Day 135a: Beauty is as beauty Does … (September 11, 2019)
I woke after a short but decent night’s sleep and proceeded to head through and out of the town of Christiansburg, and couldn’t help but note the stark difference between the grace & beauty of the town itself as compared to the glaze of dismissal (and often even outright) hostility that I had been offered from its residents. Yes, I might well have simply encountered the town on a collective “bad day” and yes, I did choose to recognize the Golden Core of Goodness that resided in even the meanest and most callous of its denizens that day. And yet the fact remains to this day that we are only as Good as our current choices and the intentions that underlie them; and only as “Holy” or “Saved” as the deeds we extend to friends & strangers & enemies alike …
“Your culture is like a forest, and its seeds are essentially the core values of you and all your neighbors. And once the same take root as behaviors, these seeds will indeed grow into trees, creating and repopulating the kind of cultural forest in which you will live. The bad seeds of condemnation and callousness and fear and greed produce unhealthy forests – infertile and choked out with thorny undergrowth and plagued by infestations of one sort or another. The good seeds of gentleness and compassion and kindness and generosity, on the other hand, produce a healthy forest and ecosystems that support life and growth and openness and diversity. One is sustainable, the other is simply not … And yet aren’t we to strive for self-reliance? Of course, and yet not without intimate interdependence. For our own strength and non-neediness mean nothing if they are not used to connect with others and strive to lessen their burdens or enhance their joy. And this is what the healthy village is all about: on the one hand, respect for privacy and the innate autonomy of every other, and on the other, awareness of each other’s needs and an active engagement with fulfilling the same … Human connection is based on courageous caring, and it is courageous caring that is continually violated when people do not practice setting aside their narrow self-interests in consideration of the interests of others – even, and indeed especially, the strangers in their midst.” ~ inspired by Diane Kalen-Sukra & May Sarton
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