inhabiting the human condition
this world makes us aware that everywhere we BE, we’ll hardly be at ease, we will always have some antsy impulse to look for what’s next, and that’s okay1. if you’re a little bit like me, you’re on the lookout for something that might hint a clue to help in comprehending a bit deeper what this human experience of ours is about. to comprehend is more than just a given task, but a responsibility, an implied obligation in each of our individual lives
the objective is not to change the human condition
by becoming immortal, omniscient, and all-powerful.
rather, it is to inhabit the human condition.
but in order to achieve that, we must accept
our fragility, our torments, and our doubts~ Claudio Naranjo
just the other day i shared in a conversation how my initial experiences with cannabis were to purposefully trigger feelings of anxiety. to become familiar with them and approach them with curiosity, that was my way of learning to inhabit my human condition and perhaps healing my normalized anxious upbringing
lately, i’ve recognized that experiencing the mystery with humility, fills me with awe and wonder; where i feel both ecstatic and at ease by just being, witnessing beauty as well as living the poetry… and once that’s done, i reflect, like i’m doing now, where my writings are my field notes
my myth
sung movements of energies
choices for a life
not to be lived in uncertainty
but for navigating the mystery
i enjoy this so much that i now consider myself a mystery maximalist, where i have no room for certainties
but it’s crazy to see how much we’ve overcomplicated things in order to get away from our fragile and impermanent conditions. some folks are out there identifying as souls…to avoid the raw messiness of life? or free spirits…in an effort to bury the egoic being… under some shallow light?
and do they even know the difference?
more concepts made to identify and separate things that are ultimately inseparable while getting lost in aspects of who and what we are but not quite the whole of ourselves
i’ve recognized the necessity to re-orient our understanding of what it means to here on this earth by dropping a few labels where only one thing remains
i am human ~ and so are you
through all this mingling of languages being lost, eradicated, or absorbed, we’ve ended up with “human” to refer to ourselves. some people say this word comes from humus —that dark soil from leaves (not the garlic dip)— but i’m not quite so sure of that, i think there might be something else to it, something more universal
here are a few examples of some words that different peoples and cultures with different languages used to refer to us human beings
in lakȟótiyapi / lakhota
wičhaša akaŋtu ~ people of the surface
in mapuzungun
mapu-che ~ land-people of
in diné / navajo
nihokáá dine’é ~ earth surface people
in sanskrit
mata bhumi ~ children of the earth
do you see the pattern?
the land peoples
like a tree apples
and we, in return
in communion with creation
and joyful appreciation
people the land, still
even though every little bit of the earth is in us, to say that “the human is the earth” is not a “fact” anymore…
(but it used to be)
we knew that we’re a miniature version of her. this was our story, and that doesn’t mean that it isn’t anymore
earth is planet, nature, and mother. she is love, generosity, sympathy, gentleness, kindness, and sweetness. as the mother of all beings, she defends the space and integrity of each one of us.
we are the earth and we will be the earth because we sprouted from her; like her airs, her volcanoes and mountains, her waters and forests pulsing with life. we posses and reflect her cycles of condensation and drying and we’re also more than that — as there are minerals running through our bodies that were forged in the hearts of stars. there is matter from the heavens flowing through us. there’s also this subtle part, an immeasurable one that’s both here and there, like the smoke that is neither fluid nor solid
in their poems, Skaay and Ghandl speak of three distinct realms - forest, sea and sky - each with its natives populations. none of these however is the human realm.
humans are only at home on the xhaaydla, the surface, the boundary or the intertidal zone, the conjunction of all three~ Robert Bringhurst,
“a story as sharp as a knife”
shallow-rooted denizens, at home in the here and there, dealing with things, hi-lo and in between. this is what we do. Skaay also called human beings as xhaaydla xitiit ghidaay: "plain, ordinary surface birds". as there are creatures with more power — like killer whales and sea lions - that know how to dive. so if we are to go with them, if we are invited to dive and pierce the surface -the xhaaydla - as it is called in Haida - we enter the world of myths, and we come back speaking poetry2
in the human gardens
that adorn the whole earth
i intend to make a bouquet of love and condescension
permission to cut
the flower of understanding
the grass of hope
the little leaf of feeling
~ Violeta Parra, “la jardinera"
to pierce the surface is to see and understand ourselves deeply ~ as earth, as expressions of her strengths, elements and cycles.
the earth is a sensible being. she even dreams, her fluency, her language of impermanence reminds us that we’re also impermanent natural beings and that our energies our constantly being exchanged and recycled
when we remember we are earth itself herself, our being blooms like flowers and we wake up to our human beingness with a true freedom that comes only when we’re not getting in her way (by trying to dominate) but instead by allowing that natural intelligence to be expressed and re-created through the lives we live
i wanted to teach people to listen to the pulse of nature,
to partake of the wholeness of life and not forget,
under the pressure of their petty destinies,
that we are not gods
and have not created ourselves
but are children of the earth,
part of the cosmos
~ Hermann Hesse
call me by our name
our task is to take this earth so deeply and wholly into ourselves that it will resurrect within our being
~ Rainer Maria Rilke
as this earth gives us everything we need, what other word is there for such an act if not an act of love? it really doesn’t take much effort to feel it, but perhaps too much abstraction has blinded some to think that they are not absolute dependents of this world. it’s hard for me to even try to understand why would anyone want to follow elon’s quest and go to some barren and inhospitable place like mars3
now i don’t really like being prescriptive, but i do have a message for those folks…a secret actually:
the earth sings
to walk over this mapu4
without breaking its harmony
paying attention to the song
that emanates its energy
barefoot, resting
over the dew i will sing:
müley kimün taiñ longko
müley newen taiñ molfüñ5of the earth, being always attentive
of its breath, strength, and movement
that breaks through every foundationembedded in the noise of the city
with the capacity to hear
the vlkantun6 of the wind~ Waikil, “alkutun”
once we start listening, once every breath is offered to her, while every footstep of ours becomes a prayer where we vow in awe, she responds. her gentle song will become the whispering of a name, an unique name to each of us
now…is that her name or yours?
…it’s both…
as a group, we will still be humans, but by ourselves, we will now have developed a new level of intimacy, whereby the means of a resonant word — a bond, a name is now shared. a token of invitation for a homecoming, a beautiful rite of passage, where one goes from being a person to being a human ~ an earthling ~ that reclaims its kinship within the web of life, by uncovering its heart to find its own remembrance of relatedness
this great island tucked against the bowl of space is home. it is majestic and at the same time a humble being—allowing us all to grow and evolve. Aki—Earth. i will walk her skin today attuned to her heartbeat, the feel of her thrumming the soles of my feet
~ Richard Wagamese
thank you for reading from the blue. i decided to keep this entry short by releasing it into a few parts, so part II and III will be coming sooner rather than later!
even now, you’re probably curious of what this dude is trying to say
Robert Bringhurst, “the tree of meaning” p.42
i don’t even think we can (by the way), but if we could, then that looks like a one-way trip to me. no thanks
land
there’s knowing in the head
there’s energy in the blood
singing