Resurrecting the Relational Nature
Wishing you peace, Community,
I missed writing to you last month. March was filled with community care.
My dear friend of 20 years went into labor early for the safety of her baby. As I supported her through her third birth, I cried with absolute awe that she and baby Jirah are both well. I then spent two weeks in Chicago as she began her postpartum season. I’m so humbled to have supported her in a birth and postpartum capacity for both her second and third children.
I give thanks to those of you who sent financial resourcing to make this possible. I give thanks to another friend who allowed me to stay with her during my time in Chicago. This is living to me.
Over a decade ago, this same postpartum friend and I wondered how we would know we’d finally "made it." My answer then remains my truth now: my measure of success is being able to show up for my loved ones. As I drove between Chicago and the East Coast, I felt the necessity of this path. I am still learning to completely trust this way of living and to allow myself to be, quite meaningfully, useless to capitalism.
If you are reading this, you likely feel that same pull. You are sensing a different flow, away from the thrashing over-current of modern life. If you feel the pressure of the world closing in, take a deep breath. Create some slack. Use the space between the inhale and the exhale as movement toward the light of the rebirth canal. By doing this, we are resurrecting our relational nature.
"Remember the earth whose skin you are... Remember you are this universe and this universe is you." — Joy Harjo, Remember
Harjo calls us to grab the hands of life's expression. To become one another. To simply notice what is growing within us, around us, and through us. To shake the dust off of the bones of life. We can do this. You can do this, First name / my dear.
For your inquiry:
Who are you in relation to other beings? Sense into this in your daily interactions.
What do you feed yourself with, and what are you being fed by? Notice the nature of this reciprocity. What returns full? What returns empty?
