Tag Archives: future

The Great Pause

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I posted this today on Facebook:

Be kind to yourself. You have done the best you could with the information you had at the time. I like to draw and am quite good at it, though not “artist grade”. When I go to classes and hear people beat themselves up because they think they’re no good, I tell them, you’re in the class to learn. If you already knew everything you wouldn’t be here, or you would be the teacher. I think life is like that. We all look back and think “If only….” But we did what we thought was right at the time. We did what we were ready to do at the time.

Now we are all in a different space. Everyone on the planet is living a life different than we expected just a couple of months ago, and for none of us in this generation will things ever be the same. Every single one of us is to one degree or another looking back and thinking, did I do right? And if we take time now to reflect on what we can change about ourselves so that we emerge from The Great Pause more in tune with our people, with our environment, then we’ll have learned a great lesson.

The past exists only in our memory. The future is yet to be. All we have is the present moment, and the gift of life on an incredibly beautiful planet.

The house is on fire

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To protect my own health I’ve actively avoided stress for the past few years, although certain situations (home renovations, moving, anyone?) haven’t always cooperated.  Nevertheless there is a difference between walking along a path and enjoying sunshine, birdsong, glimpses of ocean, burgeoning wildflowers, and shutting out the reality of the world we live in which we have helped to create.  Young Greta Thunberg has shouted out to the world that our home is on fire, if we hope to save anything we must act, and act now.  Even an old grandfather snoozing under the village tree would, I am sure, wake up and run to help save what he could if his or his neighbour’s hut was on fire, or if a flood was about to drown his village.

Blind sailors

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What is wrong with the world today? Where does one begin? But surely at the heart of it is the fact that we have forgotten who we are, where we came from, and have lost all bearings so that we have no idea where we are going. We are blind sailors on ships that have lost their sails, tossed rudderless on black waters. And yet we think we are the crown of creation.