Write Away! (prompts for a healthy life) by Naomi Beth Wakan

 

Our inaugural poet laureate, Naomi Beth Wakan, now retired, is still writing, still nurturing other writers. I’m here discussing her recent book, “Write Away! prompts for  a healthy life” 

This book is for all of us when we wish to contribute to the mental health of our community and family. Or even when we feel anxious about the state of our world.

Naomi has facilitated many workshops on our island, and “Write Away!”  is a selection of the exercises she has offered over the years.  Being human is important in this money dominated society where highly regarded news papers put the economy on the front page where the bleeds lead, and her exercises helped lead her students towards expressing their humanity.

War and economics seem to define us, while struggling to find a home, a job and take care of the family is mentioned in between.  At least there are columnists who write about domestic survival.

The word health in Naomi's vocabulary "has not much to do with illness. It has more to do with a state of mind that is positive."

The chapter on "Role Models" talks about inspiration from other humans, worthy of admiration. The first item of mental health is choosing new parents in your imagination (imagination is one of the best things you own regardless of the GDP.) This thought is immediately uplifting not because our own parents are not loved, but because we didn't choose them (although there is a spiritual belief that we did before we were conceived). This exercise allows the imagination to think about who we are and the important need for love and care. An essential place to start.

Then Wakan advises that you choose an animal spirit -  bird, fish or mammal as a spirit of support. Connecting to nature is not just new-age but human minds clearly need to identify with the living world. Climate change is the thing that demands our attention. Who are we? What are we doing here? 

Then follow 23 exercises to get your juices going - all of which are about your life, your place, your heart and your head. To engage in these exercises means you can have a break from doom scrolling, to focus on your creative spirit, to investigate who you are. The News is not interested in your potential. Statistics hardly inspire you. Facts do not love you but they are important to know.

This book contains 72 writing exercises in all, that you can do by yourself or with a friend. It's a lightweight paperback of 109 pages you can carry in your handbag or glove compartment.

With the threat of fascism returning, getting to know ourselves better can make us less judgmental and save us from the oligarchs afraid of losing their power and so use it to make us feel powerless, as Tommy Douglas warned back in the thirties.

We are a part of the world that holds up the sky, along with the deer and the birds.  For those of you choosing to express yourself by the written word, Wakan’s “Write Away! can only help you get closer to yourself and, by extension, to the world we are so intimately part of.

Write Away! prompts for a healthy life is available at Page’s Resort bookstore, 

mail@pagesresort.com. 250-247-8931

 

Who Are The Enemy?

On the Industrial Revolution:

"Unwittingly at first, then with the full knowledge of the perpetrators, the industrial revolutions released waste products into the Earth’s systems. At first, the most extreme impacts were felt in the rich nations, whose urban air and rivers were poisoned, shortening the lives of the poor. The wealthy removed themselves to places they had not trashed. Later, the rich countries discovered they no longer needed smokestack industries: through finance and subsidiaries, they could harvest the wealth manufactured by dirty business overseas." George Monbiot Looting By Other Means. 

"Having leveled two Japanese cities with atomic bombs and established itself as the world’s top superpower following the collapse of the international order in the aftermath of World War II, the U.S. quickly became intoxicated by its newfound military superiority." C.J. Polychroniou, Truthout

Colonization and aggressive power, arms industry: these developments make peace look impossible. 

As long as we are unable to see the patterns of dominance wherever it reigns we will look for the enemy in the wrong places.

I think the answer is in re-establishing the wisdom of humanity, the inclusion of the nurturing principles,  relational caring for all the creatures, plants, trees, of this earth. The interdependent web of existence of which we are a part.

Conspiracy to Care: Hold on to what is healthy

 "What explains the appeal of such evidence-free conspiracy theories? Classic psychological explanations focus on negative emotions: when people feel anxious, out of control or uncertain, they become more susceptible to conspiracy narratives. Accordingly, conspiracy beliefs gain traction in societal crisis situations and are more common among groups that experience structural oppression." https://psyche.co/ideas/how-conspiracy-theories-bypass-peoples-rationality?

Moral molecules published also in Psyche Ideas lists virtues as a way to live in a world overwhelmed with inequality when large groups of people suffer hunger and homelessness.

Here are the lists from different ages and teachers:

Plato: temperance, courage, wisdom and justice

Aristotle: generosity, magnanimity, friendliness, honesty

Ancient Egyptians:  42 sins of Maat

Judaism: 613 commandments and the famous 10, including prohibitions against murder, adultery, stealing and lying

Christianity: added faith, hope and charity to Plato’s list

Taoists: practise eight virtues, including filial piety, sibling harmony, trustworthiness, honour and a sense of shame. 

Aberewa, a spirit figure of the Akan of Ghana: paying your debts and accepting requests for help, and discourage disobeying chiefs and ‘carrying firewood in bundles into town’. 

W D Ross: fidelity, reparation, gratitude, non-maleficence, beneficence, self-improvement and justice. 

Psychologists have argued for community, autonomy, divinity, unity, respect, equality, proportionality.

And the Unitarian Universalist Association add an 8th Principle: journeying toward spiritual wholeness by working to build a diverse multicultural Beloved Community by our actions that accountably dismantle racism and other oppressions in ourselves and our institutions. https://www.8thprincipleuu.org

  

Thank You George Monbiot - again

" The current ratio reflects a determined commitment to irrelevance in the face of global catastrophe. Tune in to almost any radio station, at any time, and you can hear the frenetic distraction at work. While around the world wildfires rage, floods sweep cars from the streets and crops shrivel, you will hear a debate about whether to sit down or stand up while pulling on your socks, or a discussion about charcuterie boards for dogs. I’m not making up these examples: I stumbled across them while flicking between channels on days of climate disaster. If an asteroid were heading towards Earth, and we turned on the radio, we’d probably hear: “So the hot topic today is – what’s the funniest thing that’s ever happened to you while eating a kebab?” This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but with banter."

https://www.monbiot.com/2021/11/02/surface-tension/

It's writing like this that helps me stay connected to humans. More than just a journalist, George is a seer, one who observes, questions and places into the dilemma of our days.

