. Because this society is sick itself it has no heart for those who are struggling physically with illness (we get suckered into thinking our Western societies aren't so bad, but the evidence is all around, in the very air, in that country over there, that we are living in every way that is unsustainable. We can't see it because the very system itself blinds us and we wish to be kept blinded because we don't want to give up our stuff).

Papa knows how our stuff has almost suffocated us. I don't think s/he needs to preach about it. God doesn't need to stick it into a PowerPoint presentation for us to get it. Seems to be much more interested in showing us, in our own bodies, and minds, and hearts, and souls, through interaction with other people, with the earth, with touch, taste, smell and sight, so that the things we learn are the things we experience. You can't experience anything in a book.

This post is a ramble. But sometimes you get that.

Tonight I hope to begin writing about my dear couch Keanu :)

8 comments

  1. I think Jesus gave sight to all those blind people in order to remind us that all the help we need is given to us, if only we open our eyes and see it.
    Loved your sculpture, by the way!

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  2. Sue, I just finished writing this in my latest blog post...we must have been thinking about the same thing?

    "The air con has been turned off and the windows are open. I don't like it when we have to close the house up due to the heat/humidity. I want to be as connected to the outdoors as I possibly can be. I just love all the sounds and the cool breeze."

    A ramble it might have been but again I said something very similar.

    "And how this blog post about the early summer garden took that turn I am unsure, but there it is, and since the temps have cooled down today I can't blame it on being disoriented from the heat and humidity. It must just be my wandering mind?" :)

    Your thoughts about the crazy insane way humanity attempts to live is certainly maddening for those caught up in it. I say...let the unplugging continue. This resonated with me Sue.

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  3. Hey Barbara. Yeah, damn right. How easy it is to forget that, huh? And thanks, I love Howard too :)

    Kent. Oh, there's something nice and meandering about a wandering mind, especially when it's tuned into nature :)

    Yep. The unplugging. It's not scary, you know? It's scarier looking back than looking forward.

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  4. I felt yukky this morning after waking at 7:30 AM, and so Maggie (my 3yr. old) and I had breakfast outside (she mostly, me serving and cleaning). Being outside is so very grounding. Just looking at the sky and plants and the green grass. It's all alive, so open and spacious. It fuels me, as much as fellowship does.... I can't live without either. LOVED this post and your thoughts about the state of things. I feel the exact same way, really.

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  5. mr x and i are having some really tough challenges at the moment, health, work, finances
    but tonight as we drove onto our property and a dozen kangaroos stood there and watched as we made our way down the driveway, we both looked at each other and said, "this is worth it"
    if we were livng in a little burbs box we wouldn't still be here, but the connection with nature we have here helps keep us somewhat grounded

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  6. Manuela - lovely, I hope you got something for yourself for breakfast ... eating outside, how luvverly :)

    Kel - oh, mate, that is inspiring. Yep, it sounds worth it, definitely.

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  7. you speak the truth! Im sick of being caught up in the "You need this to be happy" world...and our endless chase after the dangling carrot...today I went to a park with Campbell and he lay down on the grass next to a duck, just to watch it waddle and peck and make cool noises, he lay there for ages, and I envied his ability to be in the moment, right there, with the duck, and the grass and the wind blowing in his hair. It made me lie down and do the same! We must have looked odd, but I didnt care ;) In another patch of the park there were quite repectable elderly ladies wielding huge silver swords and doing what looked like tai chi! most inspiring :)
    In other news, haha I cant believe you have Jacko on radio Susie, poor you!!
    Oh and I thought your lovely clay sculpture was Harold? have you changed it to Howard? :)

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  8. Oh, that sounds so lovely, Andi. Let's make sure we're those elderly women doing tai chi in the park when we're elderly in a few years' time :)Or chanting, in saffron robes :)

    Oh,and yes - it was Harold! Sorry Harold!

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