Chapter 9
2020 COVID-19 – April 6 At almost any point of the day, you are likely surrounded by things that can kill you. A cabinet full of cleaning supplies, bottles of liquor, sharp knives, dull knives, office supplies, busses, trains, cars, airbags, bags of air, heights, lows, uneven surfaces, escalators, glass, mosquitoes, sharp metal, rusty metal, death metal, and most dangerous of all…other people.
The trick with life is that lots of little things can kill you every day. But generally they don’t, they just dent you. It’s the accumulation of these dents that add up over time. The mere act of living is a story of all the tiny deaths and dents we collect along the way. Some are too small to even notice and others are so big you never fully regain your balance.
I find it remarkable what we have all been able to do during the early weeks of this new normal. How we have mobilized collectively in a way that most of us have never seen before. Nations calling citizens home because their borders were closing in the face of an invisible enemy. Did we have to be forced to be physically apart to see how much we need to be physically together? As humans not just people who ‘belong’ to certain places?
Technology is a catalyst in connecting us and perhaps fear for our own health and fear of the unknown is driving so many of us to comply. I suspect it is more to do with love over fear. If nothing else I’m feeling the innate connection (almost) all of us have to protect and contain each other. To help keep us collectively safer and to make sure we do something together to stop something that is larger than our fears.
I have no idea what next week is going to look like. And I’m blessed to not live alone during this time. Collectively we are going to shine brighter than anything this malaise tries to darken.
This year seems to have broken before it got properly started. But what if it was us who were broken?
Broken in our relationship with nature.
Broken in our relationships with each other.
Broken by looking in the wrong places trying to find the right things.
What if we all needed to reset, pause, redo and restart?
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in…
Leonard Cohen
On the other side of all this, we are forced to be changed.
One way or another. And change is always good.
The universe has made us uncomfortable so we could grow out of the old and into something else. Hopefully into something brand new.
Be safe and be well.
I love you.