A LETTER FOR HOPE

Photo of Hope Laborin

Hope contacted me, she felt discouraged, lost. Hope is at a university in Northern California.

“Dave I’m having a hard time recently narrowing down/focusing on what makes me feel alive.”

It’s taken me more than a month to get this rainy day to write for Hope, and since that time that hope tapped me on the shoulder, things have changed significantly close to home and around our planet. The pandemic is clearing the shelves of the stores and spring breaks have started two weeks early with semesters to be finished on line.

How are you doing now? I ask Hope.

“Feeling overwhelmed with the uncertainty of things but grateful for my health,” answers Hope.

My earlier answer for Hope was to talk about how we have to learn how to reinvent ourselves. That fluid place of calm that knows how to stay aligned with our selves and knows how to nudge open doors to manifest even when we can’t see what we want. All universities need to teach a course in How to Reinvent Yourself 101, no prerequisites required. Life is an impermanent always changing force. How easy it is to feel like we have invested so much of our time and efforts in one place. There is always a time when the inspiration, the vitality, the raw excitement of exploring new things, feeling exponential evolution turns into something else. Suddenly you wake up with anxiety, a sense of drudgery, a feeling that I’m treading water, looking for fulfillment.

painting by Phoebe at 14

Basically we want to feel safe and we want to feel inspired. Sometimes those two things are opposing forces. Especially if you want to raise a family and pay your mortgage. What do we trust? how do we trust that the universe provides? I remember my time in college well. I remember that feeling of why am I here, what am I doing. How do I land. I remember the pain in the pit of my stomach.

But since the moment of Hope’s existential question of who am I, how do I thrive, what do I want in my life? The world has suddenly shifted to a much more complicated issue. The Pandemic, coronavirus (COVID-19)— and it’s scary halo surrounded with misinformation, hysteria and uncertainty. Suddenly the question of what do I do now, where do I go, takes on a completely different resonance.

Focusing on what makes me feel alive now, feels more like survival tactics— wash your hands 25 times a day. Stay away from large groups. Don’t make human contact, hugs and shaking hands forbidden. This is all around us now. Social Distancing, at least 3 feet away is all around us. Seems a bit ridiculous to even talk about reinventing ourselves when the world seems to be falling apart right in front of our eyes, schools are shut down and people are having to work at home, restaurants are empty, airplanes and cruise ships are empty. The economy feels like it is collapsing in front of our eyes. Fear is even more contagious than Covid-19.

This is the time we need to invest the most into who we are, what are we invested in, what gifts do we have. If you are reading this, you are one of my friends or a friend of one of my friends. I am blessed with remarkable people all around me. We are the calm voices. we are the connection to the planet. We ask the hard questions. We bring love and we bring light where ever we go. It is dark times. But if you have been paying attention we were already in dark times. Our president is the antithesis of wisdom. It’s like a 12 year old scared shitless bully is in charge. A silver lining is he has been completely unmasked!

Yes! The world is fucking sideways right now, but at the same time in a kind of psychic/ transcendental vortex, (yes I know this sounds woo woo) a kind of metaphorical atmospheric river, an energetic flow that allows us to find inspiration and the courage to stand up for what we believe and claim it. These are the silver linings.

There is a gift here. Look deep and see a different kind of prosperity. Not one about wealth, accumulation and attachment, but one based in the integrity of your ideals. Prosperity that centers you under the light that allows you to manifest your dreams. Hope reaches out. That is a gift. My friend Crowe tragically dies yet a crow becomes part of a story that changes the course of my life. That is a gift. I feel loved. That is a gift. My work feels rewarding. That is a gift. A story I write touches one person in a significant way. That is a gift. As I collect these I pay them forward. Generosity is paying forward what you receive. This is the first step in re-balancing our planet. This is the first step into transforming a fear base reality into an inspirational and proactive one.

photo by Erin King

When I think about the pandemic and the threat it puts on our society I also thing about global warming and the crisis in ecology and the threat it puts on pour planet. It’a ironic that the young people who I am close to feel immobilized by the threat and destruction that is happening to our planet. Hope feels vulnerable, unsure. Young healthy Hope is not in the high percentage of serious covid-19 death tolls. Global warming crisis is as real as the pandemic. It’s much harder to be in denial when you go to the store and see no food on the shelves.

