When it feels like the world is falling apart
Contents:
1. Choose the heart path
2. Herbs to help you stay open-hearted
3. Things you can do
4. A simple exercise
1. choose the heart path
“Remember, if you love life, nothing is worth closing over”.
-Michael Singer
There are some people who tend to run happily in the direction of deep openness, connectivity, and squishy softness. I am not one of them: it as always felt to me a bit like jumping off a cliff with no safety net. I was also a firm believer, for years, that protecting our soft inner bits was a good thing: that it did something good for us, as individuals, and as a whole. And I remember once chatting to one of my teachers in Berlin (hi Vered!) who has as long as I’ve known her talked about how open-heartedness is the best thing for us as individuals, and I said ‘but surely there are things that are worth protecting our hearts from?!’ and she smiled and said ‘nothing’. I remember being a bit grumpy about being contradicted, at the time, but over the years, I’ve come to realise that she was right. Because, I've learned this:
To close our hearts to one thing is to close our hearts to everything.
And to close our hearts to everything is to enter into the same cycle that is causing all of the destruction that makes us want to close up in the first place.
And to close our hearts is to hurt out own selves.
And to close our hearts is to deny life.
It feels sometimes like the weight of the terrible things happening in the world is too much. There’s so much destruction. Deforestation. Exploitation. Death. So much injustice. So much extinction. So much pain.
It is easy easy to cast blame. And even easier to get caught up in the current of despair and helplessness, (which often turns into anger, and then bitterness, and then hatred) that sweeps through our communities every time something shitty happens. And shitty things happen a LOT. We either cast blame outside ourselves (its easy to hate Bolonsaro for permitting the burning of the rainforest), or we cast blame on ourselves: I should be doing more. I should be buying less. I should be helping, somehow.
But underneath all of these things that are happening, there is so much ‘other’ing. The people who commit atrocities see the people, communities or ecosystems that they harm as ‘other’. We (as a whole, though there are plenty of us individuals who don't) see the earth as other. Our ecosystems as other. Things outside of us. Things that aren’t actually a part of us. We see a country on the opposite end of the world as ‘other’, not an extension of ourselves, or an extension of all of us. And in hardening ourselves to what’s happening, casting blame, allowing ourselves to be incited to hatred, we then do the exact same thing that causes the problem in the first place. It is easy to ‘other’ because we do not want to see another person’s pain, or to feel our own. It is easier to call people names than to see them as human, and to see them as an extension of us, and us as an extension of them. We ‘other’ because we don’t want to face ourselves. The louder the voice of othering, the deeper the fear that we are what we hate.
If you want to fight for the planet, for justice, for equality, then fight by standing against the tide of fear and hatred that sweeps through the world: fight by refusing to allow other peoples’ deplorable actions to turn you into a person who is also full of bitterness.
Be angry if you need to. Be outraged. But let that anger and outrage burn through and bring clarity of purpose. Let it fire you to love harder, to be more fiercely compassionate. Let it fire you up enough to say ‘the cycle stops here’.
***
Thoughts have presence. Collective thoughts have presence. All of the shittiness in the world is the end result of these collective thought processes that create oppressive and harmful structures. So how do we change these structures?
Everything I’ve learned about trauma indicates that to revisit the trauma again and again does more harm than good within our psyches. And that the way to heal our reactions to trauma (not to make it that it didn’t happen, but that we don’t react to it in the same way), is to focus on something else, something that we actually want, and then develop a new neural pathway in the direction we want, one that eventually becomes more instinctive to tread than the old ones.
And if that’s the case for individuals, then can the same apply for us as a collective?
I don’t know the answer to that, but I know this: the way we have been approaching this isn’t working. Meeting hate with hate doesn’t transform both parties, it just starts feuds, or wars. Meeting violence with violence doesn’t make for peaceful endings in which everyone and the world around them are flourishing. It just leaves a wake of destruction, and trauma that carries on for generations.
I don’t believe that the hatred and violence in the world is the dominant paradigm. I think its the loudest, though, and sometimes in the face of that it’s hard to hear the subtle pulse of the quiet, steady, untamed, connected. And sometimes to join in the fray feels like the only way to show that you care SO DEEPLY about what’s happening. And sometimes it feels as though joining in is the only way to really do something.
(Spinning our wheels still expends energy; definitely feels like doing something... if burning rubber is doing something.)
