The Healing Path

Healing is mandatory if one wants to live a good, productive life in the vein of fulfilling one's potential; to be potent, after all, is to be filled with something effective, isn't it? The concept of healing, in our society, has been dominated by western science and those in positions of power. Personal experience and accumulated knowledge (through the process of discerning information) has led to me to a very basic, intuitive path. But one that requires discipline, rigorous honesty, and reflection in the face of more humanistic, holistic values.

I've come to accept that it's very natural and indeed an innate capacity to want to heal ourselves, to become whole, into our natural state. A natural capacity and automatic survival system also exists within us to deny our experience if it is deemed as being too overwhleming. Make no mistake about it, denial is very effective to the capacity that it serves as self preservation, however, it's not our natural state, to live in fear. Healing and denial are co-authors in this thing called life, each serving a purpose, but ultimately our natural state is to be whole, healthy, and happy.

It seems then, with this understanding, that our society structurally and foundationally lacks elements of a whole, healthy, and happy people. A sick organism at best, is what we currently have. The status quo has it that healing is for sick people, I would agree with this conception, but, I would include the organism in it's entirety. We really can't separate one from the other, can we? We are all people at the end of the day. Tiny, essential fragments in this entire existance of one. While healing has been mandatory, it certainly hasn't been guided by spirit in dominant, meanstream culture. In fact, traditional ways of knowing and healing have been relegated to the margins of society having been demonized by the church and imperial powers and thusly legally sanctioned.

Pathology is a big business in our society, being labelled as inferior in terms of emotional fitness to this society. To this society? I mean, can it really be the barometer of good health and emotional fitness? Our society is so... sick. People are being symptomatic of the systematic. Granted, there are some who can adjust better than others. People with humanistic principles and who value integrity have a particularly difficult time adjusting, and without proper supports and a holistic understanding and ideology in which to secure oneself, it is quite easy to slip through the cracks of a flawed, fractured system. Deeper into the confines of a society that doesn't care about you. It only cares about your market value. How sick is that? And how anxiety provoking?

Breaching adulthood with a less than enriching childhood (which is all to common a story) left with little to fend for myself and encouraged by the status quo to go out there, into the big, wide world, grab life by the horns and pay my taxes. Once I understood just how flawed our society was, I knew I couldn't endure the pretention, and from there, I knew I would have a difficult time adjusting. I just didn't want to play the game that I saw the majority of my peers and the dominant majority in society playing. I simply questioned things and challenged the existing status quo. Healing has been mandatory to accurately reflect this lived experience.

This healing journey hasn't come without its share of hard knocks and feelings of intense loneliness and brokenness, but, as I put the pieces of my life together and create meaning from my experience, a new story emerges, a story co-authored with the universe, moving in harmony and complete synchronicity, if I let it. In the words of Jane Rubietta, "Anger is natural. Grief is appropriate. Healing is mandatory. Restoration is possible." Here's to restoration and all the possibility that brings.

The Stolen Child by William Butler Yeats

Where dips the rocky highland
Of Sleuth Wood in the lake,
There lies a leafy island
Where flapping herons wake
The drowsy water-rats;
There we've hid our faery vats,
Full of berries
And of reddest stolen cherries.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.

Where the wave of moonlight glosses
The dim grey sands with light,
Far off by furthest Rosses
We foot it all the night,
Weaving olden dances,
Mingling hands and mingling glances
Till the moon has taken flight;
To and fro we leap
And chase the frothy bubbles,
While the world is full of troubles
And is anxious in its sleep.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.

Where the wandering water gushes
From the hills above Glen-Car,.
In pools among the rushes
That scarce could bathe a star,
We seek for slumbering trout
And whispering in their ears
Give them unquiet dreams;
Leaning softly out
From ferns that drop their tears
Over the young streams.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.

Away with us he's going,
The solemn-eyed:
He'll hear no more the lowing
Of the calves on the warm hillside
Or the kettle on the hob
Sing peace into his breast,
Or see the brown mice bob
Round and round the oatmeal-chest.
For he comes, the human child,
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
From a world more full of weeping than he can understand.

Love in Action

As I begin my journey with yet another group of people in another aspect of my life, I am reminded of just how vulnerable we are as people in society in general, to wanting other people to think we are a somebody. This somebody influenced by the people around you. We want to be seen in a good light, approved of, as a part of. The alternative being death. As social animals we need eachother but not in the way we think we do, not in the way we largely should. The resulting persona stuffed with insecurities based on the faulty premise that we are not enough as we are, as we are inately made, inately born to abide in love.

