Is It Enough To Be Frantic?

We are down to the wire with an enormous, self-created debt ceiling crisis. Certainly joining the pundits when I have nothing profound to say is not where I can help. Nor wracking my brain to find solutions to problems that are beyond my abilities to solve.

I need to not allow myself to be seduced by the hype that threatens to draw each and everyone into this circus. Avoid the inclination to embrace the crisis mentality; respond with an urgency outbreak, or make oneself a party to the various polariities. These admonitions, also, alert me to not join in with the rampant frustration, complaining and fear that is prevailing.

The current debt crisis conversation generates urgency as an addiction.  We don't really know how much emergency preparedness is truly needed here, do we? How much is only drama?

What to do? What to do in this time of manifest or, perhaps, manufactured crisis?

Then I remember the words of Everett Edward Hale, a dear friend of Helen Keller

I am only one;
But still I am one;
I cannot do everything;
But still I can do something,
And because I cannot do everything,
I will not refuse to do the something
That I can do.

There will be something for me to do before the day is over. It may or may not have anything to do with crisises. For now I will be calm and still, not frantic and caught up in the drama, knowing full well that some other new drama awaits just around the corner for tomorrow, the next day or next week.

If I stay calm, then my "assignmnet" will become clear to me; I will know what to do that truly is mine. And i will be fairly assured that this path of serenity will give me one more solid, step out of detaching from the games people play in this addict society. One step closer to awe.

As my dear zop sistah, Sandi, has said, "I am not going to allow "them" (i.e, the politicians and the media) to hijack my goodness."
 
Interpretation: Maintain balance under fire. Don't lose your head to those stirring the drama, hold to your integrity, serenity and your good sense for living. Avoid non-problem solving polarizations.

The sunshines. Enjoy the day.

Addict Society Recovery Plan Announced!

New Horizons and the Small “Zones Of Peace” Project

Announces

The Addict Society Recovery Plan

Details forthcoming

For details and stories, also check out:

Anastasia The Storyteller

http://anastasiastoryteller.blogspot.com/

To participate in our interview survey/study:

The Study Of The Possible Human, Possible Society

Contact Anastasia at:

Zonesofpeacenh@aol.com

Cell: 240.409.5347

This is gonna be such fun!

Other Than Urgency, Other Than Enemies: The Possible Human, Possible Society

Of course the "silent majority" would be fed up with Washington.

There is a quality of life; a way of living, that for many of us is as close as an arm’s length reach away. You got to know it, “not about it,” but really know IT, because you lived it.

You took the kinds of risks to know IT you’d probably avoid now that you've grown up. Still you found out much about life because you risked the knowing, up close, right in the middle of the fray. Not at the impersonal more-than-arm’s-length of cyberspace. But up close with real people, face-to-face in all kinds of mud and muck.

Maybe the living of IT was almost fanciful. Maybe you were too young and immature to be aware of its illusory, even shadey aspects. Maybe because of a lack of maturity you didn’t catch on to the pitfalls. Sometimes they even hit you hard like a two-by-four over the head. But you did get to know IT, at least for awhile.

Eventually you opted to become a good student of life, rather than demanding so much of it. So you mellowed out, took the hard knocks and went on from there, sometimes sadder but wiser. Still somewhere deep inside you held onto your dreams, even after you were brutally awakened.  

If you were – and – still remain one of these students of life, one of the things you discovered on your journey through adult life was -- though you may have even been an ardent anti-government demonstrator of this and that and the other thing -- the democratic arrangements of our founding father make a whole lot of sense.

So you gave up demonstrating and making other kinds of a ruckus – and -- decided to become a voter, sometimes consistently, sometimes intermittently, deciding its better to work within the system rather than overthrow it.

Now, however, the government is demonstrating to overthrow you. You’ve grown to care about it, but it seems to be refusing to care about you.

So you shake your head and complain or sit quietly with your sorrow and loss. There are no leaders to count on. The values of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness seem to be an almost impossible dream. Nonetheless, you have not given up hoping, nor decided to simply sit this one out on the sidelines..

However, while you seem to have grown up, your leaders do not, acting, at best, like bullies on a playground or superior know-it-alls; petty tyrants all. No real grown-ups with vision and spirit seem to be in charge or have much power to make things work well.

Not really one among them that you can count on to truly have a dream and the capability to carry it forth.

You see where you are today, wondering where did it all go.

