What if *this* could be amazing?
I've written a list of things we can do NOW to refine this unfolding shit-show.
This here is chapter 24 in this Book Serialisation journey and I’m happy to declare it’s the penultimate one. As I’ve done for seven months now, I invite anyone new here to choose to start at the beginning or go and check out the rest of the book using this Table of Contents. The first few chapters are free for everyone.
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FLOURISH
“How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.”
- Anne Frank
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“Be like the bird who, pausing in her flight awhile on boughs too slight, feels them give way beneath her, and yet sings, knowing she hath wings.”
- Victor Hugo
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When I spoke with Meg Wheatley the other week, we talked about this misconception that many are under that there is some sort of preparatory work (trauma therapy? hardening up?) that must be done before one is able to handle and attend to collapse. Meg has remarked several times that there is no time for such a luxury. We have to just step into this and rise to what is being demanded of us - now. She stressed the other night that it is a very Western idea to believe we were not born ready for this moment, that we are somehow lacking (while parents in Gaza or Sudan are not). His Holiness The Dalai Lama told me something similar about 15 years ago when I asked him how we can calm the mind so that we can live the life we want. He told me it was “a waste of time” and that we should just go straight to the living the right life part. Do not pass Go! I cried the tears of recognition when I let this seep in afterwards.
I cry now, too, to realise with you here that we don’t have to - nor can we - wait to start living in our full humanity. There is nothing more urgent that should be doing now. (Which reminds me of that Bayo Akomolafe line: “The times are urgent, let us slow down.”)
Indeed, here we are. In this. So let’s get on with it. Collapse is taking us there anyway, just as it’s driving us into a great (or otherwise) simplification before we think we’re ready for it, as well as into consuming less and to going more and more local. But I put it to you that we are in a wonderful position to choose to do this ride artfully, with love as often as possible, with as much grace as we can bring to the situation. And to role model the bejesus out of it as an act of radical service.
Here’s a list of suggested actionables to assist with this. We’re overdue for a list.
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Be the more loving one. Now. Go first.
You might recall my sharing at some point in this journey something my late friend Tim said to me, “Sar, do you want to be right or do you want love?”
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Be kind…as an act of defiance. Make muffins for your cranky neighbour.
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Be hyper pro-social. Like, even be a bit show-off-y about it, performing acts of cooperation while as many people as possible are watching. Be the person who jogs across the zebra crossing and waves at the driver who is hoping you would in fact jog across so they could hypermill onwards. Help a stranger carry a suitcase up busy subway stairs. A bunch of studies show that when we witness acts of kindness and pro-social cooperation by others we experience something called “moral elevation” - we are lifted into optimism and altruism and feel inclined to spread kindness onwards. I referred to the way awe works to connect us into our humanity a few chapters back. A global study showed that 95 per cent of the moral beauty that stirred awe came from observing kindness and cooperation in action.
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