There are a lot of kinds of complexities to live in. The global realities — climate crisis, water supply, health. The closer to home stuff — race, equity, reparation. The closer to self stuff — family, love, loss. And a bunch more.
Living in complexity is part of being a human being. It’s part of adapting. It’s part of growing. It’s part of maturing. It’s part of claiming some wisdom and some soul. Doesn’t matter what country, what age. It’s all there.
One particular complexity that I have a lot of energy for is how to live in seemingly contradicting truths at the same time. How to be in the all of it, and not just the convenient or preferred reductions of it. Few surface circumstances are outright good or outright bad. Everything is nuanced, I find.
I like the expansion of heart and brain needed to live with contradictions, be they personal, in a group, or as part of an overarching culture. It is a kind of evolution and maturing that I appreciate in others and in sharing with others. Most of us are trying to offer some good.
Buddy Chris Corrigan writes recently of such a need for dwelling in complexity. He writes “What Does it Mean to Preserve Heritage in a Settler World?“
I love the energy that Chris brings, from years of living, to not be too quick to oversimplify, while at the same time, not be afraid to name very basic principles to guide.
There are things to honor in every heritage. Sometimes for what they mean now. Sometimes for what they meant then, but have now changed in meaning.
It seems to me that we humans have this simultaneous need to hold to what is the past, but also to evolve it. It seems to me that we humans have need to celebrate what was, lament what was, contribute as best we can to evolution now, and contribute to consciousness now.
The times call for heart, I believe. Always have. The times call for learning to center ourselves even more in kindness, consciousness, and flow. Love itself is complex — whether love of self, other, or circumstance. Whether love of learning or of letting go. Whether love of simple starts or of long and difficult hauls.
I’m uber grateful to know people and to live with people that are committed to such relationship with complexity, inner and outer. I’m uber grateful for friendship over decades now, that continue to seek to grow heart and mind together.
“How to be in the all of it, and not just the convenient or preferred reductions of it.”
I find myself sometimes — maybe often — sitting with a desire to name “essence” as an anchoring of who I am in the moment. Yet also holding space for what is beyond. What another person in the community might name as their “essential essence.” I want/need to understand what matters most to me, and hold that gently as I am in the process of becoming, as I am sharing space/time with others who matter to me.