FootprintsintheWind.com

Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1028

We are the terrorists
We have done this to ourselves
Our police
Our captains, presidents, experts
Our metal detectors and electronic stripping machines
Our airlines, blankets, pillows and policies
Engender and nurse the terror among us
Terror we can see is not in bombs
But is a virus we ourselves give each other

I was reflecting on the decision to ban tailgating at the Super Bowl. I imagine the reason is that it makes it easier for the police to scan the area, patrol it, walk with explosive detecting dogs. But this also makes their job harder: the bombers, if they are there, are forced to be more circumspect. Their actions are more hidden. If they had the relaxation of moving about more freely, they might more easily give themselves away by their actions. Profiling might be easier for the police. Clearing the aisles only makes it easier to do the patrolling that will not catch nor concern those intent on doing harm. It serves most to increase the feeling of terror among us.

And of course there are those who profit by the terror—those who make the metal detectors, train the dogs, plan ways to keep people in orderly lines between the velvet covered chains.

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1027

He was at the counter waiting for his order, making a game out of chasing his 4 year old granddaughter back and forth, making faces with her. And it sent me to a place of wonder….

When people are new, little, we play with them—tickling, hiding and seeking, inventing fun things to do. Strange we do not think to do so when they are new but adult-sized. We think the little ones bright and wanting to engage with us, and our attention attractive to them….

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1026

& I, I took the path, thought
I, less traveled by as if
that made all the difference
but difference I learned is
not the truth, does
not exist
what exists is our
connection to the whole
each of us has this connection
& it is the part of us
most deeply real
the part we most want to
feel, live, & set free
the part that has our
peculiar weakness which is our
strength—our peculiarity
is the common road
we all long to travel by

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1025

Rely on people to do the good that is in them. Call attention to that good. Remind them of their hearts. Tell stories of their prodigious powers. Connect them with other hearts and hands. Repeat their stories. Use their names with others. “The queendom of G*d is within you.” “You are the salt of the earth.”

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1024

What is the bridge between G*d and the wholeness of the world? You are.

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1023

How we mend the world is through the stitches of conversation. One at a time, this piece rejoins that, and we begin to see the pattern of the whole cloth.

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1021

Come gather with me. Let’s do something about your dream. Your dream can be the turning point for the world. Let’s.

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1020

Do you sometimes, like I, ask yourself what you once liked to do, something you have long since left behind? And you know, I know, it was important. And good. And my true self. Where did my true self go?

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1019

Before you try to draw any grand plans, stand. Stand in the land, in the heart of the people.

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1018

White and deep they grow
Falling on my yard these flakes
Of Lake Michigan

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1017

Do the work that makes you feel most whole, that fulfills your deepest desires. Not for any selfish reasons but simply because that’s what makes the world most objectively alive: what most deeply makes me at home does the same for you, all yous. And this makes selling the proposition easy—and unnecessary.

This work is not easy, nor is it selfish—it is a task taking a lifetime and all one’s living energy to find and invent what is one’s truest self and desires. Getting past ego is both supremely difficult and worthwhile.

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1016

Is all the work done? Are all the hungry fed? Are all the voices heard?

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1015

There is one self. Of this our individual selves are part. Perhaps like holograms. If I shine a light on you, I shine a light on the one self, and on all. When we shine our lights on each other (which happens as we form centers near) the one whole is lighted and becomes vivid.

So our work is simply this: shining light on each other: on the good and light-worthy parts, because this shines a light on the great self. We understand that this work is different.

Almost at odds with the rest of the world which shouts “Look at me!”

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1014

Sometimes we don’t feel immense
want to shrink to a small tight ball
that’s when we most need to open
the only thing you must must do
is meet someone

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1013

The gifts of reflection: 1. discovery of unexpected aspects of an issue; 2. discovery of unexpected connections within an issue and to other issues; 3. discovery of unexpected connections within this people; 4. uncovering of the processes at work in this system; 5. use of diverse tools to work on the issue; 6. discovery of unexpected wholenesses; 7. parallel processing on the issue with all the several mental faculties in the room; 8. access to the memories of many people; 9. access to the collective mental processing capability; 10. access to the collective indwelling memory of the group; 11. accessing each of these gifts for the activities of seeing and knowing and doing; 12. assimilation for individual understanding and for group action; 13. closer access to the process of emergence; 14. access to coordination; 15. access to the intelligence of what steps and persons are necessary and how to assemble them to get good action. Why would we not want to plug into all this?

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1012

Life means we have to spend time with each other.

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1011

This too is a gift of G*d: to see with my eyes and mind and heart and community.

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1010

You should stop and render aid
if you see another human in distress
even more so if it’s the whole of humanity
as it is today sick near to death
for lack of the human touch
of reflective conversation

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1009

This deepest good is not a selfish thing—for one person, nor for a small group. It is for all those we can touch. It is hallowing the betweens. It is honoring the amongs. It is respecting what emerges from together.

Not everything we have that is good and true and beautiful comes from one person. No one person can turn the world, but we can together. No one person can get us to healthy or reduce crime or feed starving homeless people—but together we can.

Together is about farther sight and deeper insight, about hearing more and remembering better, about more hands and fingers and feet, about wider reach and closer degrees of relatedness, about wilder innovation and more practical responsibility. For getting it done, together is beyond one. Maybe because it can be One.

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1008

Giving the invitation is the first gift; continuing to give it is perhaps the larger gift.

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1007

Given that life and I and being are in essence vibration, what is the way to evolving being in higher quality? The structure of the world being vibration of living, then we need to look first for the life breathing in front of us, and see what we can do to preserve and extend that breath.

It is subtle this life. There is life even in the ugliest buildings, in the highway slashing the city asunder. We must look long and deeply. We must look with our own vibrations of love and life. Then we must gently, lovingly point them up, add to them.

So that is a clue as to how. How: transform by preserving structure, by preserving the process and the vibration already resonating. Step by step we see what is there, we add vibrations.

So this is what my task is about. This is what life is about. So far as I know today.

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1006

It has ever been and ever will be our task to find our generative ways to between and among—to make an us—.

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Footprints in the Wind^sm # 1005

I invite
You
To take responsibility
For what you
Most deeply
Love

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