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The Journey
Several times throughout the Course, we mention that collapse acceptance is not a “one and done” event in life. Rather, for most of us, it is a lifelong journey. Sure, there are some folks who become collapse aware and quickly move solidly and completely into acceptance. Alas, for the vast majority, it is a longer journey and more heart wringing than that.
I spent my twenties in the decade of the 1970’s. Although I was married with a couple of youngsters, and was largely focused on doing my best to provide for them in that era of exploding consumerism, I also had some awareness growing within me. I was too young and uneducated at that point to really put my finger firmly on the nagging itch within me. But I was also aware enough to look around and see that things just could not continue forever to grow the way I was witnessing it. Some good things were happening, like the Clean Water Act, and I was seeing positive results from that and other positive steps. Still, I sensed that we could not continue to dig up vast mineral deposits, drill many thousands of oil wells, pump huge amounts of water from one location to another, and continue to expand dumps and landfills forever. But, hey, what did I know? I was a wet behind the ears kid making my way in the world.
Over decades of living and watching changes around the globe and close to home, there was a slowly building fire growing hotter and more brilliant within me. Just as it takes time and patience to make a wood fire, the flames within me took some time to fully catch and grow into actual fire. One cannot start with logs to make a fire. Tiny tinder, placed under slightly larger kindling, with finger size branches and pieces of wood will always produce the desired results.
So, too, with my own collapse awareness, growing into collapse acceptance. Now in my 70’s, I have had the benefit of years of watching wise elders, smart authors, in more recent years sharp video makers who have, layer by layer, fed my knowledge and understanding of acceptance. It’s not necessarily an easy concept to wrap my head around. Some days, I sense that I “have arrived”, that I am finally in that place of collapse acceptance, yay, I made it! The reality is, that I am so indoctrinated in the culture in which I was raised and lived my entire life that I find it challenging to stay in that place of acceptance. Always, there seems to be some invisible force which pulls me back into “but what if”, or “maybe it won’t be so bad” mode, like a retracting rubber band.
What I do know for sure is that I have found great solace and comfort in community. I am blessed to have discovered a number of containers where it is safe to talk about my fears, uncertainties, thoughts and feelings. It seems there is not a day that goes by that I don’t witness one more thing which confirms the depth of the predicament that we find ourselves in. And then, I am blessed with an opportunity. It is the opportunity to inch closer to that space of acceptance, and recognize that, okay, here we are. Now, what is mine to do? How do I want to spend what time remains? Who do I want to be with? What act of love might I be present to today?
The journey continues.