Kaye Williams, Associate Editor, LILIPOH
I often tell people how much I love the sound of the words, Cumberland
County, Kentucky. My experience of being here these past 25 years is a feeling
of freedom of soul.
I am grateful for my low-income life that is simple to live, how I don't
need to shop at big-box stores. Because of the food co-op and all
of my friends, gathering food (what others call shopping for groceries)
is a low-stress, comforting experience that centers around human relationship.
My animal-foods (meat, dairy, eggs) are all provided by farmers, in person.
I visit the farm and get what we need. It feels good to give money
to these local providers. With each payment I am telling them: I value
what you do. I am grateful for trustworthy providers who meet my
high standards of healthy natural animal food.
My husband Greg also gardens and he brings to the table so many more
vegetables, too. Our garden produce is now in the freezer, and home-canned
in jars. I dried strawberries in our home food dehydrator. We also
receive even more, different vegetables each Monday, delivered by CSA farmers
in the county; as well as a new bouquet of dazzling flowers to sit on our
kitchen table.
I am living in a food paradise. Are you too? It is all around
you, but maybe you haven’t connected with it! You may never have
thought about such things. Sometimes I think; this way of gathering
food is something so good, I wish it were also true for everybody in this
land. Think of how so many more farmers could be supported, if
most of the money that flows through the grocery stores went directly to our
neighborhood producers instead.
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There is so much calamity in the news, big problems that need to solved.
The financial world is still shaky at best: this is either an unexpected disaster
or . . . the natural outcome of wrong ideas taken to the extreme.
It can be, the opportunity to reconsider our financial assumptions.
This much I know: standard of living, measured by dollars earned or spent,
(GNP) is not the same as quality of life.
Sometimes I hear people say “let’s go do something” and really they
mean “let’s go buy something” burn up gas, at least. Going shopping
for another new something isn’t how I entertain myself. Consuming
is not as fulfilling as creating, or connecting.
The most enjoyable times of being alive, for me, are quality time with
my family members, good conversations and laughter with friends, solitude
for rest and connecting with the Divine guide within, and the creative
expression I experience when reading or writing. Once I had the great good
pleasure of seeing a play I wrote being enacted. None of those things cost
any money to do. But if I were running in place to keep up with payments
on debt or other high expenses, that could interfere with being able to
enjoy those things.
Being rich really means owning my whole self, provided that my basic
needs are met. Being free is pretty much the same thing. Liberty
= owning my own body, and owning my own time. Doesn’t matter how
much money flows through my month - if I don’t own my own body or my own
time because of an alienating or forced work life - life is poor.
I like to think about what it means to be a citizen of the United States.
What do you think? Opinions may vary, but some facts do remain.
The Declaration of Independence is a founding document, and therefore a
defining document of what it was originally intended to be.
“We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are
created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable
Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
The
pursuit of Happiness as a phrase is a doorway into a wide opening
of interpretations and meanings. If I’m chasing happiness and never
quite catching it, that would be pursuit, wouldn’t it? That could
be a problematic definition, because it could turn into running in place,
never quite reaching it.
I prefer to think about another definition of pursuit. A pursuit
is not just a chase. Here is what a free dictionary online says it
is:
pur•suit (p r-s t ) n.
1. The act or an instance of chasing or pursuing.
2. The act of striving: the pursuit of higher education.
3. An activity, such as a vocation or hobby, engaged in regularly.
Definition 2 is interesting - but I like definition 3. Put that idea
into the declaration and it says we are endowed by our Creator with the
unalienable right to Life, Liberty, and whatever regular activity of hobby
or vocation that makes us feel happy.
Lucky for me, I have two part-time jobs reading and writing, my favorite
things to do; and with a flexible schedule, so I own my time. Being
a citizen of the USA is working for me. I want it to work for you
too.
I have an idea about a group participation project, which we could call
“The Pursuit of Happiness Project.” If you think of a better name,
let me know. The goal of the project is to liberate all of us into
whatever regular activity, as hobby or vocation, gives each one of us happiness.
The economic system that requires the surrender of soul; when it takes
your body and makes it do things that hurt, makes you slave to the clock
and not to the beating of your own heart; that economic system is in the
way of too many people. It’s un-American!
I’m thinking we can do something different: an economic system that,
instead, is actually founded on soul - vocations and hobbies of happiness
- and that this is what is promised by the Declaration of America. This
is what it is to be an American. Let’s do it!
So many people have been captured by duty into the workplace for so
long - they have lost their ability to really know what they would even
want to do, if free. It might take a bit of time to unravel all the
programming and get down to the personal truth - and that is the reason
for sabbatical. Everybody can follow their own unique path of interest
and curiosity.
I have this theory that we all have different interests for a reason.
I just believe that if we each and all reach inside and find our own unique
purpose, and then express that, our world, our economy, and everything
else will play out so much better.
What I propose is this. I propose we each take some kind of respite
from the drudgery world - so that we can listen close to our own heart’s
desire inside. I think of this as a voice of the Divine - the organizer,
let’s say. That might take only a moment, if you’ve already been thinking
about this, and who hasn’t?
Then we say to each other (without fear of being clobbered or made fun
of) what those heart’s desires are, write them down, pass them around so
everybody reads of each other, and everybody looks at the similarities
and differences between all of these. Then, as we see commonalities
emerge, we get together in small groups to talk and listen with people
who have matching desires, and we put on our thinking caps together and
make good things happen.
What I just described in the 2 paragraphs above is classic First Amendment
activity. Here is the first Amendment in our Bill of Rights, Article
VII of the US Constitution (another founding document.)
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment
of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the
freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably
to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
The syntax of this is kind of backwards, because it talks about making
sure that the US government itself won’t interfere with the free exercise
of religion, or free speech or free use of the press, or peaceable assembly
and then the grievance thing.
If we state this more positively, we can describe what it would look
like if those protected things really were happening; not being interfered
with by the government nor by anything else. . . we would say something
like this:
Everybody relies on the Divine for their own guide; everybody
speaks freely, and writes for others to read, and reads what others have
written; everybody gets together peacefully and acts together to make things
better all around.
That is a simple description of what First Amendment activity is. Our founding
documents not only name the goals of (life, liberty, pursuit of happiness),
they spell out exactly how we are supposed to do it. So this project
I’m dreaming about, this experiment to prove God, actually, this is exactly
what the US of A was made for. This is just citizenship!
There is something magical that happens when we put something into words.
It’s a creative act in itself. In the beginning was the Word, and
we share this faculty, this ability to speak. Now I invite you, look
within, come and tell your answers, and lets play with this.
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Questions to prompt this soul connection and free speech:
What is your heart’s desire?
What is your wildest dream?
What have you always wanted to do?
What would you do if you were completely free?
What would you do if you won the lottery? (just to loosen up your
thinking)
What would you do different, if you could start over as a 21 year old
person, with all that you now know?
If you had five wishes, what would they be?
What would you most like to give?
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