Common sense

Nominate yourself to do something. Create a positive position of action, no matter how small, for someone outside of you/yours. One day I nominated myself to be the birdbath tender at the Quaker meetinghouse. I mean, what a great title, for starters. I cannot wait to list this on my resume.

To get more involved in one thing, we might have to get less involved with another thing. 

David Whyte, the poet, asked us during a zoom seminar, “what would you have to stop doing?” (to get from here to there) “What conversation do you need to stop having?” 

This is different from the more common questions like what should we do or talk about? It’s a great flip to try.

“In order to get there, I need to be better,” is something we hear a lot. Whyte pointed this limiting statement out by saying, we get caught in “getting ready to get ready.” 

What can you stop doing? To have the time and space to do what is needed now? What can you lift out to replace with better material? 

Soul and personality are alongside each other but have different agendas. What I am learning is the soul has some big goals and our personality might get nervous around them. They seem too big and unwieldy.  

Today I made OM sounds with strangers on zoom. Though my mic was muted, I felt the power of the sound the universe makes, “OM.” Close to OMG, but different. The leader of this morning’s LovingKindness meditation (https://www.facebook.com/events/920188981806233/) led us in stretches and breath to sift out the negative and replenish the positive. She said that any of us could have skipped this today, or done something else… but we all chose to be here, doing this together. We chose an alternate way and interrupted automatic patterns.

Yesterday on the river I saw a dark speeding flash just beneath my paddle board. It was large and brownish, and to my eyes, a hairy hurtling swirling big foot in the water, moving at warp speed downward, maybe a time traveler. It appeared and disappeared at the same time. I almost jumped, but had to keep my feet on the board. 

We might see the broader goals for one second and that might be enough for one day.

I live near a bumblebee lair. I found out from a sting in my left ear. It’s deep in the grass by the blueberries. I went back to observe the bumblebee lair from a distance, carefully stealing my own blueberries, like the squirrels reaching high on their back feet and the jays that hop up, pick a berry, then jump on the birdbath to wash before eating.

Just then a neighbor pulled over, rolled his window down to say hi and ask, “are you doing ok?” I said yes. He said, “I think we’ll be ok, but it’s scary and we need common sense.” I agreed. 

I was reading about the best ratio of compost the other day and this does fit the theme because compost needs about 1/3 green (nitrogen) and 2/3 carbon (brown). Cosmically, all this stuff needs to rotate around each other and blend to make up a healthy galaxy. Or better yet, galaxies. Diversity creates and supports life. 

In other words, consider talking to someone you meet on a walking path, or initiating a short friendly exchange with the server/checker/postal carrier/you get the idea. We are stardust, compost. We enrich our lives with more blending. Obviously for now, using safe protocols. This is possible! 

Nominate yourself to make things better. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.