De-Escalate Hate: (De-escalation Techniques Krystal Pope, JD/PhD)

Hate is a symptom of alienation. When anger becomes solidified and turns to blame, scapegoating, alienation puts our society at risk. We don't know what to do, how to fix it. There is more education and training for how to deal with this and there are suggestions of how to recognize when anger has moved beyond opinion and now looks for release.

Take notes of emotional signs of danger: crying, yelling, arguing, inappropriate laughter, fear, and confusion. 

Behavioral signs of anxiety: Rocking/Swaying, Shaking extremities, Tenseness in the body, Clenched fists, Pacing Skitish Behaviors, Rapid Breaths, Pressured Speech, Loud or Quiet, Poor Eye Contact.

Cognitive Decline: Good judgement falls away. Overgeneralizing "never" "always" "everyone". Black and white thinking, blaming.

Black and white thinking, blaming, obsessions, preoccupation, refusing to listen. What can we do? Listen without agreeing or disagreeing. Let them know you are interested and you are hearing what they say but you are not judging whether they are right or not. Bring up neutral things like music, nature, art, family if it is supportive or friends if there is no family engagement. 

Environment: maintain space, 2 arm lengths, 45 degree angle, do not block exits, ask if there is anything they need like water or food, also do they need to be alone, to sit down?

Letters to the editor that point out what we have to be grateful for, about kindness and gratitude. Mentioning the goodness but avoiding anything that sounds like an argument unless you word it gently "actually I have noticed people who ask if I am okay even though I haven't spoken to them first".

Friends are a good source of human kindness. Be gentle and kind to the people you know.

http://paetc.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/De-escalation-PACE.pdf

Conspiracy To Care About The Well Being of Others

 Conspiracy

a poem to smooth you into

sympathy with another being

a way to identify with your tribe

with affection more than DNA

you have been great for

3 hundred thousand years

carrying that big brain

wherever you went

tools, language, storytelling

appeared later 

social interaction to gain a common end

cooperation, then a great moral crash

after isolated units competed

for the most of what they wanted

establishing a class system to exploit

whoever was lower on the pecking order

invention of types, races, genders

brave new worlds of organized

relationships and religions

revolutions of industry

knowledge, schools, churches

—so this booklet is a conspiracy

of support for those who care

for our health—a common objective

the greater good. 

The booklet is now available for a donation to People For a Healthy Community or your local clinic.

Pay Attention to Words, Emotion and Habits

We often talk as though we live in a classist world, as if this is a natural outcome of how the world works. As if the pecking order is good enough, as if conflict is war and there is only one right way to do things.

If there is one thing we cannot live without (besides food), it's love and when we use that word we are accused of making the being intellectually lazy. We've got names for stars and planets in the universe and germs and DNA but love is either dismissed or unprovable, so when a parent punishes a child while the tears are flowing from her clouded eyes, he explains this is because I love you.

Or a jealous husband beats his wife to death, it's because he loved her. Or a ruler sacrifices some of his chattels, it's because he loves them. Or a chancellor rounds up millions of citizens who have been labelled as other, its because he loves his country and puts all his future into murdering those he doesn't like.

Great arguments and speeches are recorded from the mouths of powerful leaders, because they are loved by those they rule.

Love has been used to gloss over the unexplainable. The word used to control the masses, or to excuse punishment, to sell questionable things like chocolate made of beans picked by child slaves in Africa, or to mine gems for engagements rings, to grow, pick and ship flowers to say I love you Mom and sorry that I didn't clean my bedroom or help you with the dishes when you wept with exhaustion.

I convinced myself that I had to become a famous movie star to pay back my mother for suffering because I was born. To do that, without any encouragement from family or teachers, without anyone saying I had talent, I decided I had to win every argument, be right 100% of the time and be dedicated to  my appearance. 

Narcissists are not alone. They struggle, fight and worry, to be better than everyone else. Then wonder why they have no friends. Wonder why all our fairy tales have a princess that everyone adores but not her. She has failed.

But what has she failed? What if she becomes a movie star who is adored on screen but her manager rapes and abuses her. Is she a success for becoming so fabulous to look at, sing and perform, or is she a failure because she was abused.

Who do we love so much, so faithfully that we protect them from the cuts and bruises of the world?

Violence and power is loved more than all the living things on our planet homes. Capitalism in an age of corporate hegemony emotionally tortures its CEO's so they believe the only thing that matters is the money (power) they possess.

Where is love in this manufactured world? Where is love when victims are blamed? Where is love in a boardroom of men who were bullied as children to the extent they dissociate from their emotions and silently become zombies for the ruling cause. Where is love when every relationship is a contest to win and the prize never guarantees happiness or even contentment?

Where is the money that is grateful for the destruction of the entire planet to show how obedient and faithful its servants are to the brutal dictator, whose fame is based on how much death and destruction it survived?

Where is the media that writes about all this when it tells us we need them more than they need us.

Where is the will to bring the conversation back to life? Where are the feelings of those who struggle to survive, those who wish to protect the vulnerable. Why does 'the economy' not have a column to represent that thing which the wise use to protect a culture of celebration, faith, friendship and love.