I’ve been thinking about circles. In part because I’ve become so tired of squares and rectangles. Square documents and rectangular screens. Flat, square “logic” and reading-watching-imbibing-responding through one rectangle or another. Checking boxes and filling out linear forms and reading sharp-cornered reactivity online. I want to slip out of squares and rectangles as often as possible and slip into the shapes and space of the brilliant not-made-by-humans world.
In this moment, even as I’m sitting with this rectangular screen, I’m feeling the shape of my breath moving into my body. It’s not square. Hallelujah. I’m feeling the roundness of my fingertips and the tree-ring-like fingerprints on the keys as I type. I’m letting my vision expand to include the space around me, above and below me, and letting my awareness expand into my back and the space behind me. I’m inhabiting the breath coming into me and going back out – into houseplants and trees and squirrel lungs and finch lungs and floating on a breeze perhaps all the way to you, right where you’re reading this. Shall we do it together? Breathe, I mean? And isn’t us breathing together in time-out-of-time an intimacy and a magic somehow beyond this rectangle too? Let’s take a nice full breath all the way down into our soft bellies and then a nice slow and extra long exhalation. Let’s blow each other kindness on the exhale.
I’m always wondering: Can we escape the restrictions of rectangles by invitations made through these rectangles? I know it’s possible. Maybe we just now did it a little bit. When Carl and I gather people online, that’s part of what we’re aiming to do. Embodiment, community, music, grief, praise, inspiration, poetry, movement, soul – none of them are flat or rectangular even if we’re diving into them via these devices that are.
Michael Meade says things so beautifully. Recently he dropped this: “Community is not living near someone but dwelling deeply with each other. That’s one of the basic ways to counteract the dividing that’s happening in the culture – by finding deeper ways to commune.” Friends, this is what we are all about!! I am so drained by small talk but deep communing fills my well. We love dwelling in the depths with wonderful others. Truly it’s the greatest wealth in my life.
Meade also said this: “We think we need more time. But we don’t need more time. We need more experiences of timelessness.” We’re all about that too.
Whether you’re joining one of our offerings or doing this in your own place, may we go deep together, may we bridge the divisions, and may we savor experiences of timelessness and spaciousness that are so far beyond squares and rectangles and small, flat thinking.
WIDER CIRCLES
We are moving in wider Circles
We are opening our circle
We are moving in wider circles
We are opening our circle
Oh be compass
I’ll be your light house
Speak your words with triumph
And I will watch your mouth
I’ll march with you my sister
To your place of fearing
We’ll dive into those waters
Swim into the clearing
We’ll always keep our heads up
We’ll always sing along
We’ll walk the path of kindness
Know where we belong
And I’ll march with you my brother
To the mountain top
We’ll hold back the dynamite
Make the rumble stop
Oh be a pillar
I’ll be your mockingbird
We’ll sing the rock of ages
Yes we will be heard
Lets form a great salvation
Through harmony and sound
We’ll know the shape of progress
Like nature, is always round
I’m sending kindness and soft curves and vast swaths of space and time,
along with the reminder that so much is still possible.
In each moment, we’re making culture and making the future.
May it be beautiful.
With love,
Erin
p.s. There are so many wonderful people daring to live outside the boxes of “normal,” often at significant personal expense. Many of the wonderful weirdos doing so are used to living on scrape-by finances, without pensions or benefits more traditionally employed people enjoy. But we persist in following the call of soul nonetheless because we can’t seem to do otherwise. (Carl and I have been doing this for decades so we know em when we see em! Kindreds!) While I’ll list some charities at the end which I love supporting and invite you to consider doing so too, I’m also going to list some of those wonderful soul-following folks living outside the boxes prescribed by mainstream society. Often the gift of throwing a few bucks a month (or more) under people like this means SO much. Really, you can’t know how much support means when you’re trying to carve out an unprecedented work-life in the midst of this overculture. (Infinite thanks to those of you who
support us!) Consider making a small or large donation if you have the means. Culture revives and regenerates from the edges and the margins, and I’m so grateful for the many many wonderful folks working from there. It’s so worth investing in. Even if you don’t donate, following and supporting their work with engagement is also a beautiful offering. (Some don’t even take donations, but many do.) We have a cloth print hanging on one of our walls that says
“Good People Everywhere.” It’s true.
(Sometimes these days it makes me cry to keep affirming that.) Let this list remind you that they exist. And that you are one of them. In no particular order, here are some wonderful folks:
(I’d love to know who you’d add to the list! Reply and let me know. I’d be happy to keep reposting lists like these in the future. Praise the wonderful
weirdos doing beautiful work in the world!) Let’s support biocultural restoration by investing in those making radical beauty at the margins!
Other good things:
On another note, this delicious small batch soy sauce made by my
beloved friend‘s partner is soooooo crazy good. We all love it and our teen is obsessed. It would make a really fun gift!
https://soyory.com/Here are four 4/4 star charities (rated by Charity Navigator) we’ve been donating to and invite you to join if possible. Let’s all keep praying and working for peace and liberation and freedom and dignity for all.
May the way we live be of benefit to all those beings with whom we connect. May we be blessed and may we bless.
From my heart,
Erin
