Smokey Morning Sunrise
If you always do what you always did, you’ll always get what you always got. Jessie Potter
The formulation of the problem is often more essential than its solution, which may be merely a matter of mathematical or experimental skill. Albert Einstein
Life on our planet is in trouble. … Our planet is sending us signals of distress that are now so continual they seem almost normal. …stern warning signals that we live in a world that can end, at least for conscious life. This is not to say that it will end, but it can end. … Just as lovers seek union, we are apt, when we fall in love with our world, to fall into oneness with it as well. Joanna Macy (World as Lover, World as Self)
This blog morning I wake to quiet, an eerie haze, smoke from fires hundreds of miles away has settled in these mountains and the valley below. I smile, recalling musing several days ago in my journal about learning to read smoke signals, recognizing the possibility that obstacles aren’t placed in our paths just to be overcome, but rather to inform. What might the obstacles be saying? What might they be asking of us?
What does Life need? What does Life want? I’ve been beholding this query perhaps for longer than I’m even aware. It’s embedded in asking my physical body what it needs from time to time when I experience some unfamiliar symptom or the recurrence of something familiar and uncomfortable. The query provides the context and intention in which I walk this land I occupy and steward. And this week, after engaging in several community meetings, I began to wonder what Life is telling us and what Life is asking of us as we dive into the complex problems in our community and our world.
What does Life need? Want?
Thinking of the idea often shared as a quote from Albert Einstein, we cannot solve problems with the same thinking (or consciousness) that created them, I wondered how we might think about community concerns and problems as ‘smoke signals’ or messages from Life that, in our culture and systems of separation, we have forgotten how to ‘read’. In looking for Einstein’s actual quote, I discovered that there’s no record that he spoke or wrote those words, but he did write that, the formulation of the problem is often more essential than its solution.
I began to wonder ‘what if we framed our ‘problems’ in the context of Life?’ What if, in the multitude of problems our world is faced with, we begin to ask, ‘what does Life tell us about this concern?’ What if we shift our perspective of obstacles as something to overcome and ask ‘what is Life saying about this?’ What does Life need? Want? In reframing, reformulating problems and creating solutions, what might be possible if we ask, ‘How does this serve Life?’?
What if we invite Life to prioritize and guide us in formulating the nature of the problems we face in community? Might we begin to see these concerns differently and in doing so put Life ahead of our individual ego wants and needs?
What if we remembered that we live in an interconnected web of Life, connect to one another and to All Life? What if we co-created solutions WITH Life?
Deep inside – or perhaps not so deep – I feel Mother Earth and Life calling us, individually and collectively to pause and pivot, to slow down, to listen, to love. What call are you hearing and answering in this chaotic time?
Mountain Evening - Before the Smoke