Krista, I have so much respect for you, but I have to disagree with you this time.
For some of us, for me at least, I actually think my my work right now IS to know and carefully share what is happening in (and to) my country. And because of the intentional barrage of chaos and intimidation of the press, knowing what is happening takes real work right now.
If I believe that vast damage is being done and people are being harmed, knowing less does not make me more virtuous. Knowing less might make me calmer, and calm is good. But what I am trying to do is find ways to stay calm while staying informed, engaged, creative, and vocal.
I know this route is not for everyone, but for me, digesting the news and carefully crafting civil posts geared towards anyone who might “have ears to hear,” calling my representatives daily, and considering other actions – while taking intentional breaks for rest, people, and play – this is where I am at.
Michelle...you expressed my feelings very well. This crisis we are in is more than trying to comfort ourselves. It is about working to attenuate the harm that is coming to others. It is about working to attenuate the harm being done to our democracy. If we are too frail to execute such actions, all hope is lost. Nothing is going to come along and guarantee success. There is no way of knowing if it is too late. We must go forward on the assumption that the dark forces can be quelled. To do so, we must nourish the courage of our own stability. If we do so, it will help to nourish the courage of others, such as Gov. Pritzker. Love is reciprocal and as reliable and predictable as gravity. We can do all of this.
Yes, for me, it is learning to hold in tension both action and contemplation, engagement-disengagement. I engage during my work week, and then I pull back over the weekend so I can rest, recover, and recharge.
I believe we have so many who don’t believe we are all connected. Love is the key to holding forth against those who want to push hatred in many forms . Being aware is very important and doing so with calm minds and hearts is key. May we find the grace and strength to stand firm but in the ways of Gandhi and Martin Luther King.
I know we are all connected and I know "love" is the key to holding forth against those who push hatred, BUT there is a healthy place for anger. So many are so very very very polite--isn't that nice. Another truth is "caring is love in action". MLK and Gandhi were angry from time to time, rightly so. We need to get angry, grow some courage and take action. If we can't do it for our polite little selves, then we have to do it for our grandchildren and other life on this planet.
Anger is a sign of 'fear' activated, and points a finger to needs that must be recognized and attended to. It's necessary to have courage and skills: Perhaps to admit or accept (or even welcome) the anger, then Be with it, understand what's needed, and act, accordingly. Blessings to us all
And anger can point to what we love, be a response to that which is threatened. We can honor that information and channel that energy wisely in constructive ways.
Thank you. Many people need our attention and our awareness of what is taking place right now. We need to be people who help write these chapters and do our best to put our bodies down to prevent disasters.
This doesn't read to me as an actual disagreement. Muting a constant feed of news is not the same thing as not engaging with the news at all. One can step away from the fire hose and still get a drink.
To each their own as is appropriate. We are all needed in the struggle. I for one have to be careful to balance things lest I become useless in brokenness.
I'm with you Michelle.We need to be strong and not react. We also need to do what we can and remind people we are not victims of this barrage of negativity. I would say, take the time you need for self-healing but stay aware. Stay vigilant and look for opportunities to take action.
I am so with you! Things are really bad and asking me to “see the light” in this mess is as absurd as having asked prisoners in Auschwitz to do so. Uprooting and deporting people induces real suffering. People are losing jobs and their livelihoods and with their deported workers farmers are panicking. Our focus should be on doing everything we can to get even the people we don’t know to vote in the midterms, take back the House and Senate, and impeach that sorry state of a human the very next day….
"Awareness" which is an aspect of "the Light" enables us to act in an empowered way, with the least harm to ourselves or others, and with the maximum benefit. Some will 'act' more inwardly, being Space Holders, others are the warriors in the streets. Some of us will try to straddle those spheres.
ALOHA MICHELLE: ..... hope i find you well .... i so agree with you; we have an existentially threatening POTUS and thus we are at a precipice toward survival. Yes, we have had prior challenges; this is as humongous as we have ever faced. As you, I love Christa; this one though may be fine for some, it is equally dangerous for many. Ignorance is not bliss; knowledge is power. Keep breathing and do not shut out what is currently happening.
