Photo: Rachel Liu Photography
Dear readers, welcome. I start by quoting from the introduction to the book that I am currently writing: Whole System Transformation: When You Mean to Radically Change the System…Including You!.
“One of my favorite things to do, in my childhood home, was to put a big, square mirror under my chin and to look down at the mirror as I walked through the house. I was walking on the ceiling? As I stared down into the mirror, I found my legs lifting to step over the beams in the ceiling or over the archway that divided each room. I would be startled as I almost walked right into the living room chandelier. This mirror-journey never ceased to amaze me. Holding two perspectives at the same time was as fascinating a past-time as I could find. Little did I know that my childhood obsession was tethered to what I would come to understand as my life’s purpose.
Today, we are standing at the edges of numerous precipices, not knowing where to turn or how to move. As in my childhood mirror-journeying, we are challenged to know if we should believe what appears to be right before us. Should we heed the warnings coming our way? Where should we focus? Can we trust ourselves to find a way through? And, is there anything worth journeying toward? In the story of my childhood pastime, I simply held one mirror with the assurance that I could remove its confusing signals instantly. In this information age, we are presented with many mirrors carefully placed and timed to appear and disappear just long enough to tickle a smoldering memory, a deep and seemingly forbidden longing for pure light, for true beauty, for recognizable truth, for real belonging. These are the longings of our hearts, disacknowledged throughout systems of domination yet remaining ever present and ready to be remembered. In that remembrance, we'd find ways of knowing and discern our true reflections. We'd be whole.
To travel a healing journey and clear a liberation path, we need multi-dimensional seeing—we must perceive and skillfully harmonize many frequencies at once. We know that to live requires that we be in motion but many of us, though seemingly active in the world, feel that our insides are frozen. This frozen pause is tied to what I call an ‘unwelcomed knowing.’ We sense a call for courage beyond any that we’ve previously faced or imagined. This knowing gives us pause because half-hearted efforts, efforts that got us through in the past, won’t work this time. The movement that we, individually and collectively, feel called to now demands that we cultivate inner knowing with a steadfast consciousness of interconnection. The practice of discernment is a must, alone and in community. We must be able to see through the clouds of deception surrounding us.
Today’s choice points are to be in-living or to be in-dying. Revolutionaries, transformers, healers, and creatives are already feeling the call. They inspire re-membering, bringing new stories, songs and leading power-filled resistance. All the while, the guardians of the status quo* are holding on with all their might.
We have before us a potential for living in ways yet unrecorded in our human storytelling. To live without the subjugation of genders, races, intelligences and ways of worshipping, loving, or creating. Whether through advanced digital technology or elevated consciousness, our perceiving of the root causes of our society’s instabilities is magnified for all to see.
Efforts to run away from the evidence and to dive into pools of distraction is understandable. I feel the pull to escape every day. Yet, some of you feel the same commitment that I feel to see clearly. To hear. To touch. To sense. We choose to transform for the sake of liberation. We are determined to glimpse a vision of our collective liberation. We are dedicated to bringing whatever brokenness and giftedness we have to walk in a good way that seeds love, truth, and wholeness for all.”
I have resisted starting my own Substack. I can be that way about “new” trends. I AM that way about new trends. But it was clearly time. As we move more deeply into this era of backlash—experiencing both the crumbling of structures built on the illusion of liberty for all and the exposure of uglier and uglier truths—we need each other. Moreover, we need heart-centered, root-level truth-telling and boundless love. And, I need to be with you in this way.
As I write my book, and as songs keep breaking through my spirit, I find that we must turn the signal up. An Ashford & Simpson song that has stayed with me since the early ’70s says, “If we don’t let nothing get in our way, we can make it to a brighter day. But I don’t want to miss the signs. So, I need your light with mine.”
I welcome those of you who know you need the light of others and those willing to share in lighting the way. Fear is rising all around us and will, at times, lead us to believe that running back into the arms of empire is the only logical choice. (Harriet, please help us out!) No, turning back is not the answer. The safety we seek is actually in new ways of being. I offer here monthly submissions that inspire and illuminate new ways—that acknowledges the fear, grieves the losses and strengthens our collective ability to see and actualize wholeness, joy and well-being for all.
Painting by Marilyn Johnson
Truly, our safety lies in the new ways of being. May the collective womb of the People be well protected!
Glad to be here with you!