I find it interesting that there are two aspects to how we refer to ourselves, have you ever noticed that? You know, those moments where we say something about ourselves? Who is that self? There are two selves that we are aware of, that we have distinct impressions of. These aspects of ourselves compete for eachother's attention, and for other peoples attention. Our authentic self hovers every so presently beneath our public persona. A persona we are forced to wear by the spoken and unspoken standards and values of this society. The implicit and explicit rules, essentially. And I know you know what I mean.

How many times have you met someone in your life and walked away with the distinct impression of a bad feeling, our direct experience based on a very intuitive reading that resonates on the principle of truth abiding. Abiding in truth brings with it the reward of having a good barometer and the added boon of being authentic. It is available at any moment, in any interaction where you are not feeling respected in your dialogue. The natural impulse to be ourselves is always there, always in spirit. The carving out of the niche of being ourselves begins with a very authentic first step, and this can disrupt our lives as we lose balance with who we have been for so long, who we think, and have been told we should be, and (we think) we are. Fear of rejection, setting the precendent of dominant group-think behaviours, over guided, responsible, independent, principled behaviour. And what we have is a dominant society of fearful people pleasers; where leadership is severely lacking.

We have a society fundamentally, foundationally, and functionally based on the make you/break you concepts of acceptance or rejection, looking to external influence more often than not, and finding ourselves acting in familiar, fearful behaviour. The behaviour we told ourselves we had put an end to; or conversly, behaviour we are trying to prove ourselves right in. Either way, we are left feeling insecure, afraid we are not enough as we are, essentially, we are afraid of love.

True leadership requires independent, principled behaviour based on the values of love with the option of an evolving, authentic, life changing existence. Conversely, being a people pleaser, one never gets to fulfill their actual potential, one only gets to fulfill the expectations of others. It validates them, not you. To be a true leader takes courage, the courage to change. To be courageous requires evolving and taking the initiative to teach people how to treat you (validating your authentic self) as opposed to the people pleasing behaviour of fulfilling others expectations (validating their persona). In the words of Shakespeare, "God has given you one face, and you make yourself another." I would have to agree with Shakespear's essential point, however I would add to this the very real context of our social conditioning, forsaking our true selves to be accepted.  Be a leader, be independent; god is love, love is god, be yourself. We need you.

The best Gift is Presence?

Being fearful seems to be a normal state of being in this society, whether people are generally conscious of this or not, I don't know. I'm inclined to say, I don't think so. Bodies contorted and minds congealed, nerve wracked people waiting for the potential next turn of phrase, vehicle horn, emergency siren, demands from a boss. These are just a few examples. Discussion on my periphery seems to consist largely of symptoms of being disgruntled, overworked, overstressed, and generally anywhere but in the moment. I like to say that people are being symptomatic of the systematic.

I walk along and think that people are missing the point of their lives. But I don't blame people purely out of ignorance or lack of awareness (which I have found many new age spiritual dogmas to teach), I think that hegemonic forces are largely responsible for the general malaise and expression of frustration I hear in the discussion being presented by people relegated mainly to the working classes, and the poor. Though the rich too have their qualms, of course. The topic of these classes I mention mainly centering around money, and what has been done by it, what needs to be done by it, and who gets what, where, when, and how. How monotonous, boring, exhausting, and in the last analysis, all important.

The majority seem to be planning for the future just to get past the present, well, you know, being in the present just seems to bring more of it. And for many, being in the present is a very painful, real, burdensome place. I have to wonder at the cost of not being in the present, in our bodies; and the actual consequences to our overall sense of wellness and experience of wholeness as beings with purpose in our lives. The latter being a privileged thought and possibility for the more free agents in the world.

My point being that I think the experience of being disembodied as a coping mechanism can bring with it temporary relief, inspired by automatic survival instincts, but the purpose likely is not intended to bring with it, long term satisfaction, nor the experience of being home in one's body. I wonder how the physical body, with all its ability (some more than others obviously) could create, unencumbered by poverty and social stratifications as a result of this hegemony. It's been said that, "Today is a gift. That's why it is called the present."(Alice Morse Earle) I think I'm going to go dance.