Absolutely. We must see each other’s humanity and seek to rebuild a system (in our own countries and globally) that will respect and cherish that humanity. Disengaging is not the way. Appreciating what we lose under this kind of authoritarian approach to “governing” tells us what we need to protect. Well said Michelle.
I am comforted by this, and also inspired by the following from the Talmud: “Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world’s grief. Do justly, now. Have mercy, now. Walk humbly, now. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it.” Peace to all in this hard time.
For anyone looking for tips on how to stay aware of what is unfolding in the US/world without living in a state of constant panic and despair, I am re-reading Active Hope, by Joana Macy, and some of her ideas for fully connecting with the pain of the world while maintaining (and even enhancing) your vital energy, gratitude, and joy are invaluable.
I understand the impulse to permanently check out from "the news" in the name of self-care, and I have taken breaks too, but when people with privilege who are not under immediate threat refuse to even bear witness to the attacks against vulnerable populations, they are cooperating with the abusers and authoritarians in power. And ultimately it is not a form of genuine self-preservation. This is a "first they came for..." moment.
The phrase in this newsletter "distant levels of power" is very telling. The power being exerted right now is not "distant" to many people. It's not distant to me, as a trans person, and I have already had specific rights taken away from me (not to mention a much more toxified and bigoted cultural climate).
The approach this newsletter is trying to rationalize is quite dangerous. This form of disengagement from people who can currently disengage is an ingredient that the fascists are relying on. Don't give it to them, for everyone's sake, including your own.
Something truly destructive is stampeding through the halls right now. Averting your gaze and not speaking up is refusing to rise to a moment that needs you, and it is helping to install a world that will be worse for you and for everyone. This is a time to accept that it is OK to feel deeply distressed and uncomfortable. And to take those feelings and transform them into resistance against the forces of hatred and destruction in power. That's how to find meaning in this. Not by turning into an ostrich in the name of self-care and trying to package that denial with some spiritual-sounding stuff. We have to be awake and give our country and this planet all we have got to preserve our abilities to continue to live here.
As the daughter of holocaust survivors, I am grateful for your speaking out in this way. This was the warning I always heard in youth, the importance of not just resting and watching and taking loving care of ourselves and those in ones closest proximity. It is not a loving position, or a healing position, to attend carefully to ones own while expressing only thoughts and prayers as those in the path of danger are mowed down.
Yes. No one should be encouraging people to turn away from knowledge of rising fascism, for their own comfort and inner peace.
Now is the time, more than ever, for us to pay attention. Now is the time for us to *witness* the horrors being enacted against our fellow human beings, and to take action and fight back.
Let’s not give some sort of spiritual validation to inaction and self-imposed ignorance, in the face of rising oppression, repression, and state violence.
It seems there is an important question swirling around in the comments: should we feel called to closely observe the Great Unraveling happening all around us?
Thank you for affirming my spiritual decision I made at 2 in the morning on election day, as I was reading about the most probable outcome. I offer it here:
Post Election Thoughts
On the eve of the election night, I woke up in the middle of the night, checking my phone to see how things were unfolding for my candidate. They were not good. I immediately had a vision, a way forward through this darkness, given to me from wherever they come from. I would contract my attention, meaning making it more focused on the things I value most, living in this present moment of the ordinary, looking for the holy where I stand and breathe each day. And then I wrote this prayer:
Holy Mystery
On this most grievous day
Keep our hearts in a place of equanimity
Waiting on your Spirit to sooth our souls
May we not react
May we not respond
May we just be
Knowing that in you we move and live and have our being.
This is not a passive stance to the anticipated chaos that might come from this moment in our history. This is a stance of not getting caught up in all the competing, posturing and dividing that will surely be born out of these results but instead focusing on the sacredness of my everyday, ordinary life, looking, seeing, and noticing with gratefulness the simple things.
At the same time, realizing there are those who will really suffer because of these results because they are not a white, elderly, middle class man like myself, knowing their lives are already contracted, not by choice but by outside forces of oppression. I get that I am privileged in my being able to make a choice of contraction and still have a decent life. I hold those other persons in my heart.
