Journal.

I attended one of the sister marches for the Women’s March on Washington on Saturday, and it was both an exhilarating experience as well as an exhausting one, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. And not just because I woke up early, took public transport to the March in the cold, and then walked for over two miles to participate with 20K of my fellow citizens (just in this city, an estimated 3.2 million nationwide and even larger when accounting for the international support), but because the effort felt Sisyphean, and will amount to nothing if we don’t catch the voting attention of Republican lawmakers who seem hellbent on literally killing people and life as we know it with their authoritarian policies.

So, I have been mired back in depression and mild anguish ever since. So much so, that I’m not feeling like myself, I can’t keep my mind on anything, and I’m totally lacking in enthusiasm for just about anything. So much so that I wonder if something is wrong with me? I wonder if I’m having one of those mental breaks that cause people to do crazy, out of character things, and I just can’t see it because I’m in it?

I keep seeing posts from spiritual guru types that beseech their followers to find a place of love, and rise above… And they all sound so sanctimonious to me. They leave me flat.

Then I was watching a Byron Katie video, of a woman doing The Work on Donald Trump. She was afraid because she believed that Donald Trump might possibly build internment camps, and concentration camps, ruin the economy, etc. Katie encouraged her to do The Work on the idea that he definitely WILL do those things, because that’s what the fear really is. Wow. Yes. Brilliant.

Speak the thing you’re really afraid of, rather than tiptoeing around he might, he possibly, he may…

That really helps. Just that. Finally, something REAL.

I am afraid that he will ruin and plunder the economy. I am afraid that he will sell off or national treasures, like the Grand Canyon, pristine coastline, wetlands, forests, and preserves. I am afraid that he will eliminate healthcare for millions of people. I’m afraid he will eliminate Democracy in the USA and implement a totalitarian dictatorship ala Vladimir Putin in Russia (because he IS already taking actions in that direction!)

But back to the video….

So then, when Katie started doing the work with the beautiful woman in the video, I would pause the video to do it too:

“Donald Trump and his supporters are going to create concentration camps– can you absolutely know that it’s true that he is going to create concentration camps?”

No.

No, I can’t absolutely know that is true.

So I paused the video to do my own:

“Donald Trump and his supporters will ruin and plunder the economy. Can you absolutely know it is true that they will ruin the economy?”

No, I can’t absolutely know that is true.

“Donald Trump and his supporters will sell off our National lands and treasures like the Grand Canyon. Can you absolutely know it is true that they will sell off public assets?”

No, I can’t absolutely know that is true.

“Donald Trump and his supporters will decimate the ACA, and eliminate access to healthcare for millions of Americans. Can you absolutely know it is true that they will eliminate healthcare?”

No.

No, I can’t absolutely know that is true.

Then I got the first, teeny, tiny glimmer of hope that I have seen in a long, long time….

What if they do eliminate healthcare, what if they do repeal the ACA, what if that leads to the Harvard-estimated 44K preventable deaths every year, and what if they do force millions of people to be without health insurance and/or to go into medical bankruptcy because they became ill? People would be really, really mad, and the GOP will be seen as the greedy, heartless, power hungry thugs that they are. That might cause a giant blue wave of democratic wins in 2018, and again in 2020, retaking the presidency, reversing republican gerrymandering, and ultimately lead to a 21st century progressive New Deal which includes universal, single-payer healthcare for everybody!?

Kind of like how when proposition 8, due to trick-wording, was passed against the true will and spirit of the people in California, but then it ultimately led to a federal marriage equality law later on. We may lose the short term healthcare battle, but win the much bigger health insurance war.

It’s a start. It’s a daydream that includes a glimmer of hope which has been absent in me for a long time. It’s not how I want it to work out necessarily, but it is a possibility of something bigger and better coming from what feels like a desperately bleak situation, and it is a start.

Here’s the Byron Katie video:

I’m still not all the way there yet, because I haven’t completed The Work for myself, and I’m still feeling heavy fear and anguish, but I’m not entirely paralyzed today either, so that’s something.

So, where am I, emotionally, today?

I am numb.  I am sleepy.  I feel exhausted from wishing I could do more to resist this storm, but so small and helpless that there is nothing I can do but rage, and scream, and cry… And then, I feel even worse, because all of the self-proclaimed enlightened spiritual people say “pray, see him with divine love, only the light can cast away darkness!” and I’m just not there yet.

I’m not there yet.

I’m still scared.

I feel scared that he will start WWIII at worst, or at least a manufactured crisis, like a terrorist attack that he instigates in order to declare martial law at best.  At best.

I’m afraid that he will sell off our National Treasures, like the Grand Canyon, the Redwood Forests, and vast swaths of our coastline to private interests, other countries and mining companies, and once they are gone, we’ll never get them back.

I am terrified that he will destroy what’s left of the public education system, and we will revert to becoming a second- or third-world country with a “service” economy in less than a generation.

I’m all but certain that he and his cronies will plunder the wealth-earning potential of most American citizens to make themselves rich, and leave our children holding the bag, not unlike what sparked the Great Depression, but far worse.

And that’s just the beginning.  That doesn’t even include the things he actually says he’s going to do — that’s just the behind-the-scenes things that are within my imagination to conceive.  …There is much more that “could” happen, I’m just not sinister enough to think of it all.

So what are we to do?  Protest?  Fight?  Resist?

I’m not sure enough people are alarmed enough to do that, and there in lies the problem.

Or, there is the spiritual approach:

“What if this is the exact, perfect, best possible outcome?”
“What if this is actually a gift?”
“What if this is all leading to something much better, and this is the quickest route to it?”

How could that be?

I can imagine that if President Kennedy had never been assassinated that President Johnson would likely not have then have had the mandate to sign the civil rights act of 1965.  So there is one example of a tragedy turning into something much bigger and even more important.

Similarly, I’m not sure if President Obama’s presidency would have been possible if it weren’t for eight years under the (mild) tyranny and wars of the Bush administration.

I don’t think it’s possible to see in advance, what good might come of something so terrible as what is currently being called the President of the United States, but it is happening, so I’m trying.  I’m trying to not argue with reality.

But I’m having immense trouble day-dreaming of any possibly sort-of positive, peaceful, prosperous or beneficial, even long-range, outcomes here.

What are some possibilities?

I need your help.

The inspirational (and quite humorous) commencement speech given by Robert Holden at the University of Santa Monica graduation on August 28, 2016:

 

Some points I was most moved by:

1.  You’ve already graduated.  You’re already ready.
2.  Don’t make any plans. The best opportunities happen when you are simply open to the flow of your life.
3.  You are perfect the way you are.
4.  Asking for and accepting help is good.

The whole goal of starting this website was to come out of hiding, and let myself be seen.

I can think of no better way to do that than by quoting Martha Graham:

No artist is pleased.
There is no satisfaction whatever at any time.
There is only a queer, divine dissatisfaction;
a blessed unrest that keeps us marching
and makes us more alive than the others.

Share your gifts!