a conversational stream

on honor, grief, devotion, dementia, and what we value

May 25, 2024

what does it mean to HONOR?
what does it look like to live with virtue?
what practices are devotional?
how do I want to live with you?
what lies at the heart of what my soul wants to say?
what does it mean to surrender?

ahhh...peace.

i began this morning tidying, straightening, putting things into place. i followed myself to a piece of writing in the Sun - a conversation about dementia that touched on what we value, how we provide care, and what happens when we treat all lives as sacred and all relationships as reciprocal (as well as what happens when we don't).

what would happen if every person was embraced by a genuine and lasting circle of care?
if we are not already there, what steps / practices / and forms of organizing will help us move towards unified care?
CAN WE ALL AGREE TO CARE?

i'm being facetious but this is a serious question, and one we might dare to reconsider.

how selectively do we draw our circle of care?
what disqualifies x person or people from our care?
how many thousands, millions, billions! are excluded from our care?

frankly, i'm fucking tired of the division in our country. i know it's elsewhere in the world but i don't know enough nuance to speak to that. the division in this country alone is soul-scrapping to witness, and that's probably why most of us (myself included) look away. it's much easier to draw a tighter circle of care, to stay in alignment and belonging, to be safe & protected & righteously angry.

yet if we stay in our current patterns, how can we expect anything but more of the same?

…

the same is not enough.

the same patterns of division & fear & name-calling are a form of societal rot & a pressure cooker to boot.

as we forget how to honor our subjective experiences, communicate and cooperate in good faith, and find synthesis between our countless perspectives to act in solidarity and mutual aid, everything breaks down.

for this to be happening at a time a mass-cultural transformation (driven by technology) and mass-climate adaptation (including increasing extreme weather events) is a recipe for civilization collapse.

this is not an alarmist take.

just listen to people.

feel the anger, the suffering, the rage that moves beneath the surface of our civility.

people are ANRGY, and rightly so.

we have all kinds of generational trauma stacked on top (or below?) of an economy that has been hijacked by the top 1% wealthiest people. the middle class is being crushed, our old myth / cultural narrative of the American dream is seen as dead or dying - of course people (white people) want to go back to when it was better!

temporarily side-stepping the rabbit hole of systemic racism, incarceration and oppression, let's cut to the point: there is no going back (and yet we must remember)

time flies like an arrow, and our technology is accelerating. given the same behavioral patterns we have thus exhibited, we shall receive a divided, techno-dystopian world. this is the path upon which we are converging.

but it does not have to be.

we are approaching [[the CROSSROADS]]

how we act now effects everything

the way you live changes everyone you meet

so how will we act and be?
what future do we want to see?
what did we inherit, and what is our dream?
what questions drive us forward?
what are your basic needs?
how do you contribute to your community?
what change do you want to see?
how do you embody your life philosophy?

...

my working answer is [[alçente]], living as one conversation with all of reality. [[alçente]] points us towards the heart of what matters, and reminds us that difference is the precondition of harmony. each person is integral to our totality. we are mutually composing [[alçente]] - and we can make that song exactly what we dream it to be.

the process involves listening deeply - to yourself, to your body, to your soul - and the will to see clearly.

it demands that we look at our shadow, at our generational trauma, at our inheritance and legacy. it asks us: "this then you have been given - what make of you our legacy?"

basically put, [[alçente]] speaks to the truth of our essence & integrity. [[alçente]] recognizes our significance & mutual obligation in the chain of life, that we are One with nature and we share One human family. [[alçente]] is the dream, vision, and calling of all life relating in liberation & harmony.

...

practically speaking, [[alçente]] is about direct experience centered on your locality. your body and lifespan are the instruments with which you have been given to contribute to our composition.

what do you make of us?
what do you hear when you listen?

Stepping Stones

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