Being Gentle, Healing the Self & Healing the Planet

I care deeply about the planet and I care about her inhabitants. It took me a long time to acknowledge this. 

For a long time, I would be highly reactive to people, most people, in fact. To be honest, I feel that Western society has digressed from the sacred feminine, the natural world, the honouring of ‘being’ and the blessings that exist in simplicity. 

We focus too much on material gain, ‘doing’ and busyness. We focus too much on the masculine energies of effort, determination and force. We are dangerously disconnected from the natural world. We place too much value on financial gain over well-being (of self, others and the planet), mind-dominance over intuitive knowing, arrogance over sensitivity and ignorance over feelings. 

And for a long time, I became ignorant, arrogant and angry at those very things. But you can’t fight arrogance with arrogance. You can’t rage with anger against anger. Well, you can, but it doesn’t lead to anything all that positive in my experience. It’s extremely difficult and harbouring that energy of struggle is actually harming you.

While you may in fact get your way by throwing a tantrum, is that really how you want to spend your limited time here on earth, throwing tantrums and being angry in order to force your will upon others? 

I became impotent in my anger and I suffered. I still care deeply about the planet. I do still get angry occasionally but I no longer rage against. I now use that anger to propel me forwards. I see myself like water, carving its way through a crack in the stone. That water finds the path of least resistance. It comes up against an obstacle and wastes no time in going around, trickling, flowing, effortlessly and easily. And in time, that water is capable of altering landscapes and carving great canyons.

There are many of us now, who are banding together in gentle, flowing, loving energy. I am blown away by the wise, mature and incredible environmental lobbyists and human-rights lobbyists that are showing up in this country. Intelligent, respectful, kind, self-aware, decent human beings are all emerging. 

It is my belief that most people on this planet make decisions for reasons that can be traced to a positive intent. That doesn’t always turn out well, and there are sometimes complex reasons for why people appear to do bad things, but in most instances (not all) these motives can be traced to a positive intent. 

For example, an oil executive may want to create a legacy not just for her children, but also her grandchildren. Perhaps she is only concerned with their financial well-being because she was poor as a child and money is everything to her. Perhaps she feels inadequate and the only way to alleviate her suffering is to achieve as much wealth as possible. Please note, that I am not excusing her, I am merely doing my best to understand my fellow human being. Because, it is painful for me to alienate her. Because I care deeply about all beings and the planet. 

I also have a fundamental belief that we are all one. I have been and will be a tyrant, a perpetrator and a victim. I am one who suffers and one who creates suffering. I am no angel, not even in this lifetime. Have you ever harmed another? If so, why did you do it? Was it intentional? If it was intentional, what was your emotional state at the time? Did you act out of fear or out of love and peace? Were you just inconsiderate, absent-minded or hardly there at all? 

To all lobbyists out there, have you considered the standpoint of your opponent? Have you sought to find the humanity within them? Have you considered that there may be ways for everyone to win? A true genius will be open to finding solutions, albeit potentially unconventional, to suit the needs of all involved.

Let us begin to see the needs of those to whom we are opposed! What if we can find ingenious solutions to satisfy all? Wouldn’t that be ideal? Know your opponent, learn them, seek to find their humanity.

It is another sincere belief of mine that if all humans on this planet were whole, connected with their inner being, their innermost longings, truth and deep peace, they would do no harm to others or to the planet. Therefore, if we each clean up our inner pollution, as best as we can, we do less harm. 

I once saw a young backpacker at the beach standing at her car eating and just throwing rubbish on the ground all around her. There is a minimum fine of two-hundred dollars for littering in Australia and I videoed her and her number plate. I could have sent this evidence to the police or the local ranger and she would have incurred a fine for littering. But I kept watching her. 

She appeared to be very distressed. Her friend was yelling at her and the young lady who was littering was clearly having some kind of emotional meltdown. A fine would possibly be the straw to break the camel’s back, so to speak. I decided to go and pick up her rubbish once she had left instead of sending the video to the police or the local council. 

If she were happy and emotionally balanced at that time, she would not have littered. I can guarantee it. If a person were to confront her at that time, she would not have backed down from a fight, she was in a state of pain so great that she did not care about the environment, she did not care about her friend, she did not care about herself. 

How could she? She was hurting. She wanted to perpetuate that pain. Well, actually, the pain wanted to perpetuate itself, as though it had possessed her and taken on a life of its own. Does any of this sound familiar? Have you ever been hurting so badly that you just didn’t care? 

If we want to heal this planet, if we want to heal injustices, we must start with each individual. We cannot only blame councils and governments and wait for them to do something. 

There are things that you can do. But let’s just start with something simple. Take care of one another. Be kind if you can and extend a little generosity of spirit to those who are hurting. That doesn’t mean you need to go up to a person who is on a rampage and ask them if they want to talk about it or anything. I was wise to stay away from this young girl. She wanted to kill somebody. But I disarmed my anger and judgement towards her. She feels it. We are all one, remember? 

I had planned to lovingly clean up her mess when she left. But then, her friend, went and picked it all up for her. I didn’t have to do a thing. I got to observe a beautiful, sensitive individual having a really bad moment. I have been that individual once upon a time. And accepting her, loving her from a distance, extending compassion for her plight, was very healing for me also. 

You are the future of this planet. Love, be kind, be gentle, be forgiving. As you heal, you spread a different kind of energy. As you heal, others heal also. As you heal your inner pollution, outer pollution also lessens. You are the key.