Tag: hope

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hope rises with the sun

The world is a hot mess right now, and I have to admit that it is eating up a lot of my brain power and making me want to just hide in my safe little sanctuary until it sorts itself out. We’re still dealing with a pandemic, we’ve got monkeypox on the rise, new cases of polio (which we thought we had irradiated), some new virus in China…we’ve got war in Ukraine, a former president who appears to have committed even more crime than we thought, his supporters taking guns to the FBI and calling for civil war (let alone just plain murder of agents). We’ve got Israel pounding Palestine, civilians being killed the world over, continuing gun violence here in the US and a congress who seems to have forgotten they’re supposed to work for us.

It’s a lot, and some days it’s more than I can wrap my head around. Other days, I’m wallowing in it, which isn’t good for anyone.

Still, there is beauty and kindness in this world, we just have to dig a little deeper to find it these days. The sun still rises, the rain still falls (though most of the world really needs more of that), the flowers still open up and people still do good things for one another.

And when you can’t find that kindness around you, the best way to look for it is to be that kindness. It doesn’t have to be a big gesture or cost you a fortune. It can just be the little things, the smile for a stranger, a kind word to someone you pass in the street or stand behind in line. It can be the cup of coffee you bring a coworker who is having a hard time, or the lunch tab you pick up for a friend.

Hope rises above despair, but it needs our help. Find a moment today to hope for something. Bring kindness into the world.

Happy Sunday, Readers. May it bring you peace.

Photo by todd kent on Unsplash

By the way, have you picked up your copy of Thanátou yet?

Thanátou
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what matters is now

For a long time, in my teens and early twenties, I was sure that we would see the end of the world in my lifetime. Part of me clung to science fiction in what I only now recognize as hope that I was wrong, or some unacknowledged notion that even if Armageddon was to happen, some part of who we are, the best parts of who we are if I’m using Star Trek as an example, would live on outside the scenario I was taught.

Even after I learned my way out of that fear, and out of that particular flavor of Christianity, I maintained a love of sci-fi and in particular dystopian stories. The little spark of hope, that even if the worst of humanity prevailed, something good could remain was a driving factor in what and how I changed myself.

I’ve traveled a lot of roads spiritually and academically since then, and what I believe has changed and grown as I did. In some ways, the more I learn, the more I question, and I am less sure of a good deal many things than I have ever been.

One thing I do know, however, is that what I believe about where we come from, what comes after this life, whether or not there is a god or gods, does not define how I live my life. I no longer believe that my eternity rests on a belief, or on a specific god or on a specific ritual. Or, if it does, I am not interested in it at least.

What matters to me is this life. How I live now. How I treat others now. How I grow and learn now. Love and kindness are what motivate me, both for how I approach the world and how I approach myself.

We’re here, on this earth, now. This is what matters.

Those are my thinky thoughts for this Sunday morning, Readers! I hope you are well and that your life is filled with love and kindness. I’m off into the world of The Blood Witch with my Death Wish coffee in hand.

Photo by Marek Piwnicki on Unsplash

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where hope grows

I grew up in Upstate New York, where the very first signs that spring was on the horizon were the daffodils that poked intrepid little heads up through the snows that wouldn’t yet melt for a few weeks (or more). For the longest time, daffodils were my favorite flowers because of that, and they still hold a special place in my heart.

When you’re still in the depths of the cold hard embrace of an Upstate New York winter, after the fun of snow has become the drudgery of slush that has frozen over and cold toes that don’t seem to ever get warm, that first little hope of spring is a most welcome thing

It seems we are facing much the same feeling with this pandemic right now. We are all so done with sitting at our windows, looking out on a world that is filled with hidden dangers, and we just want to be able to go to the movies, and out for coffee with friends.

Vaccines offer us that first hint of hope that our year-long winter of disease is coming to a close, but just like those first daffodils herald a spring that may still be a long ways off, so too does the promise of immunity come with a caveat. Many a blizzard has buried those first daffodils, reprimanding them for sticking their heads up too soon. Returning to our normal lives too soon will bring with it another blizzard of Covid-19 to swat us down and set back our recovery.

Hope grows where vaccines are planted, but immunity takes some time to blossom. So, as we turn the wheel of the year toward Imbolc, let us hope, but remain vigilant.

Happy February, Readers! May it be filled with love and kindness.

Photo by Charles Tyler on Unsplash

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the sun will rise

I am, admittedly, a lazy sort of Pagan. I keep an altar and I light candles and burn incense on the holidays and sometimes at other times, but I don’t go all out like I used to when I was newly arrived in pagandom. My daily meditation practice is pretty lax in the best of times, and lets face it, these are not the best of times.

I am generally more into Samhain and Beltane than I am the solstices, but this year at Samhain everything felt suppressed under the weight of world around me, and Yule has dawned with a feeling of hope.

I know that the fight with this virus isn’t over and in fact we are facing some of the worst days to come. The fact that we now have two vaccines being deployed gives me hope that we might win this fight.

I also know that getting a new president and vice president isn’t going to fix the mess we’re in politically or financially (and do not get me started on this $600 congress thinks is a boon), but the upcoming inauguration also gives me hope that we can close this chapter on the American story and get to work rebuilding our nation and our relations with the world.

