the story of stuff

the home planet.

my children belong to a culture that nominally should have inherited the ethics of a society so aware of its strengths and failings that they would make much better choices than i did, and certainly much better choices than my parents did. where two generations ago, the planet was treated with utter disregard, there is an awareness now of the consequences of those choices and behaviours that offers some sense of hope, if you accept the possibility that awareness is the first step on the journey to anything involving change.

i would say that in terms of their personal makeup, the degree of empowerment they enjoy (and sometimes use rightly!) my children are better and fuller people than i was at the same age. in terms of the larger picture of their place in the grand allness of this world though they are as lacking, if not more so, than they should be. and so what to do?

as a person who has lived much of his life internally and has intellectualized so much that should have been lived out loud, i have modelled an approach to life that maximizes my awareness and minimizes my responsibility. i accept the blame for my part in not devoting myself to a greater degree than i have in sensitizing them to the realities of the impact they have on the natural world. for not directing them to see and act on the possibilities that exist for them to effect change on a small scale through being true to their intuitive senses. for not really hammering home my knowledge that the way this world is organized makes no sense, and especially for having allowed my need to see them happy at all costs - particularly through my underscoring of the "need it, must have it, use it, get rid of it" cycle that i wasn't able to enjoy as fully as they are - to override my own knowledge that what we are doing is very wrong and disrespectful of our planet as a whole organism.

but the game is not over yet. i know that missing in these acknowledgments is a deeper understanding that my children are aware of which is simply that there is more, much more to this world than meets the eye and that it is central to living in rightness that that awareness be translated into a way of being. i have also endeavoured to give them the tools to manage the incongruities and disconnects that naturally accrue to their being social creatures in a world peopled with creatures disconnected from themselves. it's my hope that they will take these tools and use them to bring greater good into this world.

on the subject of greater good, and deeper understandings . . . for your further edification today comes this video from peterborough brenda (nope not the one i live with). the video is entitled "the story of stuff" and while very obviously american, carries a clear and well-articulated message asking for us to embrace a deeper understanding of our place and purpose on this planet.

the story of stuff

and to close, a coleman barks interpretation of a poem by the great sufi poet rumi . . .

whoever brought me here, will have to take me home.

all day I think about it, then at night I say it.
where did I come from, and what am I supposed to be doing?
i have no idea.
my soul is from elsewhere, i'm sure of that,
and i intend to end up there.

this drunkenness began in some other tavern.
when i get back around to that place,
i'll be completely sober. meanwhile,
i'm like a bird from another continent, sitting in this aviary.
the day is coming when i fly off,
but who is it now in my ear who hears my voice?
who says words with my mouth?

who looks out with my eyes? what is the soul?
i cannot stop asking.
if I could taste one sip of an answer,
i could break out of this prison for drunks.
i didn't come here of my own accord, and i can't leave that way.
whoever brought me here, will have to take me home.

this poetry. I never know what i'm going to say.
i don't plan it.
when im outside the saying of it,
i get very quiet and rarely speak at all.

jelalladin rumi (1207 - 1273) trans. coleman barks.