I first want to apologize for my long absence from writing, and I want to thank my wonderful blogging family/friends who have been gently (and patiently) trying to encourage me to write again!  I see you, and I appreciate you more than you know!

Where Have I Been?

My absence has been the result of three things merging.  First is that I have been particularly focused on my aging 20-year-old cat who is in the later stages of kidney disease. She wants to spend enormous amounts of time with me, and I want to give her that time (which has kept me away from my computer quite a bit!). Second is that I have been struggling with writer’s block for several months!  I have started a number of blog posts that I have not finished, and I have had lots of thoughts circulating about what to write about, but have not been able to do so when I have the opportunity to write.  So, the absence of postings has not been due to a lack of trying!  And finally, I have been struggling with where I want to take my blog.  I am a deeply metaphysical/philosophical person, and there are many thoughts I have wanted to share, but I have worried (perhaps a bit too much) about how that information would be received, and whether it would be misunderstood.  But I think I am gradually (hopefully) coming out of my writing slump, and coming to a better understanding of how I want to write and how I want to share information that I feel is important for me to share. But first, let me just say that everything I am writing in this and future blog posts, is an effort of mine to share my ongoing thoughts with you, and should never be seen as an attempt to push any beliefs on anyone, or to force any specific way of thinking.  I hate being told what to believe, and so I don’t want to be doing that to anyone else, either.  And if I seem passionate about an idea I am expressing, it is because it has deep meaning for me – and that is why I am sharing it.  If it does not have some resonance for you, that is OK.  (smile) Every human being has free will!  So here I am, taking a stab at my first blog post for the year 2026 (a little later than I had initially planned to)!

My Thoughts About Our Place in the Current Moment

I consider this moment of our lives that we are currently witnessing and living through, to be very, very important!  I can’t stress that enough!  Each of us, I believe, are part of a great transformation that is taking place within humanity and the planet, and we are not here by accident!  Each of us is a unique key which is unlocking an important piece of that transformation through our individually complex and informed perspectives, and if we look back at our lives, we will see how each experience we have had, has prepared us for this moment.  Because of what our life has shown us, how it has made us feel, how our experience has been colored by a variety of events woven through family, friends, pets, work, gains, losses, happy and sad moments, and so on, we have an opportunity to unlock insights into what is occurring right now, and why.  We may not realize it right away, but if we look backwards at who we have been, and who we are now, we will see a pattern of growth that has been taking us to this very moment.  And the realization of that is our superpower!  Because it is in that recognition of just how much our life experience has prepared us for a world that has been rapidly changing, that we may find the answer to why we are here right now, and what role we may be playing or may be needed for. 

What Do We Want?

Our minds and hearts are very powerful.  When I began to understand this, I began to realize how important it is to think, feel and act in ways that create what we truly want.  What has worried me the most, is where so many of us are placing our attention these days.  What we focus on, we empower. Goodhearted people do not want to see others suffer, and so we often make the mistake of spending all of our time focusing on the suffering, and on those causing it.  This is what I did for a long period of my life.  And I came to realize that this may be the wrong approach. 

If we don’t want suffering in the world, we need to constantly envision a more respectful world living in peace and harmony.  If we don’t want cruel people having power over us, we need to stop focusing on them and what’s wrong with them, and instead focus on the types of people we truly want in our lives.  It’s a distinction that is important to consider.  It doesn’t mean hiding from reality or closing our eyes and refusing to see injustice or harm – in fact, I truly do believe that we have to see reality with our eyes wide open, and to not look away from where harm is being inflicted.  But the point I am trying to make is that we are the creator of our reality, and if we dwell on something or someone too much, that is what remains with us – that is what we give our power to.  What we focus on, becomes our world. So, the antidote to evilness or harm in the world, is not to give it power or energy by clinging to its reality (In other words, we can’t always dwell on the negative and expect good to arise from that).  For me, I consciously address this in three ways:  First, I see it (don’t refuse to see it), then I try to understand what imbalance it is attempting to reveal in order to bring us back into balance, and then I try to actively live in resonance with what I truly believe (so, for example, I will make a point of showing kindness where possible, rather than wishing harm on others I don’t agree with). 

Examples of How Life Experiences Affect Us

So, I mentioned that our lives hold the key to why we are here.  In my life, for example, I believe that my experiences were creating a deeper understanding of differences, so that I could walk through a time in my future, a time of extreme polarization (which is playing out now), and be adequately prepared to question that reality while also looking for solutions to move past it. 