What to do? What to do?

Coming soon: The Study Of The Possible Human, The Possible Society.

Offering what we can to gather and support the dream makers and dreams and help them become manifest with a passion for peace.

Still intent on getting it together on ground level – and – Climbing The Mountain Of Awe

For inquiries on how to participate in our "Possible Human, Possible Society" Study, contact Anastasia at: zonesofpeacenh@aol.com

Also, check out my “We Came For Camelot” stories on Anastasia The Storyteller.

The Right Kind of Urgency

There’s a right kind of urgency. And, there is a wrong kind. A woman, generally, knows the difference. She feels it in her body, especially if she has borne children. Even more so, if she has reared them too.

The right kind of urgency comes of the fire in the soul, forging a new life form. Something tangible grows out of the effort; something that may even be beautiful, at least, to its mother.

The wrong kind goes round and round, feeding off itself, with nothing genuine to show for its efforts. Like a tiger chasing its tail. The wrong kind of urgency keeps us relentlessly on edge, like warriors poised for a battle that will have no true victor, nor any end in sight.

I don’t want that wrong kind of urgency infecting my space, especially when generated by others. It’s bad enough when I bring it in myself. Thus I am moved to speak out on the issue of urgency, at least, until I feel I have made myself “perfectly clear.”.

Nonetheless, I didn’t realize, until my Divine ZOP Sistah, Sandi, I and were head deep into passionate discussion, that it was the wrong kind of urgency that was prompting me to bring up that highly toxic subject; the coming elections of 2012, during a nice, relaxing Sunday afternoon chat.

Oops. Make room for the bad kind of urgency. If our armed, goddess-guards do not protect the gates, it can slip in anywhere. Damn!

“You know, Sandi, the politicians are going to tear us apart in this coming election. They’ve already started.”

“Yeah, I know, said she. But what can you do?”

“I don’t know, said I, back to her.”

Hmm, I mused to myself, was dear Sandi already defeated by the campaigning still to come? Well, it already could be daunting, especially if you opened up the internet. And, who could totally avoid that in this day and age?

“But, said I, you know, I/we can do something. We cannot just sit back and do nothing.”

(I, had no idea, yet, what that might be, of course.)

"Well, said she, I know you don’t like to just sit by. As for me, what I can figure out for now is just to not let them hijack my goodness!"

Is that a priceless statement or what?

I could feel in my heart as well as my body, these were the words of a wise woman who had, determinedly, made up her mind how to protect herself. So I had no more to say to at the moment to my dear Sandi.

Still, I could not quite let the subject drop inside of me with that as enough of a conclusion just yet.  Today, the spark from that exchange, already igniting a sense of injustice made right, thus found me pulling down women-power books, left and right.

Some of them from as far back as undergraduate women’s studies, others (relative to the progression of my life’s journey) as recent as "Women Who Run With The Wolves."  I would not be daunted!

The flaming, warrior woman, creative goddess within was readying herself to not be held hostage, again, by the lies and manipulations of my good life by politicians and the media that feeds off them. The political had become personal, the personal political!

Sarah Palin is just not my ideal of what I wanted out of my fight for equal rights for women and a woman in the White House. I would have to move into woman warrior mode now myself.

Question: How can a sane person navigate the coming election and happily support a winning side come November, 2012?

Answer: Somehow find a means for women’s way, the way of the feminine heart, to win.

Question: Does anybody else notice that women running for office are playing a man’s game in politics, even in a skirt.

Possible Solution: Somehow assist our democratic process to truly be feminized. Not just a new face for the same old, same old patriarchal games.

That means an election outcome with a good bit of awe. Not awful!

Question: Who knows how? And, if not now, when? (Words of a wise Jewish statesman.)

Urgency: Part II

Yesterday (July 3), after I had written and posted the blog that follows, I almost immediately wanted to take it down, delete it, disconnect myself from it, as quickly as I could. I felt ashamed of the article I had written.

Yet something in me said, “Wait, hold off, consider, contemplate the writing of the piece and the wanting to be rid of it.”

Though I read and re-read it, eventually doing so twenty or thirty times, I still could not put my finger on what was amiss for me. The best I could come up with that from my post that was as spiritual and vulnerable a piece as I had ever written, the progression to the July 3 blog seemed stilted and false. It seemed as if I had gone and put some kind of mask over myself; somehow left a part of myself behind.

