Calm & Tumult Can Coexist

It’s a tumultuous time. There are societal systems crumbling while our collective consciousness is rising.

The energy we are feeling is intense, feels like grasping and symbolizes the shift to the rebels against established order.

This feels like uprooting. This feels like eruption.

How do you stand in the energy of eruption? How do you hold your footing? How do you keep your calm? How do you keep cool in all the prevailing heat? How do you ride the thermals? Those are questions we must make room to explore, not just answer.

It feels right to name that when violence reigns, there comes a natural ending. Ending to Life. Ending to Order. Ending to Security. Ending to Safety. And with every ending, there is a beautiful beginning. What’s yet to begin? What is yet to come? What will cauterize and then grow from the fertile ash?

How do we practice breath and the sensory grounding experiences of calm among the tumult? This takes practice and presence and poise. How does one examine these needed skills?

It begins by looking within. It proceeds with giving yourself permission to love yourself. When’s the last time you did that with intent?

In this way, I've learned that loving yourself requires a courage unlike any other. It requires us to believe in and stay loyal to something no one else can see that keeps us in the world - our own self worth. - Mark Nepo, January 25th, The Book of Awakening.