Heroes Not Zombies

When the water meets the rock, both are changed.
When the waves meet the cliffs, both are changed.
Nothing exists in isolation. Everything which exists constantly influences, and is influenced by, whatever it comes into contact with. And because, ultimately, everything is part of a single vast web, everything which exists manifests the power to bring about change.

I believe in my power. I know I have the power to disrupt. In fact, I want the power to disrupt. I think that’s what I brought to doctoring….intervening, bringing myself into the situation, engaging with someone who was stuck in long established ways of an illness, or suddenly becoming overwhelmed with an acute event….and in that relationship I bring my power. I shift things. I challenge. Pull or push someone into a different perspective. Open a door or two, or at least open a shutter and let some light pour in. I bring that power to my relationships. I believe people are changed, their lives are changed, when they engage with me. I have seen my power upset people, calm people, inspire people, drive some people to despair. I’ve seen my power save a life at a moment when a person hangs between life and death. I’ve seen my power bring happiness, hope, and sadness. I have the power to bring pleasure and the power to bring pain. I believe I’m here to express that power and to learn the skills of directing it towards greater happiness, better lives, a better world even. Yes, I bother about the world, and, no,
I don’t have any greater influence than everybody else,
I know we all have that power,
and I know that I probably won’t manage to bring about the changes in the world I’d like to see, because I’m just me, just only me, and I’m here to live, to experience, to reflect, to understand, to create and to express what only I can.

I believe that, at least potentially, the same is true of every human being. However, it seems to me that a lot of people have no sense of their power and subject themselves instead to the powers of others all the time, leaving them feeling like victims, hopeless, as if the world, or God, or whatever, is against them. I don’t.

I believe in a benign universe. A universe which is the best of all possible universes to enable me, and you, and everybody else to exist, no, not just exist, but to thrive. Yeah, I know. That isn’t the case for everyone and certainly not all the time. A lot of horrendous things happen in this world. A lot of suffering. But I don’t think the universe sets out deliberately to make that happen. I can’t see how Life could exist without the support of the Universe.

I suspect that the power I feel is related to the power of the universe, or maybe even better, to the “vital force”, in exactly the same way as a wave is related to the ocean. It’s not my power. It’s just the power that moves through us all.

My point is – if I have this power, or better, as this power flows through me, then that power will interfere with others – I use the word interfere thinking of waves again, of the interference patterns on water which emerge as different energies set out across a loch. Sometimes cancelling each other out, sometimes doubling each other, but always producing something new, some new, beautiful pattern of interaction, or what the physicists call interference.

Here’s the next bit. If it really is the power of the universe, the vital force, flowing through me, and if in my ordinary, everyday living, I interact with this power (as I believe I do, and everyone does, and every plant does, every life form does, every deep throbbing, heaving mineral energy in the core of the Earth does)….I interact with this power just by being alive. I can’t help it. Even my dying will have an effect. So what can I do? Should I learn to understand it? To become aware of it, to learn the patterns and influences, and develop the ability to create, consciously create with it? Or will I be like a stick floating down the stream? Does “going with the flow” mean switching off? Stopping making choices? Drifting any which way, it doesn’t matter? I don’t think it does mean that.

I think “going with the flow” is more like “not going against the grain”. It’s about learning how life works and learning to surf it, to ride it, the way the Chariot card indicates in the Major Arcana of the Tarot, learning to harness the energies and create the new as the Magician card shows us, learning to see Life uniquely as The Hanged Man card does, and, yes, learning to be the Emperor, fully aware of his power, the power to provide and protect, the energy of Mars, of the Sun, of the Father. And, you, if you are a woman, you understand all this and you are learning to be the Empress, to bring all that beautiful, wonderful feminine, nurturing and nourishing energy of Mother Earth, of the Goddess, of Venus, Aphrodite, of the Mother. Both of us find ourselves in the Lover card, forming bonds of human compassion and care, and, ultimately, we see our powerful selves in the image of the World Dancer, as portrayed in the World card. Because there’s the next part of this understanding. We aren’t split into two utterly different types of creature, one manifesting only “the male principle”, and the other, “the female principle”. Rather, we are all the result of the constant interplay of both of these fundamental forces. As we see, beautifully represented in the symbol we call the “yin yang symbol”.

I like the imagery of the classic tarot cards. They convey a rich history of symbolism which, like all great art, can provoke and inspire. There’s one more card I’d like to mention here – The Wheel of Fortune. Chance. You see, I can’t see the future. Nobody can. I have no way of knowing what paths will open up, what opportunities will emerge, which will disappear, which doors will open, which will close. All I can do is to act with Good Heart. With what some people call a Big Heart, a heart “big enough”. I can play my hand then pay attention to see what others play, wait to see what will emerge now. So sometimes, I know, I am an obstacle to others. Sometimes, I know, I am a trigger of distress. I can try not to be. But I could only really manage it if I became utterly insignificant to them. It’s like The Little Prince and the fox, isn’t it? That wise fox who warned The Little Prince that once they created a bond, they created the potential for tears, for unhappiness. We don’t miss the people who never touched us, and who we never touched. Good Heart, Big Heart, the fox’s bonds, I think they are all referring to a way of living – bringing love to the power.

It’s impossible to avoid sending out waves to the universe, waves of energy, of molecules and of information. Isn’t it better to accept this power? To get to know it a little bit more every day? To learn how to live with it, to learn how to live in it.

More than that, to learn how to bring Love to it. I think we can all do that. Fashion, shape, influence the power which constantly flows through us. Fashion, shape and influence it with Love, so that it emerges into the universe heart shaped.

One day I saw a sign in front of the wall of the Higashi Hongan-ji Fushimi Betsuin Temple in Kyoto. It said “Life is living you”. That makes you pause, and think, doesn’t it? Say it again – “Life is living you”.

I think the best thing I can do, day by day, is try to bring love to life, so that I can feel this loving life force living me.