Which is to say, you, and I, and all of us, can choose something else. Maybe if enough of us do it, then it will start to feel like a stronger tide. And maybe it will change the underlying collective narrative. And then, maybe that will create a new pathway for us to tread, individually, but also as a culture, where the collective thought is simple, uplifting, empowering to every one of us.
Maybe our quiet voices, together, can become bigger than the loudest wave.
***
Last night I went on an energetic trip with some of my students. We journeyed to the Amazon to, well, basically donate our energy where it was needed (I don’t know how else to describe this), and when we got there we felt a circle of energy already in place. Human, yes, but also earth, forest, animal, non-human. And it was SO powerful. And what we did was step into the circle, and sync ourselves to what was already happening. And instead of feeling tiring, it felt buoyant. So many people, all holding space together. And behind us, there was also a tide. It came from the earth. It came from beyond the earth even. And in syncing ourselves to what was happening, that tide started moving through all of us: we became conduits for this intention that is hard to put into words, but to sum it up I’d describe it as: to hold the entire world within our hearts*.
No forcing. No pushing ourselves or our will on anything. No deciding how things should look (who are we to decide anyway!), simply offering ourselves up to the greater good and allowing it to move through us.
I think that one of the most cruel aspects of all these terrible things happening is that, in the face of them, we feel alone and helpless.
But I think that we feel alone, in part, because we close our hearts in protection, because we feel as though we cannot bear the weight of what’s happening.
And maybe its true: maybe you, alone, cannot bear the weight of what’s happening.
But if you were to take that step, and allow yourself to open, you’d see that you are not actually bearing it alone: there is a vast network, a web of people, and not one of us is in that web alone. In allowing yourself to take the risk of remaining open, you step into that web and it feels like a current of goodness, connection, and beauty is moving *through* you. It feels like stepping off a cliff, and then at the second you surrender to it, you realise that you are caught, suspended, held in a web so much greater than us as individuals. This web? It feels like coming home.
The way to step into that web is with your heart wide open, ready to offer up who you are to the greater good.
*I’m pretty sure that one of my students was the one who came up with this wording.
***
What is the path with heart?
The path with heart is the path that you can move forwards and remain open to the world around you. To the pain, injustice and things that scare you, but also to the joy, the connection, and the immense beauty of it all.
Anything else is cutting yourself off from the totality of who you are. Anything less is an injustice, both to yourself, and also to the world that desperately, at this dark hour, needs to be held in the glowing entirety of your being.
2. Herbs to help you stay calm and open-hearted
Rose // Rosa spp.
Rose is my all-time favourite boundary/compassion herb. And when it comes to interacting with others and managing the swirling mass of emotions out there in the world, we need both boundaries and compassion. I always picture that gorgeous, soft, open flower, releasing its scent into the world (which apparently jim mcdonald hates but that is HIS BAG OF POO), while utterly protected by its thorns. And those thorns? They’re not sticking a mile out. They’re not the first thing you see when you get close to a rose patch, in fact, the scent is so enticing (*glares at jim*) that you probably find yourself face-deep in a patch of wild roses before you notice you’re being stabbed (I picture the rose saying ‘back away slowly and sniff from a safe distance, dude’).
Rose, quite simply, softens us. The world is full of people who try to make themselves harder, tougher, faster, more driven, focused, and direct. All of this trying comes from a sort of tension— we tense ourselves as if to do battle daily, and to protect our soft hearts from the onslaughts of the world around us. Rose softens the tension that we hold to protect ourselves, but because its clever, it doesn’t leave us without our own thorns of defence.
Its astringency tightens tissues, and it does this on a tissue-based level, but it also does so on a grand scale, to our *energy* as a whole, which means that as we’re softening, we’re also tightening up, starting to be able to tell where we end and the world around us begins. It’s not a hard wall of a boundary, but astringency leads to better filtration. We become much more capable of knowing who we are and as a result, where our boundaries are. Softening and strengthening, relaxing and tightening, the most beautiful soft petals and sensual scent, and those thorns that will cut you without second thought.
Read more: Kiva's article
Found in: Wild rose elixir, Ocotillo + Wild rose incense, wild rose & sandalwood body oil, wild rose & sandalwood bath soak
Hawthorn // Crataegus spp.
Heart-friend and support for the grief state, hawthorn is like the hug you receive when you've been holding yourself together, feeling alone and unstable, that finally allows you to let yourself fall apart. When you have to go in and delve into the deepest, darkest parts of yourself, hawthorn is a supportive anchor saying 'You've got this; I won't let you fall apart completely'.
