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A Perspective of 'These Times'
These times are difficult but clearer perspectives can help us to cope.
Posted November 18, 2020
Old movies often had scenes in which a writer using a manual typewriter would have trouble finding thoughts to type. He/she would type a few words, look at them with a furrowed brow, then dramatically pull the paper out of the typewriter, crumple it up and toss it onto another pile of crumpled papers. That scene of frustration might not play out well in modern times. Dragging a computer file across the screen to the trash icon just doesn’t evoke the same physical sensation.
The phrase these times is used as a short way to express what is currently happening in our individual and global experiences as humans. Many likely share a similar list of stresses: the pandemic, natural disasters, job losses, economic insecurities, and political upheaval, for starters. No doubt many of us have our own version of some, or all, of these and more. No doubt we have different priorities of action and emotional responses. Does the total of our experiences add up to an unabridged description of these times?
Writing about these times can be exceptionally difficult. Sometimes I want to write about the pandemic and the problems of the loneliness of isolation. Sometimes I want to write about the devastation of wildfires. Sometimes I want to write about political absurdities. Then there is the divisiveness within our beloved country and the desire to heal our relationships. It can be overwhelming to be in this quicksand of events that threatens to suck us down into despair or irrational behaviors. In those old days, I would be crumpling lots of paper right now!
How am I to manage all of this confusion? How am I to help anyone else if I don’t?
Though I am among the stressed, I am also blessed to live in a rural area. This morning the sun rose over the mountain and slowly lit up the valley terrain. As it did so, I briefly experienced its light as beauty wrapping its embrace around all the varieties of life within that valley. I thought of how some trees are weak from lack of water while others drink from deep underground sources; some streams are almost dried up; some animals can find abundant food but others not; some birds have had to abandon their nests; and here I am, alive, both an observer and a participant of this inclusive event. I wanted to weep for the suffering of many while simultaneously feeling comfort from the expansive radiance that touched and joined all of us. I wished every living being could feel that comfort.
Are there lessons being offered in these precious pauses in the chaos?
What struck me strongly is how context and one’s perspective influence one’s interpretation of events. Recently, I wanted to shrink my awareness down to what is physically very close to me. I felt a strong need to be in a space small enough for me to feel some control over events within it. I wanted to shut out everything else. I lied to myself, “You can’t do anything about that anyway.”
Knowing a tight space of awareness was always available to me, however, I felt secure to use my imagination to enlarge my awareness beyond caged identity. I visualized myself floating in space around Earth—completely safe, free, and without interference from communication satellites. I thought of these times from that expansive perspective.
I remembered learning that similar times have repeatedly happened before on Earth below. They happened through natural shifts in physical conditions, had overall qualities such as chaos, and were accompanied with death, migrations, changes of behaviors, restructuring of relationships, and more. I wondered, “When a pre-human geological era transitioned into another, were the non-human inhabitants aware of it or instinctually adapting along the way?” Whatever happened, species and geographies may have changed, but Earth is still here and life still continues.
The biggest difference between prehistoric times and these may be the role of the human species to influence major changes on a massive scale. It is a species with conscious self-awareness and a complicated mixture of desires, abstract thinking skills, advanced communication, and most importantly, the ability to creatively adapt. This species has often operated by an approach of “let’s do this and see what happens!” Its curiosity, however, cannot know the future before it becomes the present. It cannot know wisdom before it acknowledges its mistakes.
In these times, humans are learning difficult lessons of past decisions made over long time periods, including the lesson of not using reasoned foresight to adapt sooner. What is happening now is not required to stay this way! What is required for change is humans waking up to who they are in relationship to each other, all life, and Earth itself.
More humans with humility, kind rationality, and creative hearts would make this easier than it has been so far. If we are divided among ourselves, it is because we are divided within ourselves. That is where we must first seek goodness, truth, and beauty. Before we can find them we might have to stop, reflect, listen, and commit to universal love.
Maybe there is a way to stop the crumpling sensation of these times. It’s to stop the crumpling that might be occurring within each of us because we just haven’t known what else to do. Here is one option, but it is a choice: Select a living being you deeply love, write on a piece of paper at least one loving sentence you want to say to him/her/it, and post it where you can read it aloud occasionally. Then remind yourself, “When we humans all write our love sentences, we are writing our human story together.”
We are in these times and will not crumple ourselves if we do not crumple those pieces of paper on which we declared our capacity to love.
© Betty Luceigh, 11/18/2020.