A 'Yes!' Poem by Emily Dickinson

I'm ceded, I've stopped being theirs;
The name they dropped upon my face
With water, in the country church,
Is finished using now,
And they can put it with my dolls,
My childhood, and the string of spools
I've finished threading too.

Baptized before without the choice,
But this time consciously, of grace
Unto supremest name,
Called to my full the crescent dropped,
Existence's whole arc filled up
With one small diadem.

My second rank, too small the first,
Crowned, crowing on my father's breast,
A half unconscious queen;
But this time, adequate, erect,
With will to choose or to reject,
And I choose-just a throne.

Social Masks and the Status Quo

Social masks are worn by members of society for the purpose of fitting into an assigned or designated role. The masks worn are various to count, though there are similar themes and patterns. Masks are informed by status, role(s), and social norms and values. These roles are designed and designated to maintain the status quo.

The very definition of a mask is that of covering one’s true identity. The average citizen is concealed under layers of daily masks that are worn as a form of social convention. It is this interacting of masks that knits the social fabric and also encourages internal and external oppression and subjugation as fundamental tenets to the effective maintenance of the economic system and class society.

This economic system and classist society assumes mask wearing not unlike theatre. As Shakespeare so aptly put, “All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players.” After the final curtain call, what standard is one measured by? According to who’s definition? In essence, stripped of classism and economic circumstances, who are you?

On Being Female

Growing up I realized the significance of being female early on, the distinctions were clear. The predilections of behavior socially imposed. My natural inclination being to challenge these impositions. I leant towards what I wanted to do and what I was good at. These things crossed stereotypes and gender roles of what it was to be a girl, or a boy; I enjoyed getting my hands dirty, scraping my knees, running fast along side the boys, arm wrestling at noon, and staying outside discovering. Being labeled a tomboy early on in relation to my aptitudes and general disinterest in girl conditioning, was a term I didn't fully identify with. I quote Keirkegaard in saying that, "Once you label me, you negate me",  as having a full experience of myself brought varying interests and aptitudes, across gender lines.

My experience of boys growing up was, for the most part (besides the macho posturing) favorable. Granted, being personable made my social acceptance among my male peers easy and their companionship mutually enjoyable. Boys were more direct and laid back. On the other hand, girls, generally speaking, I found to be more fickle and changeable, less predictable. My acceptance based on whims and insecurities, rather than facts and experiential realities.

Through the process of accumulated experience, education, and integration I've developed more of an understanding, compassion, and desire to make right the influence and impressions of gender roles. Men and women are not in their right place in society, as evidenced by the subjugation of women and the illegitimate power of men, ascribed by the processes of Patriarchy. With the sexes not in their right power, the imbalance teeters precariously to our current forecast of potential extinction.

My contention necessitates authentic dialogue exploring cognitive dissonance, challenging the status quo, dismantling illegitimate power structures in one's life, as both men and women. Taking the initiative in one's life to value integrity over superficiality, as by embracing authentic power by definition, men and women can work to be rid of the insecurities that flimsy gender constructs afford us, suggesting a niche to build a future the children can live in.

A Reflection

I have just finished reading Art Spiegelman's Maus. In short, it is a biographical graphic novel depicting his father's account of events and lived experience of Hitler's Europe, and the author's own personal journey coming to terms with his father and history. It is harrowing and impactful. It is to be the second novel read in my household this week on Hitler's Europe; the other book being, Night by Elie Wiesel. I read Night several years ago, and both are highly recommended as essential reading.

I reflect on several years ago while attending class during my Social Work degree at University being shown a film that included personal testimonies of survivors of the holocaust; describing in vivid detail, their personal experience. I will never forget this video, because of the impact it had on me; and still does, to this day.

At one point there is a woman describing her experience and stating with such dignity and strength of soul that, though the Nazi's took everything they had from her (including her family), they could not and did not take away her spirit, her soul. It was in the context of this juxtoposition that the profundity of this lived experience penetrated inside my own soul. And what happened next was a soulful cry that began with a gentle shedding of tears that slid past my cheeks and next, the outpouring. I excused myself and had a moment to abide in my experience. Upon return to the classroom and during the debriefing, what came out of me was the fact that I had been affected by the strength and dignity of this woman who had lost everything and had lived to tell about it, soul intact.