This Holy Mystery called me to be a monk in the world many years ago. I have tried to incarnate that many ways in my life, sometimes successful and many times not. But I continue to try and answer that call in my life, especially in these waning years of my life.
This election has infused new energy into that call for me ,especially as it relates to the spiritual practice of equanimity. I now see it as a small space of spiritual focus, intentional living in the moment.
“ She spent her entire monastic life grappling with what it meant to be a monk and how a monk ought to engage with the modern world and the modern church. She shared on her blog the answers that emerged over the years:
“A monk stands as a question mark to society.”
“Monasticism is a rhythm of life that fosters mindfulness.”
“Monasteries are resistance centers.”
“Monasticism is a force for life.”
The above quote is from Mary Lou Kownacki newest book ,Everyday Sacred, Everywhere Beauty: Readings from an Old Monk's Journal .
Her thoughts about what it means to be a monk sums up well, especially the first two thoughts, what I sense in this moment, which can be applicable to anyone who feels called to some kind of contemplative life style.
I’m wondering if I (or my life) can be some kind of resistance center, in light of recent events. Simplicity, slowness, smallness, all these descriptions speak to a contraction that is positive and definitely contradictory to the way the world exist.This all seems like a bit idealistic, I know, but maybe it’s worth a try.
I stumbled upon Maggie Ross’s books again while upstairs this morning (Sun. Nov 10). She is a solitaire, living alone and living in silence in a most austere way. She confesses that she can do no less.
She says, “To choose silence is indeed a subversive act”. This quote confirms this “contraction” I speak of as not being passive.
What a beautiful expression. I run an institute for Buddhist monastics in India, and prayer and presence have been our way to be connected but it sometimes feels (and here I looked out the window for a long time before I could choose the right word) childish.
I love to think that we are a question mark to society.
You've reiterated my own practices, as a shamanic, tantric Jew-Bu crone: Being the sacred container for the alchemy of the Changes our hearts long for, demand, the wisdom of Love. Daring to enVision the world 'working' for all, acting on behalf of that Desire, day to day, in any way I can, from the smallest kindness, to the greatest act of courage I can muster.
After reading the first paragraph, I decided to delete Instagram. I am about to do the same for Facebook. I have felt sick watching the news lately. I would like to read news from poets and writers and somehow share with those who are suffering in war and turmoil that I care. Perhaps we can find another way to show our solidarity. Thank you for your reassuring human being Krista. with love from Sarnath, India
I'm initiating an online wisdom circle, inviting friends who --along a spectrum of following news --- care deeply about what's unfolding, and have some skills in exchanging the malevolence we're living, into benevolence. There's a huge lack of groups, meeting to close the gap between the 'spiritual and meta worlds,' and the body politic, as if they eschew one another, instead of seeking one another.
Reading the comments, I am reminded that we may each be called to this moment differently.
For some, the call is to engage the news more deeply, to pick apart, discern, critique, and even archive so that in future days, will not be allowed to forget all that happened during this time.
For others, and I fall into this category at this time now, the work is to engage in my person-to-person life, to disengage from the news because it makes me callous toward my neighbors, my coworkers who voted differently or express beliefs I find abhorrent. I know, if the world is going to be healed, I must look for that shard of light in them. If the news is making me hard-hearted toward the people I am meant to care for and love, then I must choose one, the news or my neighbor.
I am grateful for those who are digging in and doing the difficult work of picking apart. I have been called to that work before and believe I will be called to that again.
I am grateful for those who are fighting back with all their might (and pressuring our leaders to do the same or get out of the way.) We need them desperately.
I am grateful for those like Tricia Hersey who are calling those who are wearied by the daily agonies of life to rest.
We need all of us. We all have a part to play. I am grateful all of our roles in this time are not the same.
Thank you for your words and for being a reasonable and discerning voice in this time, just as you always have been.
One thing that has helped me is to cauterize ideology , in me , and in my encountering the other .
The second is to realize that the forces of entrophy apply to me, but also to my country . I will die, everything will die.
A big shift came when it occurred to me to treat my country as if it is in hospice. I can witness this bludgeoning of our institutions calmly , calmly enough to tolerate the facts . Then , im free to let my God accompany me in discerning the next best thing.