The world turns, and we with it. The longest night will pass and the sun will rise. I hope that it burns away the vitriol and hatred that has held the hearts of so many hostage and that with the lengthening of the days, the thawing of the earth, and the warmth of the sun, we begin to grow into better versions of ourselves.

Blessings to you, Readers. May you feel the sun on your face and know you are loved.

Cover Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

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sheltering in place (and Forever in audio)

I feel like there should be something witty or comforting to say right now, but the world around us is falling to pieces, people can’t work, can’t make money and the bills still come.  All around me people who work in stores and salons and theaters are filing unemployment claims to try to scrape by while we shelter in place.

For most of us born after the last world war, this is unprecedented.

It’s an odd thing. As an agoraphobe, this is largely how I live anyway, but now that I have to live this way, I find myself frustrated a little at not being able to just decide to build up my courage and take myself out somewhere…to the park, to eat…whatever.

I probably wouldn’t anyway, but we always want what we can’t have, right?

Shelter in Place…a term we have used mostly as a means to keep people safe during terrifying emergencies like an active shooter, an escaped convict. Who thought we would ever use it to keep people safe from a virus?

Well, if you need something to occupy some of your time, my vampire novel, Forever, is now available in audiobook format and I have some free codes if you’re interested in reviewing it. Just hit me up on my Facebook page.

And with that, dear Readers, I am off to make some more coffee, drink some more water and prepare myself for a day of phone interviews.  Stay safe, wash your hands, shelter in place and we’ll get through this thing together.

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the elusive nature of unconditional love

Back in the day when I was an evangelical Christian (yes, really), I  spoke a lot about unconditional love.  I believed that I acted inside that love.  I believed that I understood what unconditional love really was.

The truth is, I was clueless.

It took a lot of changes in my life to realize that.  It took leaving behind everything I thought I knew, everything I believed.  It took discovering myself under all of the layers of learned behavior and belief/fear conditioning.  I often liken those days to days spent in a cult.

Unconditional love is something that springs from inside you and because of that, nothing external to you can change it.  Nothing someone does, nothing someone says can change that kind of love.

That’s a really powerful thing.  It’s the kind of thing that changes lives.  It changed mine.  I’m not saying I practice it perfectly, I am, after all, still human.  And I’m not aiming for sainthood here.  I still make snap judgments about people.  I still criticize things I know I shouldn’t.  But I try to embody unconditional love to all.

It’s what drives me to act with kindness.  To meet people where they are, as they are and try to be helpful without inserting my own prejudice and needs into their life.  It’s why I can be friends with people so very different to me. How I can give of myself where others won’t.

Sure, sometimes I miss the mark, but the longer I practice this idea, the longer I choose to put love and kindness ahead of judgement and fear, the better I get at it.   I just keep hoping to one day get it right.

I hope your Saturday is filled with the light of Love, Readers, and that you radiate that love back out into the world around you.  Let’s light this place up!

 

 

 

Photo by freestocks.org on Unsplash

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it’s been a hell of a week

My week started with a phone call from my mother on Sunday in the early morning hours.  My step father had a heart attack and since then we’ve been living in the waiting room of the CICU unit, getting pulled back and forth between hope and despair.

This means most of life is on hold, including writing, editing, and the job that pays the bills.

I have something brewing as a tribute to the man, but it doesn’t feel right to even start writing it while he’s still alive.  We’re stuck waiting in a limbo of emotional extremes.

So, I may continue to be scarce for a while.

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yuletide musings

It is still pretty early here in California.  I’m in the office of my day job, a job I thoroughly enjoy.  The sun is casting golden beams of light in through the blinds and it’s hard to imagine that it is actually December. The mornings have been cold, but by noon most days it’s back to t-shirt weather.

The holiday season is always a bit crazy, and being a Pagan in a psuedo-Judeo/Christian society can be strange.  Here in America, everyone seems to just default to Christmas.  If you live here you MUST celebrate Christmas, and if you don’t, you tip their world over.

It isn’t even the really devout Christians that get the most weirded out all the time.  I mean, sure, they’re the ones who started this idea that there is some sort of war on Christmas, but I’ve gotten the most flack when I talk about how Christmas to me is a secular, family holiday, much like Thanksgiving, only with presents.

I don’t really decorate for Yule or Christmas.  I live alone and it seems silly to me to spend a weekend putting stuff up, then take a weekend pulling it down and storing it when I’m the only one to see it.

That isn’t to say that all the years of my life as a Christian, and all of those Christmas traditions have gone away.  One of my favorite memories of those times was Christmas Eve candlelight service.  All those candles, lit one by one, passing the flame…the sanctuary lit up like daylight, only the light was softer and warmer than the sun ever seemed to be in winter.  We lit candles at home on Christmas Eve long after we stopped attending that church.

Today I light candles a little earlier.  On Yule I like to light my entire living room with candlelight.  It is said that candles at Yule are what we call sympathetic magic…we are reminding the sun that we need it to return, and welcoming him as he is born anew.

There is a feeling of hope that permeates these winter holidays, whether you celebrate the birth of the sun or the birth of your God, whether you ignore all that and give gifts of love to your family…there is hope.

That is something that can be hard to see.  It’s there, if you look.  Just light a candle.  Even one candle can dispel the darkness for a time.