If there’s one thing I’ve learned from all the bally-hoo’d recent astrological drama – mind you, “the stars impel, they don’t compel” as someone once said – it’s that there’s no more room for senseless anger. “Senseless” in the meaning of, say, that free-floating rage I can get on the freeway, as if every driver out there is looking to piss me off personally. Or of unconsciously picking up media messages saying that I’m “less than” if I don’t use their product. Or incorporating the Calvinist notion that if I’m not busy-busy-busy, I must be slacking, and slacking of any sort means I’m lazy, and lazy equates to bad or evil. Or how about this: getting caught up in “us” versus “them”, and how can “those” thoughts/beliefs/people be so ignorant, willfully rude, or lack such common sense?

Can’t you feel your shoulders starting to tighten just thinking about these things?

I’ve known intellectually, for quite awhile,  that this sort of anger is senseless, it doesn’t serve me, it’s a waste of energy. Still, it wasn’t until recently that I really started to “get it”. It IS a waste of time. Really. There’s been two recent comments (on the non-stop cocktail party that is Facebook) by Pema Chödrön which have summed up these recent lessons:

“And I quote this so much, this Poem of Rick Fields, where he said:

Behind the hardness there is fear
And if you touch the heart of the fear
You find sadness (it sort of gets more and more tender)
And if you touch the sadness
You find the vast blue sky”

and

“The path of liberation depends on not taking everything so personally.”

Truly. One would think I’d have been smacked around by the Magic Mirror of seeing myself doing the same damn things that others do/say/think – which were annoying of course – enough times that the message should have sunk in many years ago. I once whined to Deity “Why must these lessons be so hard?” “The lessons are so hard because you have such a thick skull!” was the reply. So there you go.

What others say, think or do usually has very little to do with me, personally. Many are running away from their own hurts and dramas, and projecting them outward. And all that anger? Usually hiding my own grief or fear. Of course, a realization does not a sea change make, and I’ll be working with these knee-jerk reactions for awhile yet. Not being so hooked into that anger, however, will be priceless.

[photo © Michael Jastremski for openphoto.net CC:Attribution-ShareAlike]

The beginning of any new journey starts right where you are. So I shouldn’t have been surprised when I got the message: “tend your own garden”. My garden? It’s a royal mess. I’d tell myself that the overgrown weeds help shade and cool the vegetables, fruit trees and flowers. The weeds do have a place, mind you, but not crowding out the growth of the food and medicine that helps sustain our house. I’d also been lax in keeping up with the pruning, pest management, and consistent watering.

It’s message of self-discipline and centering. It’s also a message of practicality. Be aware of your surroundings. Take care of yourself and what sustains you. Make your space – internal or external – a place where you don’t flinch or turn away from what you see. From there, you have a stable foundation in which to do your work in the world.

One good spray of organically-approved spinosad, a few weeds pulled here and there, and the formerly scraggly tomato plants are now growing like, well, weeds. They’re soaking up the hot Texas sun, and putting out amazing fruit. So little effort, so much reward.

Local Juvenile Green Herons

I recently received a “suggestion” from the Powers That Be (and/or brain chemical transmission) that I begin a major spiritual undertaking. It’s been intimated that I’ll be one of many doing this work, and may or may not see any fruits from this effort in this lifetime. The work will be of assisting those who want to do earth-healing work, and helping people develop a healthier relationship with this planet. And a bit of healing for us humans as well.

Sounds high-falutin’, I know. Truly, regardless of what we do or don’t do, the earth will far outlast us, even if we poison it beyond human sustainability. It would simply mean the end of us humans – the rest of life either perishing or adapting, but life would go on. With that said, there’s an assumption in this “suggested” work that we humans might have something to offer this planet. Some may find that assumption debatable. That’s okay, as I often question that there’s even a Powers That Be, and if so, that these Powers would have the faintest interest in us individual humans. Regardless, these Powers/brain chemicals have been nudging me here and there all my life. These nudgings/communications have never suggested or brought about situations that would be harmful to myself or others, so what the hell. I’m game. Let’s go for it.

“[Deity], for those willing to receive / grant us the vision, the courage, the will and the means / to heal ourselves / help heal each other / heal all that abides on this planet / and heal the planet itself.”

This is a prayer I’ve been saying – with slight variations over time – for probably around a year now. I suppose I’m seeing some of the fruits of this prayer in the aforementioned “suggestion” from the Powers That Be. Anyhow, I’ll be posting more about this journey as the days and weeks (years?) unfold. Feel free to join in, if you feel so moved.

Lost all my previous blog pages. Hope I made a backup somewhere.