I am feeling that my consumption of so much negative news is having an impact on how I meet the rest of life. I find myself having negative thoughts about people in my immediate environment that feel to critical and outside of my normal experience. The news feels like a commodity that I am consuming to much of and it is making me a bit sick. I do care and cannot feign surprise at what is happening yet I get angry at something that is perhaps inevitable. I am going to disengage more from the news and more on asking myself more about what is that I really want.
I’ve had a similar experience and realization as you. It is okay to disengage. You will know when to re-engage, and then oscillate between them. Peace to you as you journey on… 🕊
I also disagree with respect for your right to your opinion. This is not the time to take a holiday. Our constitutional rights are quickly being eroded. We need to pay attention before it is too late.
FOR much of my adult life I have tried to be the best person I could be. While I have participated in protests, donated money and precious time to causes related to environmental issues and justice, I still come back to believing that working in my community is the most powerful way to help others less fortunate.
Charity and love begin at home. Make yourself a role model of what is the most important thing you want to see others.
Now that the whole world can see that the evil lunatic and his companions are trying to destroy our nation, I'm not spending much time on spreading that word. Instead, I'm volunteering at the ACLU, helping my neighbors get food to eat, and working to make repairs to the world where I can. And that makes me happier and calmer! So get out, find someone who needs your help, and therein you will find your peace.
Krista, I have so much respect for you, but I have to disagree with you this time.
For some of us, for me at least, I actually think my my work right now IS to know and carefully share what is happening in (and to) my country. And because of the intentional barrage of chaos and intimidation of the press, knowing what is happening takes real work right now.
If I believe that vast damage is being done and people are being harmed, knowing less does not make me more virtuous. Knowing less might make me calmer, and calm is good. But what I am trying to do is find ways to stay calm while staying informed, engaged, creative, and vocal.
I know this route is not for everyone, but for me, digesting the news and carefully crafting civil posts geared towards anyone who might “have ears to hear,” calling my representatives daily, and considering other actions – while taking intentional breaks for rest, people, and play – this is where I am at.
Michelle...you expressed my feelings very well. This crisis we are in is more than trying to comfort ourselves. It is about working to attenuate the harm that is coming to others. It is about working to attenuate the harm being done to our democracy. If we are too frail to execute such actions, all hope is lost. Nothing is going to come along and guarantee success. There is no way of knowing if it is too late. We must go forward on the assumption that the dark forces can be quelled. To do so, we must nourish the courage of our own stability. If we do so, it will help to nourish the courage of others, such as Gov. Pritzker. Love is reciprocal and as reliable and predictable as gravity. We can do all of this.
Yes, for me, it is learning to hold in tension both action and contemplation, engagement-disengagement. I engage during my work week, and then I pull back over the weekend so I can rest, recover, and recharge.
I hear you Judy and working out balance comes in different ways to each of us.
Yes, exactly that. 💗🕊
Well said
I believe we have so many who don’t believe we are all connected. Love is the key to holding forth against those who want to push hatred in many forms . Being aware is very important and doing so with calm minds and hearts is key. May we find the grace and strength to stand firm but in the ways of Gandhi and Martin Luther King.
I know we are all connected and I know "love" is the key to holding forth against those who push hatred, BUT there is a healthy place for anger. So many are so very very very polite--isn't that nice. Another truth is "caring is love in action". MLK and Gandhi were angry from time to time, rightly so. We need to get angry, grow some courage and take action. If we can't do it for our polite little selves, then we have to do it for our grandchildren and other life on this planet.
Anger is a sign of 'fear' activated, and points a finger to needs that must be recognized and attended to. It's necessary to have courage and skills: Perhaps to admit or accept (or even welcome) the anger, then Be with it, understand what's needed, and act, accordingly. Blessings to us all
And anger can point to what we love, be a response to that which is threatened. We can honor that information and channel that energy wisely in constructive ways.
As was Jesus. You’re right. That kind of anger is energizing where destructive anger can be debilitating
Thank you. Many people need our attention and our awareness of what is taking place right now. We need to be people who help write these chapters and do our best to put our bodies down to prevent disasters.
