Where do we learn or teach our rights and reasonable expectations when we date or are in relationship with another person? It seems our young people may be especially at need right now, to have a sense of their bodies, and the consequences of not listening to one another, and oneself. Particularly girls, as now in this historic moment, more seems at stake for a female body.

No doubt tons of energy is being tossed around right now, depending on where someone sits on the issues, and their idea of the preciousness of sharing one’s love and body. The idea of a Dating Bill of Rights exists in many forms online and has been distributed for years by organizations educating us all on the rights of one another.

From babies up through one’s entire life, to fully understand and respect that our body is our own isn’t often a shared concept. To feel clear and strong that no one has the right to touch our body or make us do something we don’t want to, and vice versa, that is a healthy knowledge and practice to have.

May we appreciate, understand and help protect one another’s Personal Bill of Rights.

https://safedatesmatter.org/portfolio/teen-dating-bill-of-rights/

It can feel like we don’t hear enough reasonable voices, voices of people able to think through and share complicated dynamics and issues. And in a quiet, confident way. Emotions like anger and verbal tools like hammers seem to be the public media discourse we are exposed. Do those voices help us learn, better understand, or have a sense of how to help? To witness a reasonable, informed person who is also serving at the USA Federal level, oh my, what a treat. It can feel like a mini oasis to find a reasonable voice in the sea of noise, debris and clutter.

We post this because it seems important. Listening to the first part of this link, of Peter Buttigieg’s speaking, for us it provided a way to rein in our emotions and powerlessness. He speaks to history, context, the bigger picture, what justice of all kinds might look like and where we find ourselves right now. We are grateful for this reasonable voice at this time.

The idea and practice of getting along can sound simple. Many of us heard it often growing up, especially in families with kids. Yet telling children or anyone to just get along might not actually help them know how to get along. It might “teach” us we have to stop yelling, or wanting something, or clam up, but what really is at the core of getting along?

What does it feel like to come through a small friction or larger conflict, and actually be getting along with yourself and those involved? Sometimes, to get along or keep the peace in a family, or at a dinner or some tense situation, might we submerge what we want or need in an effort to have the appearance of getting along? And what happens over time if we never really are dealing with the issues, but keep smoothing or covering them over so that a “moment” looks good? What is the cost to all involved over time? We bite our tongue? We dumb down? We avoid or stay away? We make jokes? Much gets swept under the carpet. We might become aware of the “land mines” we need to avoid if we want to “get along” ? Then are we really getting along?

Has conflict or difference of opinion become scary for most of us westerners? What is the worst that can happen? Are we trying to get along or scared to really try? Do many of us skim the surface and have a life with less true feeling, vibrancy and connection because we want to keep the peace? Do we deny ourselves the full palette of color and emotion in an effort to “protect” others and to get along? Can we have peace AND listen AND be curious AND not feel attacked but rather find a new way through based on the different points of view, be it in our family, relationships, community or this world? Who are our role models for getting along while being their best selves and shining their light?

Getting along can sound simple. There are of course times to not rock the boat, to listen, to consider, and do what needs doing in that moment or period of time. Yet then once that situation or crisis is averted, can we not go back and revisit what happened especially if some involved gave up what they might have needed or wanted for the common good at that time? Do some of us expect others in our orbit to go along to get along, at a cost to themselves we rarely inquire about in order for us to feel okay?

In these large world moments of observing, it can look like few of us on the world stage get along. What are we really fighting for? And what happens if we get it? Does the world (meaning us) really want to get along if we’d have to change some aspect of ourselves? What does peace and getting along and working together really feel and look like? How many of us have that feeling in our micro world? How do we help plant those seeds if peace and getting along is what we truly want more of? What happens when some want it and others don’t want to get along?

Guess this entry is just a bunch of questions to noodle on.

Letting go of the “old stories” we tell ourselves, those stories that might have us stuck in an earlier perception or habit of who we are or how we have always been…well we can let that go it if isn’t working for us. That is the beauty and strength of being a human. We can change our minds which in turn changes our story.

What do we mean by story? Well, it might be whether we feel we have the right to be happy, or whether we see ourselves as someone who could have been a carpenter, but now it is too late. Is it? Isn’t that a story we tell ourselves? Why is it too late if there is something we might enjoy more or be better at or wish we had tried, or always wanted to experience?

If our story is limited or weighing us down, draining, hard, lacks support or goodness, what is the fear or harm in considering changing it? The shift to a new story may not even be noticed by anyone but ourselves, yet inside us, in our core, we might feel a lightness, an absence of weight or being dragged down, even if we appear to be living similarly as before. It could mean waking up with energy and feeling happy or contented about doing chores, versus resistant and dragging one’s feet. It could be about joining forces with a person or organization to take part in an initiative that makes us excitedly scared yet our new story would be “We can do this. Why not?”

