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Thursday, 29 December 05 ::
"Not only is another world possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing." ~Arundhati Roy
A friend sent a bunch of us an email, to sum it up in one sentence she said to all of us:
My heart is big and yearning for direction and peace, it must be possible. But I am finding it very difficult to walk in light and joy when so few do and can.
It was a treat to get her email, to be able to reflect on her question. This is what I responded back to her:
You pose a very good question. One that I often times struggle with myself. How to find hope in a seemingly hopeless world? Goodness, I guess I try to look at the light rather than the dark. As an anti-war activist, these days at least, I choose to focus on facts like: March 15th 2003, the world realized there was a 3rd super power-- the world's people.. and, 2.5 years into this and those in power are questioning this war -- much faster than what happened with Vietnam, and and and.. the positive things coming from our government, rather than the negative. I keep an eye on the negative, but that which I put my psychic energy into these days is realizing that all this hard work my friends and I have put into stopping this war is starting to pay off. As a human justice activist I choose to do the same thing.. focus on the good... and lastly, I guess, to keep my sanity, I do what I can every day. From the small -- a smile to someone on the street, to the larger -- volunteering for organizations that are doing the kind of work that meet my vision of world change. I simply do what I can on a daily basis, from the work that I choose, to how I care for those I love, and I do my best to know that it is enough. I'm not perfect at it, I'm far from perfect at it.. I struggle on a daily basis not to slip into hopelessness, despair and loneliness. Sometimes I succeed, and other times I don't. On those days that I fail to stop the fall into the dark, I'm working on learning how not to beat myself up for being there.
I found this quote when i first started this reply: "Not only is another world possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing." ~Arundhati Roy I like it, I like it a lot. It sums up that which I do my best to embrace.
So, how do you stay in the light and joy while there is so much suffering in the world?
posted by brooke at December 29, 2005 07:49 PM
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about
i'm brooke, born in '73. i am currently a phd student in instructional technology. this is the blog where i capture all the neurotic, and the few non-neurotic, moments that seem to come with being a phd student (if you want to read less neuroses and more professionalism go to: oer's, dl's, reuse and culture: it's about a phd student researching digital resources in a multicultural world). i have been from eugene, oregon for a long time.. 8 years specifically (its my home now, but i grew up in southwestern virginia), but now i'm here in logan, utah at utah state university. after finding my roots in eugene i never could have expected that i would leave that liberal oasis and head to utah. but i did and there are days when its a blessing and days when i'm tempted to go back to oregon and beg the folks at lost valley educational center to let me move in. but i won't leave because there are days when this process is better than any kind of high i could ever imagine. what else? i collect things, i have 2 cats, 2 kayaks, 2 laptops (i'm a geek - one mac, one pc). i can be emailed at brookesblog@rivervision.com.
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