This doesn't read to me as an actual disagreement. Muting a constant feed of news is not the same thing as not engaging with the news at all. One can step away from the fire hose and still get a drink.
To each their own as is appropriate. We are all needed in the struggle. I for one have to be careful to balance things lest I become useless in brokenness.
I'm with you Michelle.We need to be strong and not react. We also need to do what we can and remind people we are not victims of this barrage of negativity. I would say, take the time you need for self-healing but stay aware. Stay vigilant and look for opportunities to take action.
I am so with you! Things are really bad and asking me to “see the light” in this mess is as absurd as having asked prisoners in Auschwitz to do so. Uprooting and deporting people induces real suffering. People are losing jobs and their livelihoods and with their deported workers farmers are panicking. Our focus should be on doing everything we can to get even the people we don’t know to vote in the midterms, take back the House and Senate, and impeach that sorry state of a human the very next day….
"Awareness" which is an aspect of "the Light" enables us to act in an empowered way, with the least harm to ourselves or others, and with the maximum benefit. Some will 'act' more inwardly, being Space Holders, others are the warriors in the streets. Some of us will try to straddle those spheres.
ALOHA MICHELLE: ..... hope i find you well .... i so agree with you; we have an existentially threatening POTUS and thus we are at a precipice toward survival. Yes, we have had prior challenges; this is as humongous as we have ever faced. As you, I love Christa; this one though may be fine for some, it is equally dangerous for many. Ignorance is not bliss; knowledge is power. Keep breathing and do not shut out what is currently happening.
Absolutely. We must see each other’s humanity and seek to rebuild a system (in our own countries and globally) that will respect and cherish that humanity. Disengaging is not the way. Appreciating what we lose under this kind of authoritarian approach to “governing” tells us what we need to protect. Well said Michelle.
I am comforted by this, and also inspired by the following from the Talmud: “Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world’s grief. Do justly, now. Have mercy, now. Walk humbly, now. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it.” Peace to all in this hard time.
Finding the balance is critical.
Thanks for your post🙏
I ❤️ Micah.
For anyone looking for tips on how to stay aware of what is unfolding in the US/world without living in a state of constant panic and despair, I am re-reading Active Hope, by Joana Macy, and some of her ideas for fully connecting with the pain of the world while maintaining (and even enhancing) your vital energy, gratitude, and joy are invaluable.
I understand the impulse to permanently check out from "the news" in the name of self-care, and I have taken breaks too, but when people with privilege who are not under immediate threat refuse to even bear witness to the attacks against vulnerable populations, they are cooperating with the abusers and authoritarians in power. And ultimately it is not a form of genuine self-preservation. This is a "first they came for..." moment.
The phrase in this newsletter "distant levels of power" is very telling. The power being exerted right now is not "distant" to many people. It's not distant to me, as a trans person, and I have already had specific rights taken away from me (not to mention a much more toxified and bigoted cultural climate).
The approach this newsletter is trying to rationalize is quite dangerous. This form of disengagement from people who can currently disengage is an ingredient that the fascists are relying on. Don't give it to them, for everyone's sake, including your own.
Something truly destructive is stampeding through the halls right now. Averting your gaze and not speaking up is refusing to rise to a moment that needs you, and it is helping to install a world that will be worse for you and for everyone. This is a time to accept that it is OK to feel deeply distressed and uncomfortable. And to take those feelings and transform them into resistance against the forces of hatred and destruction in power. That's how to find meaning in this. Not by turning into an ostrich in the name of self-care and trying to package that denial with some spiritual-sounding stuff. We have to be awake and give our country and this planet all we have got to preserve our abilities to continue to live here.
As the daughter of holocaust survivors, I am grateful for your speaking out in this way. This was the warning I always heard in youth, the importance of not just resting and watching and taking loving care of ourselves and those in ones closest proximity. It is not a loving position, or a healing position, to attend carefully to ones own while expressing only thoughts and prayers as those in the path of danger are mowed down.
Yes. No one should be encouraging people to turn away from knowledge of rising fascism, for their own comfort and inner peace.
