Yesterday’s blog post about sensemaking included the following quotation.
If we are to find a new kind of good life amid the catastrophes these myths have spawned, then we need to radically rethink the stories we tell ourselves. We need to dig deep into old stories and reveal their wisdom, as well as lovingly nurture the emergence of new stories into being.
Pontoon Archipelago or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Collapse. By James Allen, originally published by Medium, June 18, 2019
How do we radically rethink the stories we tell ourselves?
And how do we share our radical stories with others? Radical in the sense of a significant departure from the status quo. This is important work, because we change the world one story at a time. That’s the reason I write so much on this blog.
ALL THAT WE ARE IS STORY.
Richard Wagamese (October 14, 1955-March 10, 2017) Ojibwe from Wabeseemoong Independent Nations, Canada
From the moment we are born to the time we continue on our spirit journey, we are involved in the creation of the story of our time here. It is what we arrive with. It is all we leave behind. We are not the things we accumulate. We are not the things we deem important. We are story. All of us. What comes to matter then is the creation of the best possible story we can while we’re here; you, me, us, together. When we can do that and we take the time to share those stories with each other, we get bigger inside, we see each other, we recognize our kinship — we change the world one story at a time.
Social media platforms like Facebook, twitter, Instagram and blogs give each of us ways to share our stories with the world.
One idea is to share stories from earlier times. “We need to dig deep into old stories and reveal their wisdom.” The Quaker Stories Project is an example. https://quakerstories.wordpress.com/
And to re-think those stories. To consider what they say about our world today. To see if they represent something we have lost. Something it might be good to return to.
The following, from my friend Joshua Taflinger, is another example of radically rethinking our stories. Since he wrote this, I have looked at things from the perspective of what I think a spiritual warrior would.
I am inspired to share with you all more directly a post I wrote, because I consider you an established & effective nature/spiritual warrior, and believe that there is a need for the perspectives shared in the attached post to be more common thought in the minds of the many.
If you feel truth from this writing, and are inspired, I highly encourage you to re-write your own version, in your own words/perspectives, and post to your network.
With the intention of helping us all wake up, with awareness, clarity, and direction.
..spreading and weaving reality back into the world….
What has risen to the surface at Standing Rock is a physical/spiritual movement. Learn how to quiet your mind. To find the silent receptive space to receive guidance. To learn to adapt and follow the pull of synchronicity to guide you to where you will find your greatest support and strength.
What I have found in my time praying in the indigenous earth based ways, is that it’s not about putting your hands together and talking to god…. It’s about quieting and connecting with the baseline of creation, of nature. Tuning into the frequency and vibration of the natural world, the nature spirits. The beings and entities that have been in existence, for all of existence, the examples and realities of sustainability and harmony.
It’s about becoming receptive to these things. Being open and flowing with them. The spirit guides us, but we have to make ourselves receptive to feel, sense, and respond to this guidance.
Joshua Taflinger
Another great way to help you and others think of, and rethink stories is by asking questions and writing answers to them.
- How is Earth’s story calling to you in this time of great change?
- What opportunities are you offering your community to address the Earth’s (and all earthlings’) current existential predicament?
- And how are you coping with more immediate losses from climate change close to home?
- Are your people recovering from fire or flood?
- Are the plants you love best to grow no longer suitable for your climate zone?
Celebrants & Ceremony in Response to Climate Grieving, Dina Stander, July 26, 2019
Yet another way to radically rethink our stories is to look at photos and imagine the stories they evoke. Then writing those stories and sharing them.
Quakers, social justice and revolution 