Perhaps I had created what ego-infused “urgency” can do; erected a barrier between my outer self and my inner self as I wrote the blog. Or, perhaps the excitement generated by our last, power-packed “Climbing The Mountain Of Awe GAME” group (June 30) had not been adequately channeled.

Perhaps I was simply feeling pushed by my self-imposed deadline to post, at least, one piece before 4th of July and just wasn’t up to par. Or, perhaps I had gotten so many, precious accolades from that post (I truly did love it myself) that I felt stymied as to what to do next; “a tough act to follow.” Maybe so much change, both positive and challenging, is presently going on in my life that I just do not, consistently, have me together.

Anyway, our blueprint stage GAME group (now meeting almost weekly) was a richly rewarding experience on Thursday, June 30th and brought with it some exciting news that is posted here below.
 
To help us make the impact we are after, SABA Direct, Inc. has donated a starting supply of the first (of ten parts) of my unpublished, unedited “Random House Trilogy” manuscript for our new fundraising project, specially designed to overcome areas of polarization in communities.

“Surviving Addictions: “On The Origins And Cure Of Adrenalin/Excitement Addictions In Contemporary American Life” makes a strong case for the power and impact of the New Horizons’ approach to community development and violence prevention. Hopefully, our readers, followers and supporters will want to know more about our theories, perspectives and strategies from here forth and will be as excited to purchase a copy of this first manuscript portion as we are to now make it available.

Centennial Memorial United Methodist Church overcame the polarization their congregation was experiencing with the guidance and support of our unique community development approach. In danger of their doors closing, they not only overcame divisions to keep the church open and operating, they took what we provided and created that enviable outcome I call awe. Of course, Centennial drew upon the authority of that best-selling book, The Bible. That was the main source of their awe.

In the secular world, however, something further seems to generally be needed, if one is to reach awe, personally and collectively. We are "excited" (hopefully in the healthiest of ways) to introduce you to the philosophical and theoretical underpinnings of the New Horizons’ Small Zones of Peace community development and violence prevention model through the pages of this held-too long in abeyance material.

Thanks to Saba Direct, Inc. we will now have copies of my manuscript (part one of ten) for our participants to use as a handbook for that trek up the Mountain of Awe should you want to join us or try it on your own.

See this link for details on how you can purchase your own personal copy and support our developing “Climbing The Mountain of Awe GAME” project and our other projects yet to be announced.

Urgency

“Urgency is what you need to get across to people!”

Bob Hanson is stressing this point to Sue and I. We are meeting with Bob and his partner, Barry Hinton, of Saba Direct, Inc.,* direct marketing specialists. At this particular moment, we are the recipients of their bountiful wisdom on how to run a successful community visibility and fundraising campaign.

I am happily challenged. Sue is just happy, especially as she is the one that brought these generous, wise men to us.

Yes! To gain the impact we are after through our project we must convey the urgency! What good sense that makes.

But, urgency is an addiction. Along with addictions to power, anger, lying and excess materialism, defeating these addictions on a community-wide level is one of our program’s prime objectives. (i.e. Addictions other than to alcohol and drugs.)

And, yes, trust me, if you don’t already know it, urgency when infused with repeated hits of adrenalin fuels many of the ills of our society (i.e. excitement addictions).

Exceptional communities are founded on other than adrenalin highs. So how can we build healthfully generate “excitement”? Be “of it (i.e. the problem), but not in it”; solution builders, not addiction enablers?

One of the prime objectives of our project is to teach people how to strengthen and/or form small community pockets that are exceptional in nature. That means we are after something more elevated in character than fostering the mediocrity of the masses, the shallowness of living in an addicted society such as our’s.

My heart and my mind, like most Americans on the 4th of July, yearns for the majesty of our country at its best, not the messes we seem, also, able to create.

So when the fireworks go off, as they already started to last night in my neighborhood, along with celebrating the holiday, I will be asking myself:

What are the fires our Small “Zones of Peace” initiative wants to particularly dampen at this time?

And, how can we present ourselves as proponents of “urgency” without addiction; that passion for integrity, social justice, creativity and commitment that infuses our best?

You know the “good guys” urgency; the urgency that is based on genuine survival imperatives, not the ego-generated ones!

Perhaps we could even attempt to make a dent in overcoming the polarization of politics that looms ahead with next year’s elections?

Such are the issues our New Horizons Board of Directors will ponder with me when next we meet on July 17.