Now is the time, more than ever, for us to pay attention. Now is the time for us to *witness* the horrors being enacted against our fellow human beings, and to take action and fight back.
Let’s not give some sort of spiritual validation to inaction and self-imposed ignorance, in the face of rising oppression, repression, and state violence.
It seems there is an important question swirling around in the comments: should we feel called to closely observe the Great Unraveling happening all around us?
Gorgeous and principled response. Thank you.
Dearr Krista,
Thank you for affirming my spiritual decision I made at 2 in the morning on election day, as I was reading about the most probable outcome. I offer it here:
Post Election Thoughts
On the eve of the election night, I woke up in the middle of the night, checking my phone to see how things were unfolding for my candidate. They were not good. I immediately had a vision, a way forward through this darkness, given to me from wherever they come from. I would contract my attention, meaning making it more focused on the things I value most, living in this present moment of the ordinary, looking for the holy where I stand and breathe each day. And then I wrote this prayer:
Holy Mystery
On this most grievous day
Keep our hearts in a place of equanimity
Waiting on your Spirit to sooth our souls
May we not react
May we not respond
May we just be
Knowing that in you we move and live and have our being.
This is not a passive stance to the anticipated chaos that might come from this moment in our history. This is a stance of not getting caught up in all the competing, posturing and dividing that will surely be born out of these results but instead focusing on the sacredness of my everyday, ordinary life, looking, seeing, and noticing with gratefulness the simple things.
At the same time, realizing there are those who will really suffer because of these results because they are not a white, elderly, middle class man like myself, knowing their lives are already contracted, not by choice but by outside forces of oppression. I get that I am privileged in my being able to make a choice of contraction and still have a decent life. I hold those other persons in my heart.
This Holy Mystery called me to be a monk in the world many years ago. I have tried to incarnate that many ways in my life, sometimes successful and many times not. But I continue to try and answer that call in my life, especially in these waning years of my life.
This election has infused new energy into that call for me ,especially as it relates to the spiritual practice of equanimity. I now see it as a small space of spiritual focus, intentional living in the moment.
“ She spent her entire monastic life grappling with what it meant to be a monk and how a monk ought to engage with the modern world and the modern church. She shared on her blog the answers that emerged over the years:
“A monk stands as a question mark to society.”
“Monasticism is a rhythm of life that fosters mindfulness.”
“Monasteries are resistance centers.”
“Monasticism is a force for life.”
The above quote is from Mary Lou Kownacki newest book ,Everyday Sacred, Everywhere Beauty: Readings from an Old Monk's Journal .
Her thoughts about what it means to be a monk sums up well, especially the first two thoughts, what I sense in this moment, which can be applicable to anyone who feels called to some kind of contemplative life style.
I’m wondering if I (or my life) can be some kind of resistance center, in light of recent events. Simplicity, slowness, smallness, all these descriptions speak to a contraction that is positive and definitely contradictory to the way the world exist.This all seems like a bit idealistic, I know, but maybe it’s worth a try.
I stumbled upon Maggie Ross’s books again while upstairs this morning (Sun. Nov 10). She is a solitaire, living alone and living in silence in a most austere way. She confesses that she can do no less.
She says, “To choose silence is indeed a subversive act”. This quote confirms this “contraction” I speak of as not being passive.
Alan, from Georgia
What a beautiful expression. I run an institute for Buddhist monastics in India, and prayer and presence have been our way to be connected but it sometimes feels (and here I looked out the window for a long time before I could choose the right word) childish.
I love to think that we are a question mark to society.
If only the world could truly pause.
You've reiterated my own practices, as a shamanic, tantric Jew-Bu crone: Being the sacred container for the alchemy of the Changes our hearts long for, demand, the wisdom of Love. Daring to enVision the world 'working' for all, acting on behalf of that Desire, day to day, in any way I can, from the smallest kindness, to the greatest act of courage I can muster.
This resonates with me. Thank you, Alan!
I am reminded in these times and by this message of John O'Donohue's mission: to bless the space between us.
Facing suffering,
neither evade nor invade.
Bear witness, engage.
