New Old Way Of Being
Stories As Heart-To-Heart Resuscitations
Dear Ones,
Hi Sapiens. Holy cosmos. Take a look at what is ending. Take a look at how you relate to what is ending. Are you rattled by energy of completion and closure?
No one has the same experience. I fumble around in this body spacesuit. The space where everything ends and begins. I came out generous. I vow to return that way.
Work through the knots. It is worth it after lifetimes of rootlessness. Beach stones soften by turbulent seas. May we too smooth out jagged pains like shore rocks?
EARTH WEALTH
Light runs wild now. Honestly, I don’t trust anyone who vilifies stars. Whatever beauty and truth you find here, it is from nature. Our nature.
I trade all I know for a new and uncertain way. A new old way of being. I dream of a world where a living tree is worth more than a dead one. A world where a living being is worth more than a dead one.
If wealth is tending to a garden. I am the richest person walking this Earth. Digging out stories of the Earth. Creating wild-crafted plant medicines. Cherishing what sustains me. Friends from the 1900s. Bookish whimsical life. Flower medicine. Earth food. Sea full of heartbeats.
SUFFERING IS SUFFERING IS SUFFERING
I don’t understand people who come wound up in any sort of units. Existing only in pairs. Self-decodification is hard enough. I can’t even sort out my rich buried mysteries. Let alone devote this short life to try to understand any thing or any one else.
Inauthenticity is a tension. A maladaption. Energy vampire. Stems from fear of fear. This suffering is not mine vs. yours. It is a common quality of our shared humanity. Whether you are aware or not, we stew together like a pot of my Persian garden Ash.
SEASON OF POMEGRANATE
We suffer from digestion problems from sensory overload, sapiens. What goes in comes out.
I am pretty sure nutrient-dense pomegranate is what love tastes like. This ancient fruit, native to my home country, helps my body and soul digest it all. When in season (starting now), I add medicinal pomegranate seeds to my breakfast, lunch, and dinner almost daily. Fresh fruit is actual medicine. Fruit of our ancestors.
It is a good source of vitamin C, A, and E and has anti-oxidant, anti-viral and anti-tumor properties. Good enough reasons to head to the local farmer’s market this fall if you ask me. I can’t wait!
DIAGNOSIS OF SAMENESS
Is sameness (aka self-abandonment) an ICD diagnosis code? It should be. Who writes these codes anyway? Nevermind that question…Let’s just write new codes together. Redefine it all.
Variation and diversity are necessary for healthy ecosystems. Monocultures lead to infestation and necrosis. Be they crops or people. Sameness is a deep sickness because it lives outside of our awareness.
Oneness is not the same as sameness. Oneness: living beings are unique and we operate as one organism. We can acknowledge diversity and still recognize interconnected oneness. Paradox holding is some balancing act.
BIOLOGY HEART
I am a biologist at heart. Some call me a solutionarist. Well, no one calls me that but I like the sound of that sentence. I call myself that. I am no one. So there.
A biologist is a scientist who studies living organisms and their interactions with each other and their environment. We understand that conditions never stay the same. That things are always going to change. That is literally the definition of being alive. We change, grow, age, fall ill, and die in any order.
SEASONS OF YOU AND ME
I plant in the Earth when the moon and the sun tell me to plant in the Earth. It is called biodynamic gardening. Greater cycles affect smaller ones.
A zillion years ago, in 153 BC, the Roman Senate declared January 1st as the first day of a new year. What an asynchronous choice.
Bodies are to be in rest and hibernation mode in winter. Not drugged up to keep up with atrial fibrillation of hustle monoculture. Busyness boobie traps.
COMFORT CRISES
Let’s face it. Our modern obsession with comfort and convenience grew excessive. Blame our microplastic, digitally doped-up brains. Forever chemicals.
popularized the concept of comfort crisis in this great book.Human comfort tendencies led to a decline in our physical and mental well-being. Comfort conditioning contributes to relational imbalances with self, others, and the world.
Indulgence decreases brain activity. Worth reading that again. Distraction is a type of anesthesia to keep us asleep. Check out this 4 minute cartoon of the addiction of “happiness”.
Embracing discomfort (ie. facing dark truth) helps us tap into our innate human healing potential. The remedies within us. We can unlock a range of benefits through emotional and consciousness awareness.
What is the root cause of comfort-seeking human behavior? good question, my guess is pain
Who taught us to avoid discomfort and why? denying hard truths leads to eventual soul departure
How hard is it for individual brains to unlearn and relearn awareness habits? depends on our openness
Rx FOR SPIRITUAL DEPRIVATION
Just think about it: what is the first thing religious dictators do for social controlling endeavors? Spoiler alert: Forbid gods of art, poetry, music, humanity… How curious?
