Sangha of Auspicious Companions

October 8, 2021

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Ecology by A.K. Ramanujam

“We live in times of such great potency. The time of the sixth mass extinction that a vast majority of us are participating in and co-creating, just by how we live our lives, and the choices that we make. We human beings, need the tree beings, the kingdom of the plant people, for our very breath; and if we wish to steward our planetary home away from what appears to be an inevitable fate of climate and species collapse. But why is it so difficult to convince more and more people to plant and care for trees? Whenever I ask this question, I go back to the core of it — how do people actually ‘relate’ to trees? Do they?! And then I’m reminded that being in relationship with any being is incredibly complex. There is beauty. There is also messiness and injury. Drama. Poignancy. Something that appears to keep relationships afloat in stormy seas is commitment. To a cause or a principle or a shared life perspective. Something larger than the beings involved in the relationship. It might serve us well to cultivate these complex, nuanced relationships with the trees in our lives too.” More in this thought-provoking post that features A.K Ramanujam’s poem, ‘Ecology.’ { read more }

Be The Change

Do you relate to any trees in your neighbourhood or land? Does your relationship carry complexity? If not, try tracking your relationship to a tree through a full cycle of the seasons. What comes up?

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The Promise of Biomimicry

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October 7, 2021

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Two Simple Ways to Release Grief

“One of the primary reasons in the West is because we’ve privatized it. If we don’t have a community to witness the process as so many cultures before us did, we risk falling into depression or despair. If we don’t grieve enough, we risk suppressing the grief. According to Francis Weller, suppression risks health problems or volatile emotions like anger.” In this thoughtful essay Cynthia Li differentiates between pain and grief, and shares two simple rituals to release grief and welcome joy. { read more }

Be The Change

Join a special Qi Gong workshop with Cynthia on October 13th, focused on learning how to rest and relax the mind even in times of uncertainty. { more }

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October 6, 2021

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Threshold Choir: An Interview with Kate Munger

“In November of 1990 I was invited to spend a day with a friend of mine who was dying of HIV AIDS. He was comatose, but very agitated. There were chores I had to do in the morning, dishwashing and gardening. And he was a quilt maker so I organized his quilts fabric. When the work was done, I sat down by his bedside and didn’t know what to do. I waited and waited. All I knew to do, to calm myself, was to sing. So I sang one song and I sang it for two hours. I sang it over and over again. I watched his breathing slow, and he got much calmer. And I got much calmer, because it was a song that was really soothing to me personally. So as I got comfortable, he got comfortable and at the end of the experience I felt like I’d touched something very deep in myself and given a gift that was unique to me to give. It wasn’t baking a pie or doing a chore. It was the gift of my essence in the form that was most fitting for me.” Kate Munger, founder of Threshold Choir shares more in this interview. { read more }

Be The Change

Join an Awakin Call with Kate this Saturday. More details and RSVP info here. { more }

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October 5, 2021

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Window of Possibility

“We live on Earth. Earth is a clump of iron and magnesium and nickel, smeared with a thin layer of organic matter, and sleeved in vapor. It whirls along in a nearly circular orbit around a minor star we call the sun. I know, the sun doesn’t seem minor. The sun puts the energy in our salads, milkshakes, hamburgers, gas tanks, and oceans. It literally makes the world go round. And it’s huge: The Earth is a chickpea and the sun is a beach ball.” So begins this piece, that goes onto explain why the Hubble Ultra Deep Field is the most incredible photograph ever taken { read more }

Be The Change

Check out this selection of awe-inspiring images of space. { more }

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October 4, 2021

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A Quite Interesting Approach to Education

John Lloyd is the television producer and presenter of some of the most renowned UK comedies in recent decades, including Blackadder and The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. In 2002, he made the pilot of “QI” (an acronym for “Quite Interesting”), a popular show which is now in its 18th series on the BBC. “When I started QI, only about five per cent of people that I talked to understood what it was really getting at. They said: “Oh, it’s a game”, but I would say: “No, it’s a principle”. The principle at the core of QI is that literally everything in the universe without exception is interesting — if looked at long enough or closely enough or from the right angle. This is a philosophy that really works. Over and over again we have proved that something that looks dull is not dull. It works for anything — any country, any fruit, any town, any house, any person.” He shares more in this interview. { read more }

Be The Change

Try looking closely at something today, that in your typical frame of mind, you would find uninteresting or utterly trivial. See what happens if you examine it “long enough or closely enough, or from the right angle.”

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October 3, 2021

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Mizuko Kuyo: A Unique Japanese Grieving Ritual

When parents lose a child, there are rituals to mark their grief — holding funerals, sitting shiva, bringing casseroles. But when that loss happens before birth, it often isn’t marked. Sometimes, it’s barely even mentioned. It’s different in Japan, which has a traditional Buddhist ceremony that some US Americans are adopting as their own. Called ‘mizuko kuyo’, which could be translated to ‘water baby memorial service’, this ritual originated in Japan post WWII, and draws on the idea that life is like water, a fluid resource with no beginning or end. This NPR piece shares more. { read more }

Submitted by: Gayathri Ramachandran

Be The Change

What rituals could you gently adapt/adopt to grieve what has been lost in your life? While you contemplate this, here is a poem by Barbara Crooker that evokes the raw tenderness of irreplaceable losses { more }

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October 2, 2021

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The Difference Between Healing & Curing

“In my thirty years of working with cancer patients, I’ve seen a profound distinction between curing and healing. Curing is what a physician seeks to offer you. Healing, however, comes from within us. It’s what *we* bring to the table. Healing can be described as a physical, emotional, mental and spiritual process of coming home.” The founder of Commonweal, Dr. Michael Learner shares more. { read more }

Be The Change

“Already Free” is a new documentary that traces the transformative healing journeys of two individuals through the practice of a particular form of Qi Gong. You can watch it here. { more }

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October 1, 2021

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How Do You Be?

“‘How are you?’ Back before the pandemic, when you and I would greet other people by asking this question, we usually didn’t expect or desire a real answer. If we got one, it had better be brief, and not too grim or involved. We weren’t up for longwinded or dreary responses. That’s not how the game was played. The pandemic might have altered our customary ‘How are yous?’ a bit. It might have made them less superficial, and more sincere. Those three words definitely mean more to me now than they used to. How about you?” Phyllis Cole Dai shares more in this thoughtful piece. { read more }

Be The Change

“How do you be?” Consider the question for yourself, in the light of Phyllis Cole-Dai’s post. For more inspiration, join a 21-Day Interfaith Compassion Challenge that starts this weekend. More details here. { more }

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