Where we are going is not necessarily where we have been

There is a sense that what we have done before will work again. 

There is a sense that how we do things has to be proven, known and repeated before we can actually do something properly. 

I am feeling right now, in this current time, that we need to challenge this assumption. Not throw away all that information, knowledge, learning, experience, not at all. What I'm suggesting is innovation, adaptation, growth and change all come from doing things in a new way differently than we have done before. 

Individually and collectively we encounter transition whether we want to or not. When the challenges of such times face us, we then emotionally, even seemingly logically, tend to either hold on to the way things were or reject them outright. There often is not a lot of gray area.  There is also a need for allowances for people who are not in the same place as those who are ready to change. 

In response to such change the first thing I feel is really important is to accept yourself where you are at now. This personal grounding is the anchor point. It is the place from which you come in order to be able to deal with where others come from. If you are not anchored and clear in your own self, then you will be swayed easily, rocked about, tossed and turned and pushed over easily by everybody else. 

Over time, whether long or short, each person goes through their own adjustment, their own transition, their own sense of newness in their clarity around what and why they are here. It is possible in such change that a sense of purpose comes up, a sense of being comes up, a sense of why begins to emerge. 

As people go through these types of experiences, then those around will either reject, support, buffer or hold on to that person in the old way. In response it is important to be really strong in who you are because if you are changing as a person then those who have known you in one way will not understand why. 

They don't need to. That is your business, not their business. However, the change in your behaviour, the change in your actions might be taken personally by those who do not understand you. In a way people will mirror back to you the challenge that you are going through. As they test you, as they bounce back to you your own words and actions, they might even demonstrate that in the past you have done this. So who are you to do that? There are a lot of experiences that may come up, and again, it goes back to being really clear about yourself, being really sure about your own way, your own stance.

Now this is not a way of excluding other people, because the next step is to also honour and accept others who are in their place. So take a moment to consider a perspective. Imagine you are standing in yourself and that you are looking out around you. As you look around notice the circle of people that is closest to you, that immediate group of people, family, friends, co-workers, colleagues, community members. This very small inner circle is the first one that you are going to see and they are going to mirror back to you what you are going through. Again some will go with you. Some will go in their own way, but there will be a shift, a change in that circle the more you change. 

Now let's imagine you pick somebody in that circle to walk with you through your change. Notice how they walk with you in this change. Notice how they support you or do not support you, and support does not necessarily come out explicitly.  Support can be inexplicit, it can be subtle. It can be through just the actions and not so much through the words. So they may choose behaviours and actions that go against you. Again, this is just my view that we need to be prepared for this reaction of others. Yes, as we change, those around us may not be ready to. 

Everybody has a window, an opportunity to relook at their own views, to rechallenge their belief system to in a sense pay attention to where they are at now and test out the assumptions they have made in order to get there.   At the same time, there is a need to accept and recognise that past that you have been through. There is nothing at all wrong with what that is. It's just what got you where you are now.

I started thinking about this whole conversation thread, this whole piece, because it occurred to me that we are trying to fix the problems in the world by doing what we have always done. We are fighting with each other. We are taking sides. We are aligning with institutions that represent what we think are our beliefs. We go back to where we have felt comfortable, safe and known even if the fundamental aspects of these places no longer serve us or even worse, no longer serve us collectively as a group, a community, a society, a planet even. 

I do not expect upheaval in everything. I am not looking for that. I am by far the last person to be considered an activist. What I am though is definitely somebody who believes that we all have our place in testing and challenging, in a constructive way, the status quo. To actually ask “is the way we are doing things is still suitable?” To ask “is the way we are doing things, still working and if not, what can we do about it?”

What this also means is that there is a huge challenge for all of us, myself included, to not blame others, to be able to look at things in a way that is both compassionate to others, caring of others, nonjudgmental and supportive. Then to also look at ourselves in this way. 

As I write this post, and as I communicate this point, I feel the frustration. I feel the angst and tiredness of us all. We have fatigue, we are done. We do not want to do this anymore. We want it to be easy. And I do not think it is actually going to be easy if we fight it anymore. 

I'm looking around, as I am sure you are too, and seeing that every single day now something is coming up, something is happening that tests us, that challenges us. For those who do not want to read the news, do not want to look at social media or just do not want to know, it is also testing us when the environment itself around us is in upheaval and screaming out for attention. 

You are affected by happenings around us whether you want to know or not. It is as if events are saying we have to do something and I truly believe that unless we do something, it is going to just get worse.

I think the complacency, fear, avoidance, or whatever we are all going through (and I'm included in some of these things for sure) of, ‘I don't want to look at this’, ‘it's too hard’, is there in front of our faces and we need to stop and actually look at it, but look at it from our heart, not just our head. Look at it with love and understanding and say, well how did we get to this place? What happened that got us here? What is it that is leading us down this path that could possibly change that we could go in a different way. From these comments perhaps you can already see where I am headed and again it is not a blaming scenario.

It is not about ganging up on others who do not share our views or are different from us. It's not about that. Yet this dividing response is happening. Instead we can respond to an invitation that is implicitly out there saying let's rise above this. Those who are ready, called to and willing, have the capacity, are interested and care can start having the conversations that lead to new actions. Let's start looking at things differently. Let's start asking the questions. 

To start -  we need to do so within ourselves. 

So we are back to the reason why I am writing this post. It is because in my heart of hearts, I believe that if each one of us individually stops and does this work ourselves, then collectively we will actually make a positive change. I genuinely want us to be a better place for all, for future generations. I want us to live together in a way that is kinder and fairer and more loving than what we are going through right now.