It seems that everyone I know, including me, is feeling stressed out due to the upcoming election, the state of world peace, and all of the environmental disasters that have been occurring more rapidly.
What’s a person to do? How do we find peace and calm amidst this noise while continuing to be engaged citizens? I don’t pretend to have the answer to this question. I will share with you a few things that are keeping me sane right now.
Sometimes I get off one highway exit early to my house in order to drive by the sign in the photo above. Whomever put the sign up recently repainted it in bold orange paint: “Everything will be OK.” For some reason, I find this sign oddly comforting.
Recently I was looking for a podcast that had nothing to do with news or politics. I found on “Switched on Pop,” a podcast I occasionally listen to, an episode about Stevie Wonder entitled “The virtuosity of Stevie Wonder.”
Stevie is my go-to musician to cheer me up and make me think at the same time. I also like to sing and dance along with his music. One podcast led me to another: “The wonder of Stevie,” which includes several episodes that go into depth about his albums from the 1970s. In one episode, Journalist Brittany Luse describes how on Stevie’s “Innervisions” album he pairs two songs, “Living for the City” with “Golden Lady” and how this demonstrates that “alongside great pain and great struggle is also great beauty and great joy.” I feel both in Stevie’s music.
Robin Wall Kimmerer, in her book, “Braiding Sweetgrass” writes, … “it is not enough to weep for our lost landscapes; we have to put our hands in the earth to make ourselves whole again. Even a wounded world is feeding us. Even a wounded world holds us, giving us moments of wonder and joy. I choose joy over despair. Not because I have my head in the sand, but because joy is what the earth gives me daily and I must return the gift.” (Page 327)
In these troubling times, we may both express gratitude and reciprocate by sharing our personal gifts, whatever they may be, with other beings and in how we live our daily lives.
May you walk in peace,
Sue
Lagniappe
I highly recommend the book, Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer.
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