Contrary to popular belief, a flow-state condition is not “zoning out.” It is being “in the zone” like I am during this transmission.
Flow state = art = spirituality = divinity = humanness= connection to nature/our nature.
Flow state allows for a heightened concentration and focus for healing. Temporary down-regulation occurs in a process called transient hypofrontality. This inactivation of the prefrontal area may lead to feelings of distortion of time, loss of self-consciousness, and loss of inner critic. Ego-dissolution.
Humans in flow state:
Seek out activities that align with passions so are less likely to be controlled.
Focus on the process of learning and growth, rather than outcomes.
Experience spiritual fulfillment regardless of external forces.
Cultivate a high degree of self-awareness and self-direction.
BRAVE NEW WORLD
Mass media, advertising, and other forms of propaganda are used to create societal norms, manipulate thought, and stifle dissent. Social controls (“norms”) are pernicious.
We are all susceptible. If you think you are immune, you have the deepest variant of this modern affliction. Bamboozlement 10.0. Trust me, I took an honors course.
Aldous Huxley‘s prophetic book Brave New World depicts a dystopian society where people:
are conditioned to be passive consumers (not aware).
are discouraged from thinking critically.
are controlled through manipulation and distraction.
are unable or unwilling to think for themselves.
RED-WINGED BLACKBIRDS
Don’t despair. There is good news: brain activity increases with a connection to nature! How cool is that? Free medicine. Maybe let’s get the children outside? It is just a thought.
Local songbirds left my side at the end of August. On August 28th to be exact. It disoriented me. Birdsong was a free anxiolytic medicine for the last 5 months (March-August). The supply chain ended. I needed new medicine. Free medicine. The hummingbirds and monarchs arrived on the same day. I guess they took the baton for “Nessa’s rescue squad relay.” Thank heavens.
I stood under the wires trying to Merlo identify birds that sounded like machines. An enthusiastic neighbor came outside. We exchanged sexy bird information. Together, we admired the fire under their wings and odd electronic birdsounds.
She confessed she used to feed peanuts to our resident crows. I once saw the crows bury said peanuts in the soil of my garden.
This is a healing story of the interconnectedness of neighborhood birds, plants, and humans.
***NESSA TIP*** Free nature medicine is everywhere. Check the pulse of local birds, flowers, and trees on a daily walk around block. Take a minimum of 10 minutes a day to be mindful, present, and connected to the seasons of your local fauna and flora to receive physiological benefits. Don’t believe me? I don’t blame you. Dare to go analog and see for yourself.
Thank you for sharing this labor of love with me. Slam on the heart below if you feel like it. Sharing, commenting, liking, and subscribing = loving.
May All Beings Find Peace.
Nessa (born at 333 ppm)
***********A NEW LISTENING PROJECT**********
Listening is healing. Storytelling is heart-to-heart resuscitation. Relational health is vital. Nessa Sanctuary is my new experiment of being available with you in a safe space as a teacher, student, and guide. I plan to meet one-on-one for 60 minutes with a limited number of people for unknown duration. It will be a pay-what-you-can model. *No “medical” advice.
For a free 30 min curiosity call, click on calender link here or reply to this email.
SCARS OF MY HAPPINESS
I appreciate the streams of consciousness that appear to influence your writing (and I could be dead wrong!). My time spent in South America this year has been, in some respects, a chance to separate from the comfortable and familiar. My path forward may not be any clearer, but what you've shared provides welcome company for the journey.
Love the hip-rock-hopping jazz of it all. There's a beautiful old world-worded book by Robert MacFarlane called (I think) Nessa, poeticated on a bomb shelter on the coast. Nuclear language entanglement? My favourite line (of yours today) is that you just liked the sound of that sentence. As the serpent said in the storyfold of Eden (bizarrely, in Latin), "quidne." Why not?
Appreciate the uncomfortable point. Yes, don't take things for granted. Stay hungry.
We had a pomegranate on our front porch growing up, seedful. Those seeds are rocks. But the tiny bit around the seeds, pink-neat? Patience and tiny nibbles. In neighbourhood news: just last week two kookaburras sat waiting on a branch as the dog, duck and I waddled gavorted the paddock. One their third arrived they erupted into song together, then stopped together, all looked left, then stayed that way. I think they were waiting for us to clap. But sometimes silence, like a bow, is a deeper appreciation. So I'll leave this here.