Morning Clouds Shroud the Peaks
Anguish is the emblem of our helpless love, fully felt in every cell of the body; felt until it overflows, in a cry, in tears in words that try to negate, powerlessly, what is occurring. Anguish is our foundational cry against the unjust taking away what we feel should be forever ours. … But anguish fully felt is also the first stop on the road to recovery and healing. …anguish is the last fully felt measure of our care. … Anguish is not debilitation: anguish fully felt, is a sign that we are fully awake at last, through our own pain, to all the heartbreaking losses and goodbyes involved in the drama of a human life, anguish tells us we are getting ready to embrace, or are even now, against our will, willing to embrace what until now could never be embraced, that is: our ability to live fully in this body despite its never ending griefs and wounds… David Whyte (Consolations II – The Solace, Nourishment, and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words)
It seems fitting that the first word in Whyte’s recently published Consolations II is anguish. There is much in our world that seems worthy of allowing ourselves to feel the depth of loss. And, to recognize in so doing we are invited to step through a portal of healing. A divine portal of intelligence.
Little did I know last evening when I read Whyte’s exploration of anguish just before ‘lights out’ that I would awaken this morning to my own cry against a culture that seems to want to take away, or at least diminish or deny, my/our natural intelligence: the knowing from this and prior lives walking this earth and of listening deeply to Gaia and all her beings, the wisdom of my heart and connection to the intelligence of that which sources Life.
But I did just that. I woke feeling heaviness darker than the clouds that shrouded the peaks this early morn. As those clouds lifted, I sat quietly, curious about the nature of the dark cloud I was experiencing as I looked at the beauty of fresh snow visible on the mountain peaks. Such beauty is Nature, our planet home from which we have lost the truth of our connection.
As I reflected, I realized that my personal war with our culture’s striving to keep us separated from this truth by instilling fear around every bend, in corners and crevices all around was rearing its head. And I sensed the anguish I felt was springing from a well of concern about so-called ‘artificial intelligence’, prompted by recent discoveries and conversations about how artificial intelligence is being used and by the culture’s messages that technology, artificial intelligence, is superior to our intelligence as sovereign, sentient beings.
I feel the anguish of something that is mine/ours by design is being taken away. The intelligence of our interconnectedness with All Life. The intelligence of the universe. I think of Rumi’s wise words: You are not a drop in the ocean. You are the entire ocean in a drop. I am that intelligence. You are that intelligence. We are that intelligence. Think about the intelligence of the ocean and the life it sustains and be with that reality for just a moment.
As I continue to reflect, I feel drawn to go to the woods out back, to Mother Pinon and Grandmother as I feel deep sadness, a sense of losing who we be as we gravitate and become more dependent on technology. The Mother Tree calls me first, and there in her embrace I feel the insanity of our embrace of artificial ‘anything’, most assuredly artificial intelligence. It occurs to me that in calling it ‘AI’ we ignore and may forget its artificiality, just as we have been led away from the ingredients of foods that are not natural or ‘real’. Foods that continue to create all manner of health issues.
Tears streaming, I ask how it is that we continue to fall for the idea that this next great technology, artificial ‘thing’ is going to solve the multi-crises that we have created? Where is the intelligence of choosing this path over the natural intelligence of Gaia, of the Cosmos, and of our design that is inextricably linked and has access to the Intelligence of all that is?
Experiencing this anguish in what feels like the depths of my being opens me to step through that portal toward understanding and the healing reconciliation that may come from a sincere desire to understand this ‘thing’ called artificial intelligence at the same time I deepen my connection with and understanding of the intelligence of Mother Earth as I increase my capacity to hear, respond, and align with her intelligence.
P.S. There’s no artificial intelligence here despite numerous prompts to let ‘co-pilot’ take control of this stream.
Snow on the Peaks (and Rain in the Foothills)!