2) Change, Breath and Life as Our Teachers
What are the good old times? They are always past, they are gone, whether they were good or bad. Here is a quote from Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower : “All that you touch you Change. And what you Change changes you. The only lasting truth is Change. God is Change.” For decades, in every one of my classes, I am talking about Change. It is the core of my T’ai Chi teaching and daily practice, and of course it is at the core of Taoism. Exploring Breath as friend and teacher: it invites us to participate and learn about the constant Change of in and out. “Allow yourself to be breathed,” I keep repeating when guiding students to discover Natural Breath, which is actually more difficult than learning specific breathing techniques. Being breathed challenges us to cultivate yielding, listening, awareness, sensitive participation. This practice teaches to be awake to the reality of continuous Change, in ourselves, life, and the natural world. Not easy for us. We hold on. Being only a minute part of the Cosmos, we humans resist, and often battle transformation, the cycles of death and birth, as if.... Here on earth, all living beings depend on the elements, sun, moon, growth, and Change. All that touches us, and all that we touch, changes us.
Every breath, every encounter – precious.
The other day, when attending with two younger friends, Emma and Henry, the rock-opera Parable of the Sower by Toshi Reagon at Berkeley’s Zellerbach Hall, I feel lifted. The opera’s co-creator is Toshi’s mother, the renowned song leader, composer, scholar, and social activist, Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon. The opera is based on Octavia Butler’s novel with the same name. I know Toshi via the famous Sweet Honey in the Rock (in 1996, I used one of their songs in my film Voices from Inside) – my friends know Butler’s science fiction novels. All three of us are stunned, moved, energized by this opera, which was developed in communities all over the country in the course of many years. It gives everyone in the hall “stark” hope. We leave feeling energized by a multitude of songs, feelings, sounds, rhythms, vibrations, and voices.
It confirms my belief that when, and if, we muster curiosity, inclusiveness, flexibility and playfulness, we will be ok. Not automatically, or cozily. Definitely, we must invent the right kind of gods. And most of all we need to practice respect, love and caring for each other. Especially for those oppressed, beleaguered, abandoned, imprisoned, sick, old, differently abled, Trans, Muslim, and the many otherwise excluded. These days, they might be the majority in America.
Caring for each other – now even more than in the "good" old times of yesterday’s normal.
Ask young people, they know this. So much joy and apprehension, confusion and courage in their faces. All at once. Despair and hope. In truth we often, and easily, experience and hold these so-called opposing feelings at the same time. Paradoxes can be turned into inspiration. They bring us closer to the Big Mystery, and make us sense our smallness in the face of the bigger forces of life, history and universe. Breathing in and out – Change.
Don’t forget: I am the mother of butterflies, dolphins, clouds, and rock –
blossoms, seeds, winds and waves are my children…
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