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It seems as though uncertainty is the prevailing feeling at the moment and it’s making us all edgy and nervous. With Brexit fallout, rancorous politics, terrorist threats and racial tension it sometimes feels hard to breathe. However, uncertainty is where the power lies. In uncertainty all possibilities are still potent. In uncertainty power is shifting, minds are changing, lines are being redrawn, hearts realigned, new ideas forming, and a new future is becoming.

Only with deep breath and in stillness can this wave of change be ridden with grace and certainty. When the outer world is full of uncertainty the only place to turn is inside where true certainty resides. In the outer world is chaos and churning potential, inside where we are quiet and calm lies the ability to choose with certainty when the opportunity to react flies in our face. So when I feel a bit stressed by the day’s news, I try to remember to take a breath or sit on a park bench and watch the sunset.

Ubuntu is a South African word which according to Wikipedia is often translated as “human kindness”. Within the last few months, I have heard of this word and concept a few times. It appears to me that the idea is gaining a badly needed foothold in our consciousness. Last week I heard a piece of a story on NPR about a South African who grew up on a game preserve and watched the wild animals. Specifically, he was fascinated by a crippled elephant that was assisted by all of the other elephants to survive. More and more we hear stories and see videos of animals helping each other; the monkey that revived an electric shocked monkey friend on an Indian train track, the goat that led a blind horse through a forest to the best pasture, a dog that wrapped its front legs around a companion that was hit by a car and dragged it across five lanes to safety somewhere in South America. It brings tears to my eyes to think that “human kindness” can also be seen in “animal kindness” it is our basic nature born of our core being.

Here is the thing. We have been sold a bill of goods that is not true. Darwinism is not the only and last gasp way of being. “Survival of the fittest” is not the best way to live and survive, we all want to thrive not just survive. The idea that survival is a struggle and that we need to compete with each other to win has spawned a brutal winner takes all mentality. Cooperation is really how we survive and thrive but to truly cooperate we must respect each other in our sameness as does the elephant and in our difference as does the goat and the horse.

I was moved this morning when I saw hundreds of people lined up in the hot Florida sun waiting to give blood after this last terrible mass shooting. Those people live the Ubuntu philosophy. Deep inside, I believe, we all feel a profound need to help, to be useful, to care and to share our love. I know I do. The tools out of our societal dis-ease are in the idea of Ubuntu. I am determined to embrace it.

This is going to be a tough post, I’ll say it right off the starting gate. I know it’s been a long time since I posted. I’ve been focusing on finishing and publishing my first novel, “Gabriel’s Flight”. I love the book, it’s been great fun but when will it be good enough, when will it be done. I keep writing and rewriting, trying to get an agent and rewriting again.

It’s been a rough spiral down when it should only be an upward swing. The book is about flying, ascension and touching the sky. Unfortunately, I indulged in a few weeks with the dark night of the soul. I allowed myself to doubt and that led to an awful sense of failure before I even got anywhere. It’s the bugaboo of my life and possibly why I chose the subject, “Heaven is Here” to blog about. I am so afraid of not being good enough, of failing that I really beat myself up and I end up stymied or crippled. A few weeks ago I was a bloody mess. Thank God for Mastering Alchemy and SYDA yoga; practicing self-awareness gave me the awareness, finally, that I was being very indulgent and I am crawling back out of the mire.

Part of the crawl back is to renew my dedication to practicing what works and keeping good company is so important as I have heard from the master. This space is good company, you are good company. I haven’t looked here for a while and I see there are over 650 followers and people looking at the blog every day. Thank you, I won’t let you down again. I hope that you find upliftment here. I promise you there will be more to come.

On January 6 the holiday season is officially over, time to wrap up all that joy, that harmony, all that good cheer and bless us everyone once and for all: or is it. January is just the beginning of another long year of opportunities to celebrate our humanity together, to be joyful and in harmony at almost any time.

I love all the holidays, all the moments we as humans create to catch a taste of the sacred and make life special. No culture seems to have a lock on that idea and every culture has a variety of ways in which to attempt to capture the true feelings of special connection to that unnamable something holy. After a lifetime of study, I finally get it, that the taste of divine we look for in those outer celebrations is really inside each of us. I have tasted the profundity of it enough times to know this. I also see that very often it is so much easier to taste that divine presence in the company of others, together in community.

So I invite everyone to seek out the opportunity to share a special moment throughout the year. Find a festival or sacred holiday not of your own lineage to participate in. In January, we still have Epiphany, Armenian Christmas, Orthodox New Year, Tu B’Shevat a Jewish holiday celebrating the New Year for trees and a Punjabi holiday called Lohri involving a bonfire. Lighting a fire is common to many winter celebrations when we are most yearning for light.

Even if there is no holiday available on the horizon we can always commune with each other in respect and love and joy. I just heard last week of a study that determined that people traveling on public transportation absorbed in the bubble of their devices are less happy than those who engage in conversation with their companions. The trip goes faster and leaves the participants more satisfied at the end of it. So have a conversation, laugh, joke and enjoy.

Celebrating each other is more important now that it has ever been before. I am talking about celebrating difference, diversity, strangeness and that which is not our way. So much delight can be found in stretching ourselves to embrace something that we don’t quite understand. As an offering in this light, I invite you to watch this 5-minute short video that I directed a dozen years ago. New York City Spirit is a brief celebration of the diverse ways that New Yorkers connect to God during the course of any ordinary day.

New York City Spirit

Global chaos is what I have heard global warming is called in Europe. It speaks to a greater understanding of what is actually going on here right now in the not so firm firmament of our universe. Tomorrow the largest hurricane ever seen will hit Mexico, warnings are to “get out of the way”. But how do we do that? Everywhere things seem to be coming apart at the seams; war, drought, floods, extinctions, governmental paralysis and even government extinction in many countries are creating mass migrations and distress. People are trying to get out of the way of so much trouble everywhere these days.

This blog is part of the Heaven is Here series and though I have not written a new post for quite some time, I have not forgotten to keep looking around me for the evidence of that statement. Yes, Heaven is Here, this is heaven – as a friend once said, “We live in God’s backyard.” With all that is happening in the world right now, I look out of my window and see a glittering sunny fall day, the trees are glorious in full fall color. This is heaven.

However, how can I ever tell those who have lost everything to war, flood or fire to look on the bright side? Life is so tough for so many and seems to be getting tougher and tougher. I feel a visceral pain in my heart for the children wandering through Eastern Europe now in search of a safe new home.

This turmoil, upheaval, shake up is not just about external events it is internal. It is about recognizing that we have all that we need, that we are all powerful, that we are all equal, that we are all connected and that we share a small fish bowl. What each of us says, does, thinks, promises, curses or prays affects every single one of us. I include all living creatures and plants plus the crystalline heart of this earth and every mineral or liquid within and on her in this statement too. We and everything that we encounter are sacred. When we acknowledge this and begin to cherish each moment and encounter, we may not begin to shift the actual circumstance but we instantly shift our perspective and our experience of the circumstance.

If only a few of us master this the benefits to all will show and will be remarkable.

Blessings.