How it does this, I have no idea, but I have an analogy that I like. When we fall apart due to grief, it's like most of our entirety gets swept away in a tsunami of it. It swallows us, breaks us into pieces, dashes us against the rocks, and washes us up on the shore, battered and broken. But as we're being pulled to pieces, there's always that constant thrum in the background that's 'you' there. I mean, it's the constant that most of us aren't even aware of because we're so caught up with the surface stuff (I am my job, I am what I wear, I am my reactions, I am my gender, I am my sexuality, I am gay/straight/poly/queer/neurodivergent/cis/trans/alawyer/adoctor/adeskjockey/acashier/ajock/anartist/aniceperson/abadperson/lonely/confident/cool/aplantperson/rich/poor/inarelationship/loved/etcetcetc.) Except, if we were to chip away at every single self-identifier we have, we'd still be there, still exist, still be *us*. When our lives fall apart, either in grand explosive fashion or in little pieces, and when WE fall apart as a result, that nugget of 'us' at the center of our being remains constant. And it's that nugget of 'us'ness that hawthorn connects to and strengthens, so that the rest of us can fall to pieces around it. If our entire being was a map and the 'you are here' sign moved around on said map depending on how we feel on any given day, hawthorn points to the land itself so that the lines on the paper can dissolve and rearrange themselves.
Protector of the heart, protector of the faerie realm, which in our own psyches is the tender young part of ourselves that still sees the world with innocence and possibility. Hawthorn wraps itself around this like a protective shield allowing it to blossom again. Hawthorn's thorns are hard and sharp, sticking out at (at least what feels like) random angles to catch you unawares. It's interesting to me that these plants that are so so easy to love are the ones that protect themselves so well-- my first instinct with all of them is to fling myself on them and hug them, and yet you can't do that at all. I have tried it with a big pile of hawthorn twigs and leaves and flowers, and, well it hurts. One of the things you learn is that you can experience something just by hanging with it, being near it-- you don't need to fling yourself on it and try to hug the daylights out of it. For those of us who sometimes lack boundaries, this is an important lesson, and it's a lesson that hawthorn especially can teach us well: to experience something deeply you don't need to lose yourself, but actually to inhabit yourself more fully.
Hawthorn helps us soften by strengthening the parts that burn brightly through the darkness. That is, hawthorn affects the core of who we are, our hearts, not just physical but that little spark of awareness that was you before you knew what an 'I' was. Hawthorn wraps itself around it like a protective shield, whispering things like 'you've got this' and 'you can fall apart now I'll hold you up' and 'a little restructuring is ok but we'll hold it together here' and for those of us who are afraid to soften, afraid that to let go a little bit means the entire world will cave in or fall down, or rush in like a deluge, hawthorn is the beacon in the storm.
Found in: Heart + Happy, Deep forest tea, deep forest soak
(image credit: Leslie Lekos)
See those thorns up there? Devil's club knows about self-protection. Growing in the deep, dark forests where moisture abounds, and where said moisture seeps into everything, boundaries are so necessary. This is the world of mycelium, where everything is a part of everything else, where the one-ness of the place combined with the moisture, the fog, the moss, the sponginess of it all, makes for one seeping massive organism. How to be an individual surrounded by that? How to stand tall in your self-hood and be not soft and spongy but a sharp beacon of individual strength? Giant thorns, that's how. I consider devil's club to be an archetypal plant of self-hood and inner strength because of this.
One of the reasons I think oplopanax is so incredibly powerful is that it's connection in our energy is to our deepest sense of who we are-- the part of ourself that has no words to describe it, but just *is*. It's the us when we were born, the us that is free of constraint and 'shoulds' and trauma and fear. It's our past and our potential, all wrapped into one. That part of ourselves is always there, but for most people it's buried quite deeply. It's an energy that exists deep at our core, and emerges from our ancestry and our blood, and it blossoms in our chests, driving us forward even if we can no longer feel or hear it speaking to us. Devil's club connects us to that part of ourselves.
One of the nice side effects of this connection is that things can no longer hurt us as much.
On a more physical level, oplopanax is used to balance blood sugar levels, to treat infections, to help raise energy levels over time in exhaustion. Among many other things. It's an amazing, powerful plant, and one I feel very grateful to receive boxes of in the mail.
