I am in tears reading what you have written and the necessity to continue to bear witness to these creatures and our planet home who desperately need us to tend to this crisis. Thank you for allowing your heart to break and for bringing such searing clarity and language to this dire situation.
"To be truthful—and the Literature of Restoration demands truthfulness—I have no patience for those who say, they can’t face it all because they get too depressed and then they can’t function. To them, I say, tell that to Polar Bear mother whose ice, the land she needs to survive, is melting because of how we live and she and her cubs are starving. Tell that to Elephant mother, to the Matriarch. who is responsible for the entire herd but can’t find water or food and if/when she does, finally, the poachers descend and cut off her tusks while she is still alive and her calves are watching. Tell that to the Wolf pack which is running from the helicopters with marksmen shooting AK47s at them allegedly to protect the cows which members of our species will eat instead of the wolf pups who are now writhing in pain from bullets or dying without a pack to sustain them. Their situation is grim and they are helpless before us. We are not helpless; we must not look away."
I am right beside you in this Deena. It does not seem to be a popular point of view, but I can see nothing more relevant than being willing to bear witness in these devastating times. It is quite a lonely place to be, which leads me to deep gratitude for your presence and your voice here on Earth.
I love you so much, Deena, and I am so filled with overwhelming gratitude for you, for how you've taught me to think and to live. Thank you. Sending an ocean of love and blessings to you and the Trees and all the great beings on your sacred land in Topanga. Sending hugs, tears of gratefulness, and a deep bow. My heart swells with courage to read your words. ❤️🙏🏽❤️
Thank you Deena, so poignant and fierce. You are one of our Hags, uncompromising truth speakers.
Witnessing and changing our lives. I've been hearing these teachings from you for years and when I can incorporate your definition of magic you spoke many, many years ago now, I can see additional possibilities. Magic, to paraphrase you, is making an action in one realm with an effect in another. As in Lise's witness ripples the pool. I cannot stand seeing the Wolf Mother and Elephant Matriarch, can we bear the helplessness or does our heart being broken ripple the shape of things. Love to you. Nora
Our broken hearts, undenied, like your insistence that we accept the grief of loss, can / must affect the environment we're in, and so ... and so ... we live differently, we must, I think. You say, you think, it matters to the dead that we reach out to them; similarly, i think it matters to the living. Lots of love to you, Deena
“I don’t know if it is choice or happenstance that I eschew depression in response to our situation and become energized by the call to meet these circumstances.”
You have taught all of us so much about the kind of energy that is required. Thank you Deena for this powerful and timely reminder. As I face a new group of students this week in my university classes, a majority of whom are in treatment for anxiety and / or depression, I take inspiration from your words and teaching, which guide me in helping these young people to find the healing energy inherent in bearing witness, to see what is true, and fall in love with an earth that needs them.
Yes. we must be there for the young ones who are inevitably undone by the hell we are creating and their seeming helplessness. So much to say here ... but, first, they don't have to follow our ways. And then, If and when they find intimacy with the other beings who are also suffering, the heartmind can direct them to the varioius means to becoming true allies for the future. Your being alongside them, in the knowing and the not knowing ,and the loving that is foundational, matters so much.
I am in tears reading what you have written and the necessity to continue to bear witness to these creatures and our planet home who desperately need us to tend to this crisis. Thank you for allowing your heart to break and for bringing such searing clarity and language to this dire situation.
/Dear Claire: Bless your tears. Are they not rain in this fire season?
"To be truthful—and the Literature of Restoration demands truthfulness—I have no patience for those who say, they can’t face it all because they get too depressed and then they can’t function. To them, I say, tell that to Polar Bear mother whose ice, the land she needs to survive, is melting because of how we live and she and her cubs are starving. Tell that to Elephant mother, to the Matriarch. who is responsible for the entire herd but can’t find water or food and if/when she does, finally, the poachers descend and cut off her tusks while she is still alive and her calves are watching. Tell that to the Wolf pack which is running from the helicopters with marksmen shooting AK47s at them allegedly to protect the cows which members of our species will eat instead of the wolf pups who are now writhing in pain from bullets or dying without a pack to sustain them. Their situation is grim and they are helpless before us. We are not helpless; we must not look away."
I am right beside you in this Deena. It does not seem to be a popular point of view, but I can see nothing more relevant than being willing to bear witness in these devastating times. It is quite a lonely place to be, which leads me to deep gratitude for your presence and your voice here on Earth.
Thank you from the trees, our beloved companions on this earth.
I love you so much, Deena, and I am so filled with overwhelming gratitude for you, for how you've taught me to think and to live. Thank you. Sending an ocean of love and blessings to you and the Trees and all the great beings on your sacred land in Topanga. Sending hugs, tears of gratefulness, and a deep bow. My heart swells with courage to read your words. ❤️🙏🏽❤️
Love the tears which water the times.
Thank you Deena, so poignant and fierce. You are one of our Hags, uncompromising truth speakers.
Witnessing and changing our lives. I've been hearing these teachings from you for years and when I can incorporate your definition of magic you spoke many, many years ago now, I can see additional possibilities. Magic, to paraphrase you, is making an action in one realm with an effect in another. As in Lise's witness ripples the pool. I cannot stand seeing the Wolf Mother and Elephant Matriarch, can we bear the helplessness or does our heart being broken ripple the shape of things. Love to you. Nora
--
Our broken hearts, undenied, like your insistence that we accept the grief of loss, can / must affect the environment we're in, and so ... and so ... we live differently, we must, I think. You say, you think, it matters to the dead that we reach out to them; similarly, i think it matters to the living. Lots of love to you, Deena
“I don’t know if it is choice or happenstance that I eschew depression in response to our situation and become energized by the call to meet these circumstances.”
You have taught all of us so much about the kind of energy that is required. Thank you Deena for this powerful and timely reminder. As I face a new group of students this week in my university classes, a majority of whom are in treatment for anxiety and / or depression, I take inspiration from your words and teaching, which guide me in helping these young people to find the healing energy inherent in bearing witness, to see what is true, and fall in love with an earth that needs them.
Yes. we must be there for the young ones who are inevitably undone by the hell we are creating and their seeming helplessness. So much to say here ... but, first, they don't have to follow our ways. And then, If and when they find intimacy with the other beings who are also suffering, the heartmind can direct them to the varioius means to becoming true allies for the future. Your being alongside them, in the knowing and the not knowing ,and the loving that is foundational, matters so much.