Creating a new story is particular and personal to each of us. In these amazing, weird, scary, uncertain times it seems good to consider what matters, what we might regret not doing or being, and choose to do or be that. Choosing new stories takes practice and daily attention.

As we look at the global horizon, it seems an ideal time to revisit our individual stories. If our old story is not serving us in the here and now, we have the capability to write a new story for ourselves which better fits where we find ourselves, and lightens our hearts.

Maybe our whole planet is in the process of finding a new story.

Life, as some teachings say of our day-to-day living   ” carry water, chop wood ” can provide personal learning and growth. What do we mean by that?  Anything we do can have meaning and opportunity for checking in with ourselves, about our day and how we lived it.   Did we live up to our own expectations or standards for ourselves?  Some people may look at life as an opportunity in each encounter and choice they make, to pay attention, be present in order to learn from it. Some may call it checking in with their “inner compass”. Some people say they have standards or expectations for themselves to live up to, that seem innate, coming from their inner core. Others may look to the outside world to get their bearings of how to be. No matter where we look, pain seems a part of this life. Physical or emotional pain gets our attention. Pain may stop us in our tracks. Maybe the pain forces us to change course in life, to move, quit a job, or slow down. In retrospect we might understand the painful time could also have brought gifts or shifts that altered our life for the better.

Along this journey of life there are joyous moments, heartbreaking ones, small hurts, big challenges, and unexpected surprises. How we interpret, process and behave determines a lot of what we experience. And as humans, we can change our minds and look at our interpretations to better line up with our inner compass. Some of the hardest and most challenging times in our lives can be full of pain. Yet the gift in that experience when we are “awake at the wheel” is inner growth and an open heart. We can keep the gift and let go of the pain.

Many ideas, intentions and thoughts circulate at the beginning of a calendar year in western culture, and often some reflection is given to important acknowledgments of the year just passed. New years are a time to review, reflect, recharge, and ideally look to new beginnings, no matter what occurs. Naturally, in the throes of personal crisis or grief, we need be present to that in the healthiest of ways. In those times it may provide us the opportunity to be more certain as to what comforts or soothes us, or even who. Belonging, connection and community seem to matter more and more when we face a crisis, or feel separated from others, or perhaps lose direction.

So many species in nature understand the cycles of living, of being able to adapt when food becomes scarce, or weather conditions alter their course, or they lose some from their herd or flock. Sandhill cranes are other worldly to watch. They generally travel long distances in a chevron shape, and circling if they need wait for others to catch up. To see them in the air, or coming in for a landing or standing in fields munching as part of the north/south migration, it can be inspiring. Inspiring by the rarity for many of us to get to see these birds, but also to witness their community, and nature doing what nature knows to do no matter the threats, most not of nature’s making, but nature continues doing what she has always done.

There is a true awe feeling to hear the slow sound of flapping wings as a crane passes overhead, or the deep trill purring sound cranes make to alert, locate, communicate with one another. Depending on the numbers of cranes in a group on the ground, one or more will have the role of sentry or look out, so the others can eat and explore. They take turns.

When we look up to see cranes in flight we may be seeing a couple, or a couple with their offspring, or any additional configuration of that, but rarely do they fly alone. They are a community, being together in this new year, doing what they always have done, heading south to feed, and soon headed north. Together they fly, look out for each other, and go in the same direction. They do this now and every year. There is a beauty to constancy, and moving in a forward direction together. 2022, here we are.

(Photo credit LLZ)

May this be the day
We come together.
Mourning, we come to mend,
Withered, we come to weather,
Torn, we come to tend,
Battered, we come to better.
Tethered by this year of yearning,
We are learning
That though we weren’t ready for this,
We have been readied by it.
We steadily vow that no matter
How we are weighed down,
We must always pave a way forward.

This hope is our door, our portal.
Even if we never get back to normal,
Someday we can venture beyond it,
To leave the known and take the first steps.
So let us not return to what was normal,
But reach toward what is next.

What was cursed, we will cure.
What was plagued, we will prove pure.
Where we tend to argue, we will try to agree,
Those fortunes we forswore, now the future we foresee,
Where we weren’t aware, we’re now awake;

Those moments we missed
Are now these moments we make,
The moments we meet,
And our hearts, once all together beaten,
Now all together beat.

Come, look up with kindness yet,
For even solace can be sourced from sorrow.
We remember, not just for the sake of yesterday,
But to take on tomorrow.

We heed this old spirit,
In a new day’s lyric,
In our hearts, we hear it:
For auld lang syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne.

Be bold, sang Time this year,
Be bold, sang Time,
For when you honor yesterday,
Tomorrow ye will find.
Know what we’ve fought
Need not be forgotten nor for none.
It defines us, binds us as one,
Come over, join this day just begun.
For wherever we come together,
We will forever overcome.

Poet Amanda Gorman wrote this poem with the “aim to celebrate the new year and honor both the hurt and humanity of the last one.”