As an example, when I was very young and somewhat religious (religious enough to want to be a nun, despite not being Catholic, but not religious enough to want to be a part of any religious structure – so being a nun was also out of the question! Ha!), I kept asking myself why a Savior would be crucified, while criminals were set free.  My answer, I think, has been delivered to me quite clearly, and with multiple examples, over the past 10 years.  Now I absolutely understand how that happens (but it made no sense to me 50 years ago when I had an assumption that everyone could clearly see what is “good and bad” and make the “right” choices based on that shared understanding)!  “Good and bad” are much greyer concepts now (as are “right” choices), and clearly, we do not all share the same understanding of anything, nor the same information!  Realities can be quite different! 

Another example is that I was born and raised in the South (southern US), yet traveled the world and most states in the US, and had multicultural parents, so I was exposed frequently to different ways of thinking, as well as to the different ways that people’s thoughts are influenced to move in certain ways.  I grew up in the military in the 60’s (attended DOD schools which were very well integrated with kids from all types of backgrounds and cultures), later attended a military college in Texas in the 70’s and 80’s (which I can honestly say, looking back, was my first exposure to “MAGA” thinking and behavior), served in the military myself in the 80’s and 90’s, then pursued Graduate studies in the 90’s in Peace and Justice, which expanded my understanding of peace, the development of 1st and 3rd world countries and relationships, all forms of injustice (i.e., wealth, health, housing, food, security, race, gender, etc), then worked with homelessness, and finally, worked in all forms of higher education at a Community College in the 90’s and 2000’s. I was a gay person serving in the military during the time of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (though I did not know I was gay when I entered), did not “come out” as gay until years later, and was fortunate to be living in Massachusetts when gay marriage was legally recognized (which enabled me to marry the person I loved – which should be available to anyone!). 

So, I have kind of seen life from all different angles, and the more I gradually understood difference through my own life experience, the harder it became for me to see things in the black and white way I used to see them. 

The last time I remember seeing the world so black and white, was right after Trump became President the first time (in 2016 leading into 2017), and I was filled with anger – extreme anger!  But shortly after that (perhaps a few months later), I started seeing things differently.  And that mindset has only expanded since then!  I could reflect on my life, and start to make connections.  And that’s when I began to see that, perhaps, what can save us, is a change of perspective on what we focus on! 

I still remain informed and current on every single (awful) thing happening in our country and the world, but I choose now, to see the differences as the result of differing experiences, exposures in life, cultural and religious differences, media influences, and so on.  In other words, I do not see people as inherently evil or good anymore (though I certainly have moments of pain and sadness and even anger at what some are willing to do to others to inflict pain and suffering – and I do honestly have my moments of seeing certain people as pure evil, until I snap myself back out of it! Ha!).  What I mostly see, instead, are people reacting to what they know or don’t know, and what they fear or have no control over.  And this is why, somehow, we need to find ways of connecting with one another, and understanding how we arrived at our differences.  We don’t have to welcome those we don’t like into our lives, but we do need to find some degree of common ground that we can relate to (human beings actually do have quite a lot in common, but don’t always realize it!).  If we don’t seek that out, we will never change our world.

I will write about other experiences in more detail in future blog postings.  For now, I hope this is a good start! 

A Final Thought

I would ask that, if you can, try not to remain focused so much on how bad everything is around us (which I know is really hard!).  Certainly, be aware of it (don’t look away or hide), but then try to see things from a different perspective. Understanding requires more than one viewpoint. Perhaps we are needing to witness our differences through new eyes (and through the eyes of others), and to experience the real difficulty in truly reconciling those differences which have been plaguing our country for 250 years or more. Perhaps seeing these difficulties being played out on a much larger scale and affecting all of us so personally, enables us to see our world more clearly, and to address deep wounds and problems more urgently and with greater understanding, than we had previously imagined was needed.

We also need to realize that the only thing we can change in this moment, is ourselves, as well as influence those things we have specific control over or access to (such as, for example, in our personal connections, in our communities or groups, through our donations, through our writing, through informing others with important facts and actions to take [as some bloggers – in fact, many of you reading this – are fantastic at doing!], or through protesting, or doing whatever is possible within our specific realm of influence). 

We also have to let go of our need to change everything quickly and all at once, particularly because each moment may be teaching us about new and important things we had been unaware of, but that truly do need change and healing!

And finally, we need to let go of our desire to change everything by ourselves! We cannot change the world or country by ourselves alone.  That is too overwhelming, it drains us, and it makes us unproductive and incapable to affecting real change.  But collectively, with everyone doing what is possible for them to do in their own realm of influence, and with new eyes and new experiences illuminating what is truly needed, along with expanded hearts that have acquired a deeper understanding of the source of our differences, we can INDEED change our country together and become a more positive impact on our world!