(A Bud)
(There is a Bud.)
And the birds (still)
celebrate every morning in song!
Right before the outbreak of COVID-19, news and social media focused on the climate crisis and the grave impact global warming will have on our species, as well as our planet. The outlook was—and is—grim, to say the least. Greta Thunberg’s plea to save our dying planet was everywhere. Now her message seems to be more in the background. But I wonder: Is this current pandemic a part of what Thunberg and the countless other activists were trying to convey to us about our ecosystem?
The massive outbreak of COVID-19 and our inability to contain the spread of it has consumed all of our days with justifiable panic. As Charlie Brown puts it to Linus, “my anxieties have anxieties.” Flight or fight mode is a real thing. I have experienced it most of my life and have come to realize that one does not have to feed panic or even anxiety. Rather, during this pandemic we can choose to take action and use the anxiety mindset to act appropriately in crisis mode by not activating and fueling our emotions. It is not easy to do—but it can be done. We can accomplish this by recognizing that, for most of us, we are “ok” in this moment. Any other feeling is a projection of the future, a future that is not a current reality. If our focused attention is on a disastrous tomorrow we, coupled with that fear, may actually end up creating that fearful future. Collectively, if we band together in panic, how can there ever be any positive resolve? There can’t be.
This recent pandemic is claiming lives across the globe, discriminating against no one. (Discriminating against no one.) It is important to take pause and to fully see how nature acts and reacts. Still, so many of us disregard and choose to remain ignorant to the needs of planet earth. Mother Earth may have not created the virus, but perhaps our susceptibility to it is a result of the damage we are doing to our ecosystem. Could there be an underlying message here? Could there be a silver lining in our broken economy, sickness, and disease? Could this be an invitation for all of us to heal our planet and create a better humanity?
No matter how ignorant we remain, Mother Earth will protect herself. At first, she gently reminds us of her needs, to not only protect her but to protect us! She gently whispers that we are one. Her voice grows louder the more we do not listen to her plea. She is us and we are Her. When we ignore her with our incessant greed for power and conquest and destruction over her, she throws back her glacial and winded arms and clears all the greedy and ignorant decks we think we can trick her from seeing. She makes her demolition point, nonetheless.
When we ignore the subtle invitations that our lives present to us in the quiet background whispers of our busy little days, She will demand our full attention. (She always does.) Whether the invitation is to leave a toxic relationship or job, or to simply clean up our eating habits and exercise a little more—eventually we either take note with action or we will pay the awful price, sometimes personally, sometimes globally.
COVID-19 is also wreaking havoc on the economy and tearing small businesses apart, leaving some people jobless and homeless. It is leaving others subject to the contagion simply because they cannot stay home and quarantine themselves. Without much warning we have been brought to our economical and spiritual knees being asked by Mother Earth: “What is really important here?” Greed for more and more and more? Vanity? Possessions? More of all we do not need? Our infidelities? Our lacking integrity? Happy hour? The endless shopping sprees we indulge in? We so often do these things to avoid paying attention to what is real. We take our lunch breaks at our desks, if we eat at all. And now we are instructed to stay home and cloister ourselves. This is a time to meditate, journal, evaluate our lives, and actually practice self-care and love for the people we are supposed to love. But many of us can’t sit still long enough to hear our own thoughts—even for a second.
What is going on here? Is this COVID-19 the desperate invitation for a long overdue paradigm shift? Is it the wake-up call for all of us to reevaluate our priorities? We think we need certain things to maintain a lifestyle that we might feel is out of our control. We buy into the script of society that we have to have certain things; things we've been conditioned to think we need. As caregivers we blindly supply our children with toys. tablets, and cellphones before they even have a choice to understand the physical and mental damage being done to their spines and brains. Yet we act like we do not know better—but we do know better. There are always options and choices, perhaps too many and that is yet another problem. Even if those options and choices are how we choose to think differently.
This is a time to ask: Will this pandemic wake us up? If so, will we stay awake or will we blindly fall back into old, comfortable, and even uncomfortable patterns once the crisis is over?
This virus is speaking to us—in all of our languages. It is begging for us to take our lives seriously. It is asking us to listen. To see. To notice all that is important and what is important.
We can see what has value: our lives, our relationships, our natural resources—essentials that will become treasures we once took for granted. Look at how valuable toilet paper has become and how many of us used to just toss it into our shopping carts without a care to its value.
We are all being asked to take inventory of our lives. Please don’t run from this crisis. You have run from too many before. This time is about not hiding. It is about being vulnerable. Being vulnerable is for you. It is the same feeling as forgiveness. Forgiveness is for you. It frees you. It’s not about the people you are forgiving, they may not care or even know you have forgiven them. To be vulnerable in the face of a crisis allows you to be vulnerable the rest of your life so you can see how strong vulnerability makes you feel.
There will be suffering. There is great suffering already, but there will be joy and healing too. We were created to endure, thrive, and uplift. Prepare yourself for when the crisis ends and you may find a silver lining; a rainbow and a happy ending.
Our routines have changed: Embrace a new positive one. There will be 1000-plus reasons to want to run and there is one reason to stay and sit. Be still. The reason to sit and be still is the only way you will hear CLARITY. Clarity will place you in the loving arms of this moment and this moment is worth 1000 new reasons to notice that life, your life is happening now.
Life is uncertain. It always has been.
Security is an illusion. Always has been.
Fear will only immobilize you and cannot coexist with love. (This will never change.)
Love will always free you. Choose love and choose hope.
Faith will carry you. Hold on to its wings and direct it to a safer and happier tomorrow.
So now, sit back. Relax. Face yourself in the mirror and be your own hero and as you unveil your real self. The YOU who has loved you from the beginning of time. Pack up the personas and send them off to look for a new host. Replace your fears with fruits from your dreams that are happening right this very moment. Welcome who you are with open arms. Now is the perfect time to review your life and come out of this stronger, healthier, and happier!
xx R.A.
“The morning wind spreads its fresh smell. We must get up to take that in, that wind that lets us live. Breathe, before it's gone.” ~Rumi
How To Help
Many organizations are working to ease the burden and provide relief and resources to those who have been acutely impacted by COVID-19. Here are several that are taking donations:
One Fair Wage: This non-profit organization works to give impacted tipped and service workers immediate cash assistance.
WHO: The World Health Organization collaborated with the Swiss Philanthropy Foundation and United Nations Foundation to create a solidarity fund.
IRC: The International Rescue Committee provides focused support to countries that currently have unstable health systems.
Feeding America: A hunger-relief organization, Feeding America is now giving additional support to food banks that are helping those impacted by COVID-19.