The Mycelial Nursery Begins
Evil is always committed in the name of something good. Evil believes itself to be good. War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength. … The world is in great peril and we have to step away from us-versus-them thinking NOW. … The mindset that demonizes one's political opponent is the same one that demonizes a foreign enemy to make war, or that demonizes a population to facilitate ethnic cleansing. Charles Eisenstein (Shades of Many Colors – read it here)
This September finds me on an inward journey much like that of winter when I snuggle in with myself (and, in years past, a canine companion) by a warming fire, hearty soup simmering on the stove. Yet this week while I’m inwardly focused – asking deeply about myself, our world, and myself in that world, I’m drawn out into Nature, to the woods out back, Cottonwood Creek nearby; opening to Her knowing. Her wisdom. For surely, She has medicine to heal the toxicity of our fractured world.
In the wake of last night’s presidential debate and on this 23rd anniversary of the events of 9/11, my attention gravitates to the political realm, to what is in the belly of the whale of our ‘us vs. them’ political discourse. I look within, wondering what choices I may be making that contribute to the toxicity, the villainizing each of the other.
This inward-outward focus is reflected in a project that I began on the September 2nd new moon: constructing a mycelial ‘nursery’, an experiment to support the mycelial network of these woods. And, hopefully, to yield some tasty blue oyster mushrooms just outside my door.
I sense that I/we need this deep work within to support Life thriving above ground to help us come to more deeply know, understand, and live into what I’ve called ‘the truth of our Oneness’, a focal point in my life that’s shared and reflected here in The Pivot.
I believe the knowing of Oneness is in us all, an untapped well waiting to be tapped, so that its nectar can flow into our lives. As the sweet nectar flows, we navigate daily choices through an ever emerging and evolving lens that helps us align those choices with the whole of which we are a part. Choices that invite, nurture, support the more beautiful world we long to live in and leave behind for generations to come.
I’m saddened by the toxicity I encounter – both that within me and in the world. Toxicity that seems to permeate every aspect of life. I think of the toxic chemicals, created after deeming that certain pests are villains that must be eliminated. Chemicals that kill our soil and pollute our water and our air. We are starving with full bellies as we ignore that Nature knows better than we the ecosystems She needs. And, She knows how to create them.
This same villainizing infects our body politic, with each ‘side’ taunting and demonizing the other, choking out thoughtful, reasoned deliberation and civil discourse.
If we are willing to look beyond the surface, we can see that toxicity rises from believing we are separate – from one another, from our planet, from the cosmos. For when we know that we are One, we will, I believe, begin to unwind and set aside our toxic choices.
There is no single right path or solution. We must each begin with where we are, questioning with care, to discover our own personal pivot points and evoke our will to pivot, not for ourselves, but for the greater good of All.
I’ve long decried the degeneration of civil discourse anchored in demonization. Yet this day finds me contributing to that which I decry, observing myself silently cheering for what seems to be a victory of one villain over the other in last night's presidential debate. I challenged myself to watch and to watch with as much non-judgement and open-mindedness as I could muster, desiring to bring forth my lens of Oneness in whatever way I could. And I did so having read Charles Eisenstein’s timely essay, a long, challenging read that invites us to look beneath each side’s demonizing the other, into the very belly of the whale that calls be transformed. Then, having looked and questioned our motivations and our questioning, to ask compassionate questions that may help us get to the root causes of our multi-crises. He says,
The revolution we are seeking has compassion at its core. Compassion asks earnestly, “What is it like to be you?” “How did you come to be as you are?” “What is your story?” “What are your circumstances?” “What are your hopes?” “What are your fears?” “What do you want?” “What do you need?” And, as Orland Bishop says, “How must I be, so that you may be free?”
Such questions are for me like rich compost for soil and soul, restoring and regenerating healthy ecosystems outside and in. Are we willing to pivot to such deep, personal questions and care – not to change our vote, but to cast our old habits of separation on the compost pile of that which is decaying, and in doing so is growing nourishing new life of possibility? Am I?
Gentle Flow