Facing the World, Facing Ourselves
Kalo mina, we say in Greek on the first day of the new month,
as a benediction, an open wish for goodness in the time to come. This time certainly does need a loving benediction . . . Kalo mina!
In the U.S. today, amid the uncertainties and hardships of COVID-19, we are witnessing the anger and suffering ignited by systemic violence against people of colour, especially Black people. George Floyd’s murder by a police officer in Minneapolis was too unjust and sickening—and too familiar—to be tolerated. In Toronto, Canada, people came out to walk against racism and the suspicious, police-involved death of a young Black woman, Regis Korchinski-Paquet. The walk started at my local park, Christie Pits, a site that has its own history of racism in the form of anti-semitism.
There is so much uncertainty and pain in the world, so much injustice. The pathology of the bystander is untenable, as always. It is destructive, as always.
How do we step into that open, vulnerable place, facing the world and its people, facing ourselves—accepting the responsibility of our citizenship in this fragile world? How do we dare to act, and to act rightly? How do we know when it’s appropriate to remain quiet and to speak up when we must? (As a white woman who’s written about violent racism against Indigenous people in Canada, I’ve learned that it’s crucial to remain quiet sometimes, ceding space and listening, allowing People of Colour to speak and be heard first. Remaining quiet is different than remaining silent, or acquiescent.)
In The Courage Room during the month of May, we worked with vulnerability, creativity and self-and-other in an open-hearted way. Sitting In The Courage Room isn’t about direct political involvement, but it IS about cultivating the honesty and open-heartedness to live courageously in these fraught times.
Out of an experiment with tender words and engagement, a group of strangers came together to sit in creative communion. I held Sitting in the Courage Room through May twice a week. I read (briefly) from the work of John O’Donohue (To Bless the Space Between Us), Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat (Spiritual Literacy), Lewis Hyde (The Gift) and a few gorgeous poems.
For June, due to my expanding therapy study and work duties, I offer this creative meditation once a week, on Thursday, at 11am EST.
Please feel free to join a small community of people from several countries and ten time zones, to work within a safe container of creative meditation and an accompanying exercise. It’s a nourishing community experience that moves across many borders. No speaking is required, though you may fall in love with some people’s smiles. We’ve had participants in Spain, Germany, Greece, Mexico, Singapore, Australia, as well as from across Canada and the U.S. May’s topics included: Boundaries, Sweetness, Healing in the Body, Receiving The Gift, Bestowing the Gift, Blessings . . .
FOR THOSE WHO ATTENDED IN MAY, THE ZOOM LINK IS THE SAME, SO PLEASE RECYCLE THE LINK if you still have it, for THURSDAYS only during the month of June, starting Thursday, June 4th.
If you’d like to join, or if you require a new link, please send me an email at karen@karenconnelly.ca
I’m also requesting that Sitting In The Courage Room participants make a donation in any amount to the wonderful Earth Medicine Clinic for refugees on the island of Lesvos. This special healing place was created by an Indigenous Chilean woman, the gifted physiotherapist and healer Fabiola Velasquez, pictured above with two volunteers at her clinic. For several years, Fabiola'’s been treating the most physically vulnerable refugees on the island, pro-bono. You can learn more and donate through the GoFundMe site here https://www.gofundme.com/f/refugeeslesvos
Or send me an e-transfer directly to the email address karen@karenconnelly.ca . I will add your donation to the GoFundMe site manually, if you wish.
For those who haven’t donated and wish to join, I request a donation of $20-50 on a sliding scale, entirely dependent upon you. I know these are difficult financial times for many: you are still welcome to join even if donating isn’t possible at this time.
Sitting In The Courage Room, we breathe in consciousness, in creative spirit, in the spirit of the gift. Below you will find two small gifts: a poem by Langston Hughes and a poem by Rilke. Both remind us that the imagination is a tremendous agent of change and of protection for the spirit. That’s a powerful thing to meditate upon at any time—but especially now.
May this world, our home, be well. May this world, our home, be free from suffering and injustice.
May you be well. May you be free from suffering and injustice.
Wishing you courage . . .
. . . and Kalo Mina!
Karen
The Dream Keeper
Bring me all of your dreams,
You dreamers,
Bring me all of your Heart melodies
That I may wrap them In a blue cloud-cloth
Away from the too-rough fingers
Of the world.
—Langston Hughes
Sonnets to Orpheus. Sonnet 11/29
Quiet friend who has come so far
Feel how your breathing makes more space around you.
Let this darkness be a bell tower
And you the bell. As you ring
What batters you becomes your strength.
Move back and forth into the change.
What is it like, such intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself into wine.
In this uncontainable night,
Be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,
the meaning discovered there.
And if the world has ceased to hear you,
Say to the silent earth: I flow.
To the rushing water, speak: I am.
— Rainier-Maria Rilke. Translated by the great ecologist and activist Joanna Macy & Anita Barrows, after the American invasion of Iraq, 2003.