Today, upon completion of this remarkable work, I sat, affected. The research as documented by wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Holocaust) states that it is estimated that 6 million Jewish people died under the Third Reich; there were an estimated 9 million Jews residing in Europe prior to the war. Furthermore, scholars estimate the number of deceased to be anywhere between 11-17 million; these numbers would account for and include: The Romani, people with disabilites, soviet prisoners of war, Polish and Soviet citizens, Jehovah's witnesses, homosexuals, and other religious and political opponents. 

Words can't capture this silent meditation, and perhaps rightly so. However, from a felt experience to a cognitive construct I will say this; it is a study in the systematic dissemination of propoganda and illegitimate power. It invites us to be affected.

Bridging the Divide

As stated by Meret Oppenheim, "Freedom is not something you are given - but something you have to take." In this vein, I concur. What most citizens of our society are given are rights issued by decree which are manufactured and reproduced to maintain the status quo of a classist society and pertain to specific class, social, ethnic and cultural groups.

My observations and direct experience in society is of an ongoing struggle and fight for rights specific to these groups. This keeps groups and individuals separated, creating barriers to the effective mobilization of forces; preventing effective utility of force by, for, and with the people (ie. those who are effectively marginalized, controlled, and discriminated against with the rights bestowed to them by the overwhelmingly corrupt power structures that are government and corporate institutions). Ultimately, these rights are distributed by those outside forces to keep the masses divided.

Advocacy in its many forms address these power relations. Social justice advocacy addresses existing unequal power relations, in social, economic, and political environments and seeks to change them through direct action. 

I think if real and perceived barriers between social groups and political factions can be trancended into a more comprehensive whole, then sheer force is made available through organized potency and thusly, social and political change. Facilitating advocacy with and for eachother as co-authors scribing with inherent sovereignty as the guiding principle.

In illustration, in the words of Robert Fulghum; "When you go out into the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands, and stick together." It's a simple image of a profound concept, when laid upon the current political climate. It's what I learned in kindergarten.

Shark Water?

I have just finished watching 'Sharkwater' for the second time. And I am left with the same feeling and experience of sobering insights and awareness I was left with the first time. It is striking to me that we live in a world that is so deadly in present day. With systems of corruption being found and explored by brave individuals and pockets of mobilized people and organizations in every facet of society.

In this particular film, the exploration and uncovering of a multi-billion dollar industry, that being shark fishing, and the subsequent slicing off of the fins they carry. These fins are then sold for on average $200usd/per pound (namely in particular, Asian countries), presented as a symbol of wealth, and longevity, though allegedly there is no documented evidence of these fins having the healing power they are said to possess.

Upon watching the video, I am struck as sharks are caught using longlines, and then the fin is shaved off of them, and they are kicked and shoved back into the water, to accumulate at the bottom of the sea where they are left for dead and eaten by other fish.

Sharks, eaten by other fish. The top predatory animal. A beautiful animal that has been inhabiting the earth far, far longer than the human race. Sharks have been here for over 450 million years. And they have managed to survive. However, over the last 10 years, with the increase of illegal shark finning, they are dying by the millions in a multi-billion dollar industry. Sickening.

It strikes me that the average person here in the west is seemingly scared of sharks, not surprisingly after watching the myth-making video Jaws, and absorbing, uncritically, sensationalized mass media. This uncritical view often shared as a fact, when, in fact, it is an uneducated opinion. After watching Jaws as a child, I too, was scared of sharks. Sharks eat people was the general conclusion, and not at all based on empirical evidence. Just some dramatic effects and an idea.

An open mind, awareness of media and pop culture indoctrination led me to watching this film to learn more accurately the facts of this beautiful, majestic animal. This animal that is being hunted and destroyed driven by superficial values, economic greed, and economic slavery. It costs little to hunt and kill these animals, compared to the exorbitant profit.

The thing is. This is not something separate that is happening in the natural world with no effect on human beings. As the sharks go, fish (sharks prey) increase and consume plankton in larger quantities. Plankton release oxygen into the air. The very air human beings need to survive life on this planet.

But, you see, I think I shouldn't have to highlight that fact. And use it as a "selling" pitch to cajole attention to enlisting concerned, impassioned humans. The value of "other" species has been so far removed from mainstream consciousness that it has become "someone else's" problem. Well, from what I gather, this massacre illustrates not only how sharks are valued, but also how human beings are valued, as commodities and purchasing potential.

If there ever was a time to get to know our fellow inhabitants, meaning our fellow species (yes, even the sharks), it would be now. We truly are interconnected, and a fragile and formidable whole at our best. And if you want absolute proof, just breathe.