After reading the first paragraph, I decided to delete Instagram. I am about to do the same for Facebook. I have felt sick watching the news lately. I would like to read news from poets and writers and somehow share with those who are suffering in war and turmoil that I care. Perhaps we can find another way to show our solidarity. Thank you for your reassuring human being Krista. with love from Sarnath, India
Substack, so far, seems to be a reasonable and “safe” space.
I'm initiating an online wisdom circle, inviting friends who --along a spectrum of following news --- care deeply about what's unfolding, and have some skills in exchanging the malevolence we're living, into benevolence. There's a huge lack of groups, meeting to close the gap between the 'spiritual and meta worlds,' and the body politic, as if they eschew one another, instead of seeking one another.
Thank you for caring about America. Those in power do not represent the vast majority of our people.
Krista,
Thank you.
Reading the comments, I am reminded that we may each be called to this moment differently.
For some, the call is to engage the news more deeply, to pick apart, discern, critique, and even archive so that in future days, will not be allowed to forget all that happened during this time.
For others, and I fall into this category at this time now, the work is to engage in my person-to-person life, to disengage from the news because it makes me callous toward my neighbors, my coworkers who voted differently or express beliefs I find abhorrent. I know, if the world is going to be healed, I must look for that shard of light in them. If the news is making me hard-hearted toward the people I am meant to care for and love, then I must choose one, the news or my neighbor.
I am grateful for those who are digging in and doing the difficult work of picking apart. I have been called to that work before and believe I will be called to that again.
I am grateful for those who are fighting back with all their might (and pressuring our leaders to do the same or get out of the way.) We need them desperately.
I am grateful for those like Tricia Hersey who are calling those who are wearied by the daily agonies of life to rest.
We need all of us. We all have a part to play. I am grateful all of our roles in this time are not the same.
Thank you for your words and for being a reasonable and discerning voice in this time, just as you always have been.
Thank you.
This is an offer of a drink of cool water in the midst of being parched by too much soulless information. Thank you, Krista.🙏💖
It is!
One thing that has helped me is to cauterize ideology , in me , and in my encountering the other .
The second is to realize that the forces of entrophy apply to me, but also to my country . I will die, everything will die.
A big shift came when it occurred to me to treat my country as if it is in hospice. I can witness this bludgeoning of our institutions calmly , calmly enough to tolerate the facts . Then , im free to let my God accompany me in discerning the next best thing.
Not giving up, just softening.
Beautifully stated. Jim
Thank you. My thought was that I wish to be a healthy cell, in my experience of a cancerous body politic...
Yes yes yes Krista. Thank you for reminding us of ancestral wisdom. 💚
I am feeling that my consumption of so much negative news is having an impact on how I meet the rest of life. I find myself having negative thoughts about people in my immediate environment that feel to critical and outside of my normal experience. The news feels like a commodity that I am consuming to much of and it is making me a bit sick. I do care and cannot feign surprise at what is happening yet I get angry at something that is perhaps inevitable. I am going to disengage more from the news and more on asking myself more about what is that I really want.
I’ve had a similar experience and realization as you. It is okay to disengage. You will know when to re-engage, and then oscillate between them. Peace to you as you journey on… 🕊
Krista - You are deeply missed at 7 am on Sundays on WNYC. This article reminds me why. Please come back.
She’s on another journey. I let her be.
I also disagree with respect for your right to your opinion. This is not the time to take a holiday. Our constitutional rights are quickly being eroded. We need to pay attention before it is too late.
KRISTA,
FOR much of my adult life I have tried to be the best person I could be. While I have participated in protests, donated money and precious time to causes related to environmental issues and justice, I still come back to believing that working in my community is the most powerful way to help others less fortunate.
Charity and love begin at home. Make yourself a role model of what is the most important thing you want to see others.
Now that the whole world can see that the evil lunatic and his companions are trying to destroy our nation, I'm not spending much time on spreading that word. Instead, I'm volunteering at the ACLU, helping my neighbors get food to eat, and working to make repairs to the world where I can. And that makes me happier and calmer! So get out, find someone who needs your help, and therein you will find your peace.