Read more: Ryan Drum's article
Found in: Root + Heart, deep forest soak
Ocimum sanctum // Tulsi
While tulsi has [most likely] about a million medicinal uses, the vast majority of them owe themselves to tulsi's ability to boost our ability to handle stressors. These stressors can occur in different systems, be it the immune system, digestive, nervous or in the overall metabolism, and these stressors can come in many forms, be it chemical, metabolic, psychological or bacterial.
In the immune system, stressors come in the form of pathogens, but at its most basic, the immune system differentiates 'self' from 'not self'. Tulsi helps the body's immune response and is at the same time antimicrobial, helping the body to fight 'not self' both from the inside (by helping the response itself) and also by directly fighting pathogens.
In the nervous system, tulsi helps to increase our stress tolerance, not by turning us into super humans, but by once again working on that 'self' and 'not self' axis. I'd say, from my own perspective, that tulsi strengthens the innate sense of 'self' which then makes 'not self' that much easier to deal with. When it comes to mental stressors this is incredibly important: think of how much mental stress actually has to do with us thinking we don't have the capacity to handle something. Think of how much more stressful life is when we feel overtired and that our resources are too meager to actually be effective. If 'self' is small, and 'not self' is huge, then the entire world feels overwhelming and like it's too much to handle. This is an incredibly stressful place to live, and most of us who suffer from anxiety issues live here full time! Think on the other hand of how the world looks when you feel calm, centered and *big* enough. Like you have enough resources (energetic, financial, whatever) to handle what life throws at you. That is a place where the world can't swallow you whole, and it comes from knowing that you are enough to handle it. Tulsi, in my opinion, helps to strengthen that sense of self. It's not that it by itself is a stress relieving herb, but the effect of that strengthening is that you can handle more by default. Psychologically it calms the mind because the mind doesn't need to be as agitated if you're not about to be swallowed by the world around you. And your nervous system doesn't need to be on high alert because you feel safe.
Another side effect of this 'safe' feeling is that, since your nervous system is no longer freaking out over every minor thing, your view of the world is no longer clouded by fear or panic. As a result, people tend to see the world with more clarity when taking tulsi. In a way, it's incredibly expansive in the brain, because our perspective narrows intensely when we're feeling threatened, and when we feel safe, our perspective expands. Our worlds quite literally get bigger to us as a result of taking it. Tulsi's effect on mental activity as a result of this is incredibly interesting: it helps with retention of information, and also with clarity of thought.
This calming, centering, grounding extends to the digestive system,
where tulsi's aromatics help calm agitation in the gut. Once again, this same action: where some foods can feel like 'too much' for us, causing indigestion or gas or bloating, tulsi draws our attention into our guts and the centre of our bodies, calming, grounding, and assisting with the digestion of foods.
Found in: Tulsi + Pinon syrup, Tulsi + Ashwadangha chai, the Tulsi & Gratitude surprise box
3. Things you can do
It sounds wrong somehow, or counter-intuitive, that we should be focusing on good things while everything else falls apart. And yet it is focusing on what is good in ourselves and each other (while not pretending the shittiness isn’t happening), then it becomes so much easier to stand in that heart-space.
Some ideas:
-Have a really meaningful time with a friend.
-Get out into nature.
-Spend time with animals.
-Make love
-Do something nice for yourself like making a really delicious and nutritious pot of soup, or a big salad, or go for a long walk.
-Do something kind for someone else, like helping without being asked, or buy a stranger’s groceries, or holding their child while they go to the toilet (I’ve done this for a stranger in an airport; I have no idea how she was going to manage to get her pants down otherwise).
-Do something good for the earth, like planting a tree, or making offerings to your local nature spirits, or donating to nature conservancy charities.
-Do something good for the people in your life: when you find yourself wanting to close off and cast blame, be brave.
4. A simple exercise to help you remain in an open heart space
This is something simple and short that you can do throughout your day to return to your heart space. Here is an article on it, from the Heartmath institute, and here is the basic gist of it:
Heart-focused breathing:
-Place your hand over your heart, and slow your breathing to 5-6 count on the inhale and exhale. And start to picture your breath moving into your heart on the inhale, filling the center of your chest with breath, and then on the exhale, picture the center of your chest exhaling.
Another variation that I like:
-Place your hand over your heart, and slow your breathing to a count of 5-6, and as you inhale, picture your breath moving through your heart space into your belly, then pelvis. And on the exhale, picture it moving back up, through your belly, then your heart. But keep your focus on your heart, as your breath moves through on the inhale and exhale.
Whichever one you choose, do it until you feel yourself return to a state of being centered in your heart space.