What wild times these are. I know we are all feeling the sadness, stress, frustration, and anger, here in the summer of 2020. I am not even going to list the events. I’ll bet we are all feeling collective grief and crazy.

As my own life has changed, and as I watch everything else change, I am reminded that is all there is. This too will change. Things will eventually calm down, the pace will slow, and then it will speed up again.  The picture behind my head shows a tree in the various seasons of the year. Constantly changing and yet also standing tall in the chaos of it. Holding the earth tightly with its roots and bearing the changing weather, using it.

I have no deep insight or profound thoughts on what is happening in our world today. But I do know that it will change, and keep on changing. The cycles of change could be a day, a month, a year, or decades. We all must stand in its wind and storms.

Finding resilience in change has been something I have been working on my entire life. If we can find the strength to stand tall amid the changing seasons, and even to use the changes as fuel for growth, we will all be in better places.

Yes we live in chaos. And yes we have agency to affect our surroundings. And yes we should all address the shadows of ourselves, our communities, our systems, and our world.

If we don’t come out of this better we will come out of this worse. There is no other choice. As individuals and as a society we are all accountable for our future. No matter the privilege or oppression, we all always have a choice.

“Change is the essence of life; be willing to surrender who you are for what you could become.” – unknown

My hope is that as a society we can become stronger in the broken places. I suppose a first step would be admitting that we are broken. You cannot heal that which you don’t acknowledge to be sick. With the veil of what we say we stand for pulled back, what is it we are seeing? I know there are people rationalizing, pulling up blinders, getting mad and acting out, getting depressed and loathing, feeling numb and giving up, and feeling inspired and creating.

Love Yourself. Be Honest.

Kyle