I hope you will take a nice long walk just to look, really look, at the trees that inhabit the community where you live.
“But the most astonishing thing about trees is how social they are. The trees in a forest care for each other, sometimes even going so far as to nourish the stump of a felled tree for centuries after it was cut down by feeding it sugars and other nutrients, and so keeping it alive. Only some stumps are thus nourished. Perhaps they are the parents of the trees that make up the forest of today. A tree’s most important means of staying connected to other trees is a “wood wide web” of soil fungi that connects vegetation in an intimate network that allows the sharing of an enormous amount of information and goods. Scientific research aimed at understanding the astonishing abilities of this partnership between fungi and plant has only just begun.
The reason trees share food and communicate is that they need each other. It takes a forest to create a microclimate suitable for tree growth and sustenance. So it’s not surprising that isolated trees have far shorter lives than those living connected together in forests. Perhaps the saddest plants of all are those we have enslaved in our agricultural systems. They seem to have lost the ability to communicate, and, as Wohlleben says, are thus rendered deaf and dumb. “Perhaps farmers can learn from the forests and breed a little more wildness back into their grain and potatoes,” he advocates, “so that they’ll be more talkative in the future.” Opening”
― Peter Wohlleben, The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate—Discoveries from A Secret World
Women, you may take up as much space in the world as you require.
Of course with the right to take up space, we also carry the responsibility to be mindful and make space for others, especially when they might otherwise not have had the same historical invitation.
But, we do not have to shrink or apologize when the space we take up is uncomfortable for those who have historically, and to this day, never had to concern themselves with how much space they take up.
In today’s social and political climate, it seems quite easy to talk about what we are against. When we clearly see wrongs in the world, we point them out and (hopefully) hold accountable those who perpetuate harmful paradigms.
So too in our personal lives it is good and right to know and articulate what we will not allow in our lives – that from the outside that seeks to diminish our sacred worth or that from our internal dialogue that undermines our work to realize our ideal self.
But if we get stuck in only creating boundaries against what we are against, then it becomes harder to flourish in what we are for.
Fr. Richard Rohr in a reflection for the Center for Action and Contemplations, says:
“Everyone gets tired of critique after a while. We cannot build on exclusively negative or critical energy. We can only build on life and what we are for, not what we are against. Negativity keeps us in a state of victimhood and/or a state of anger. Mere critique and analysis are not salvation; they are not liberation, nor are they spacious. They are not wonderful at all. We only become enlightened as the ego dies to its pretenses, and we begin to be led by soul and Spirit.” – Richard Rohr
What do you think about this quote?
It can be harder to talk about what we are for because that asks us to be active participants in change for the better. Once we can clearly identify state what we want for ourselves, our family, our community and our world, we are called to be the very change agents we need.
How are you making manifest what you are for? How might you be the change you are seeking?
“We but mirror the world. All the tendencies present in the outer world are to be found in the world of our body. If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him. This is the divine mystery supreme. A wonderful thing it is and the source of our happiness. We need not wait to see what others do.” – Mahatma Gandhi
At this writing, I am 165 days into my year-long social media sabbatical and I still get responses that sound a lot like – WOW or That’s Intense or You Are So Brave! or That’s Amazing! – all of which seem to be significant reasons to maybe give up social media for good, don’t ya think? Stepping away from the stream or madness shouldn’t be arduous and is certainly not an act of courage.
Are you sick and tired of being sick and tired of the vitriol and your own addiction to either watching the dumpster fire or participation in planning the flames? Maybe you’ve considered going on a digital detox? Good idea! But, what will you do with all of that extra time?
Here’s a random list of 25 things to do instead of scrolling and trolling…
Make and keep a junk journal made just for this occasion
Use DuoLingo to practice a new language when the urge to go go gadget gets me
Learn the names of plants, trees and birds that you see on your daily routes
