Snow at Last!
There is one sin I have come to fear above all others. Certainty. If there was only certainty and no doubt, there would be no mystery. And, therefore, no need for faith. Cardinal Lawrence (character in the movie Conclave)
In reality, life does not often conform to our wish for certainty, and there are few examples in the natural world of things staying certain, fixed, knowable, stable, definitive or enduring. Ambiguity and ambivalence are more natural states of being that no one wants to talk about with most things moving in and out of balance and flux every second of the day. Our bodies are constantly seeking adjustment, the planet is constantly cycling through stages of creation and decay, and even our human-made empires come and go … In a world full of transition, flux and fluidity, the logic of pinning things down and conquering is to bring order and sanity. … To want to compartmentalise, categorise, objectify and organise isn’t surprising or pathological, but the to the extent that it seeks to obliterate grey areas, transitional states, contingency, ambiguity and ambivalence, it is troublesome. Life shows no fixity in service to our anxieties … Ruth Allen (Weathering: How the earth’s deep wisdom can help us endure life’s storms)
Like the vibrant life underground awaiting the signal of warmth to emerge, I began to stir a bit more as we passed the halfway point between the Winter Solstice and March’s Spring Equinox. Yet, silence and stillness, quiet walks in the woods beckon as does the dark, starry sky on cold, clear nights and before dawn breaks.
I’m present to a deep need to be grounded in this chaotic and uncertain time. At the same time, I remember that this time and its events, like every other before, are a tiny blip in the evolution of the cosmos. And that we are at choice in how we evolve.
And yet, this is the time we are in, the time we are navigating. A time where deep polarization asks that we choose which side is ‘right’ and make other binary (yes/no, this/that, good/bad, boy/girl, black/white) choices. While reading Allen’s Weathering (a grounding read in itself!), I began to think about how our quest for certainty leads us to make such choices, and how in doing so we limit the palate of possibilities open to us for creating our shared future.
I’m present to my own uncertainty about what and how to write as well as overall uncertainty about how to navigate what is unfolding. Like many others, I feel a sense of angst and unease. Sometimes even the feeling of powerlessness creeps in.
At the same, I believe that how and what each of us thinking and choosing moment to moment is influencing what and how we evolve. When I remember that, I can ask with an open heart, what is mine to do today? What do I need to know today? How do I need to BE today? Aiming each day to embrace this time as mystery, perhaps ‘The Great Mystery’, and to imagine the emergence of a peaceful world that works for all.
Embracing life as mystery, not be solved, but to be lived in harmony with all Life indeed requires faith and great care in where our faith is placed. And perhaps that’s a Pivot for another day.
The Melt … the snow didn’t last