3 Learnings from 2020: The Wildness of Life, Nature is Life, and Remember to Rest

This year-end has brought me back to a practice I started a few years ago (and then forgot about and then returned to; I suppose we all have our patterns). I hold hope that we will make meaning and find wisdom together through these times. I truly believe this is a part of our interwovenness as humans — we are all finding our threads of connectedness: where they intersect, where they fray, and where they become knotted or entangled.

Here are some of the threads I’ve been with this year. You’ll notice each one comes with an accompanying book, podcast, and/or practice because resource sharing is definitely one of my love languages:

1) The Wildness of life (Finding our Way Podcast & The Rumi Prescription)

I won’t enumerate what you’re already living, but it’s an understatement to say it has been hard to find solid ground and steadiness in the wilderness experience of this year. Yet, something about sheltering-in-place has shown and reminded me of just that: to find a shelter (or refuge, in Buddhist practice) within my own physical home and within my own body and mind. As someone who has weathered a multitude of fluctuations in her internal and mental states, it felt like I was somewhat equipped to weather the storms of this year. With varying degrees of discipline, I’ve spent the last 13 + years in practice (embodied movement and yoga, meditation, writing, prayer/contemplation, therapy and somatic therapy ) of meeting myself in various internal responses to life. In many ways, these practices have readied me to be with the fluctuations and the chaos externally and to find stillness and ground within the container of my body and within my own (nervous) system. They’ve taught me to attune to my inner system and the greater ecosystem, and even, to dance with it (in many moments, literally) in the wildness of it all. I’ve found these practices to be a part of daily life and life -giving, and it turns out so have many folks for thousands of years, including many of y’all as we’ve now adopted them into our 21st century lives. Somehow, most days, not all, I am finding my ground, definitely in big part to the actual ground of the earth.

And, because I love to share these practices and practice in community, here is a brief mindful movement practice I recorded for you to try on at your own time and pace (video production skills are still a work in progress over here).

2) Nature is life (Braiding Sweetgrass & How We Show Up)

Mama Nature held me immensely this year (and all life really for billions of years). When everything closed down, the East Bay parks remained open and I sought refuge in the hearth of the redwoods, the vast waters of the Bay and ocean, the canopies of leaves, and the solidity and humility (humus = deep earth) of the soil. I’ve found myself more alive in my senses and more in tune with the cycles of nature this year. When I have felt overwhelmed with the grief, sorrow, and heartbreak of these pandemic times and with some of the young folks I sit in therapy with, or felt enraged with the injustice of yet another Black man’s life (and Black woman’s and Trans and Disabled and yet more Black folks lives) being stolen, I have turned to Nature, not for answers but to remember that we are all part of her. I placed one foot down and then the other, often alongside a dear one’s footsteps, and I said please help me hold some of this or, can I lay this (or myself) down for a while? She (in tandem with my friends, partner, and therapist) supported me to replenish, to fortify, to build back up my inner reserves and capacity so that I have been able to stay with it all, move with it, and to continue showing up for myself and my loved ones.

3) Remember to Rest (Burnout/ Unlocking Us Podcast Episode & Book of Delights). It turns out when I’m not commuting 12+ hours per week and utterly depleted racing from place to place, there is spaciousness and even, this thing I think they call “downtime”. So many of us walk around charged by cortisol and some combination of adrenaline, endorphins, caffeine, and sugar. We don’t allow our systems to come into full rest, to complete a cycle of charge/ stressor, release and rest known as our stress cycle. I recognize that folks who are trying to just survive, and/or parenting while working while human-ing may not have this ability or frequent access to rest. And, we all have stress cycles that need to come to completion rather than just loop, so somehow, between wash cycles, REM cycles, and election cycles, we must find a way — physical activity, creative expression, laughter, hugs & cuddles (thanks oxytocin!), to name a few — to complete our stress cycles. We give ourselves permission to rest not just for us and our loved ones, but as a collective act of resistance (Nap Ministry), which subverts a white supremacist capitalist system that wants us to grind until we are completely out of charge. In many moments of this year, I have found myself prone on the floor, one cheek turned to the ground, visualizing layers of earth beneath me, holding me, tears trickling down to the floor, and just letting breath come and go until my body settles enough to return to my home office set up a few steps away.

And so we are here, in the midst of pandemic-steeped life, in these days following the re-re confirmation of a new president elect and madame VP, an epic astrological event (Great Conjunction between Saturn and Jupiter).

From this place of here, may we all find our ground within the wildness of life, may we attune to our inner nature and the nature surrounding us, and may we take deep rest.

Sending many blessings, much ease, and hope for the continued lifting of the veil in this year to come.

And please, share your learnings, listenings, and readings in the comment section if you feel called. I’d love to connect in that way.

Take good good care of yourself and each other.