“All change starts with a distant rumble at the grassroots level.” ~ Tom Coburn
I spent a weekend on retreat exploring new responses to old issues: how to change our perspectives, our language, and our responses.
We don’t like change.
Even as we are watching our climate change, our landscapes and neighborhoods change, our concepts of who we are, the voices of the unheard arising and changing our culture, we (including me) cling to what is comfortable. Many years are invested in creating our lives the way we like them, and frustratingly, unseen forces come along and change things.
So many changes have already occurred in my lifetime without my participation.
We expect our help to come from outside ourselves. We look to God, the services we pay taxes for, our government, emergency service teams, our medical professionals, the plumbers, our military, etc. We have forgotten that we are the help
.
We are the help.
But the problems in our world are so vast, so insurmountable, and so chaotic.
What can one person do?
What can I do?
I was grateful for the younger people at the retreat, who exhibited behaviors that show that some things have already been changed and assimilated into their cultures. For yes, there are many worlds within worlds in our collective world. Most that I have no experience of.
My favorite response from the retreat was “I’ll do what I can do.”
For further exploration:
“By Breath” song by Sara Thomsen
“The Dream of the Earth” book by Thomas Berry