Both threaten our lives they just run different time lines, but in the scope of time both are ticks of a second hand. Perhaps there are silver linings that we can we realize that as a global community the amount of energy we can muster to fight the pandemic, we can also muster forth to fight global warming— my god, how fast we could turn things around. These last few months China’s carbon foot print has been reduced by half. Stay healthy and look beyond the news. Believe in yourself. Be generous. Be friendly. Have hope and stay calm. Walk in the forest, jog on the beach, get on your knees and look closely at a native bee on a flower in a meadow. Let a butterfly land on your hand. The other day I was greeted by the sound of a peleated woodpecker. He landed on a tree near me and knocked out his crazy rhythm and then flew off. That shit inspires me!

This sweet quiet raining morning, Rain washes away so many of the anxieties. Earth takes a big breath. and releases a big sigh. I reflect on a few things as the birds feed and the clouds move through the valley.

A shaman teacher told me that In the forest, in traditional culture, it is a part of their life, that when the hunter receives a gift, that animal, that secret trail, that plant that offers to the prosperity and health of the family, to stay in balance in return gives something back to the forest. Otherwise you will be out of balance and the gifts will no longer arrive. It becomes such an art that the hunter knows where to sit, and quietly and calmly waits and what they are waiting for arrives to them. He knows how to listen to the forest.

Hope we need to give back nature and our communities

The other night at Spirt Rock Dharma talk, Jack Kornfield shared a story from Tich Nat Hahn.

“When the crowded Vietnamese refugee boats met with storms or pirates, if everyone panicked all would be lost. But if even one person on the boat remained calm and centered, it was enough. It showed the way for everyone to survive.””

Hope we need Calm.

tattoo on arm, a list of all of phoebe's paintings!!!

This morning before I began to write this letter for Hope I looked at a tattoo on my arm. Seven phrases, seven titles, from the paintings created by Phoebe. They have become such a part of me over this last decade. But this morning they welcomed me like forgotten friends. Dad listen to them. Hard to fathom. Her death but also that such a bright spirit could leave behind such valuable lessons and gifts at such a young age of 20. Her art found homes fast and much of the titles were not even known to us. After she died we collected all the artwork and it was the first time that all the pieces were seen together. I existed in a world between worlds in that time. If there was a Pandemic then I would have gotten on a cruise ship to china… But these titles came to me and the haunted or maybe I should say, taunted me for months…

Cover of a book about Phoebe

This is when I learned to feel Phoebe nudging me. This is where I learned to hear her voice. Listen she said. Go deeper dad, go deeper than that, then go deeper than that. Do not be afraid. I did not know what these seven titles meant when I asked Matt to tattoo them on my arm. They became a mantra. One day waiting in an acupuncturists waiting room the mantra profoundly turned into an epiphany. I saw each one, not with articulate words but with graphic, poignant resonance. I cried openly. Profound. It was my first shift in the journey of profound loss. I am grateful for what it has brought me.

Hope we need gratitude and the wisdom that comes with it.

How well do you remember?

Waters rising

By the light of the trees

Surrender with a sigh

Ancient knowledge

Nourished by the mystery

As we sprout stems (and close our eyes forever)

HOW WELL DO WE REMEMBER

How well do we remember all of this, the gifts, the love, the hope, the care, the calm but also that the world is under duress and we all play a part in bringing her back….

How well do we remember that good information is our first line of defense. Denial, panic, conspiracy theories, bigotry and hoarding are all counterproductive.

WATERS RISING

My heart goes out to all of those who are suffering. Waiting for an answer to a question that it seems no one can really give.

“Feeling overwhelmed with the uncertainty of things but grateful for my health,” answers Hope.

The waters they are arising!

BY THE LIGHT IN THE TREES

Lets leave God out of this. But the light through the trees always reminds me that there is something sacred in our relationship to this world. Within that there is connection to a spirit and a world that is far beyond our understandings.

SURRENDER WITH A SIGH

We are warriors you and me. Yet within this field we release those things that no longer serve us and surrender with a sigh

Surrender

And while the white flag waves and slaps hands with the wind

everything else is left under thick shadows and heavy steam

and its hard to recall the things you hated

and the things you once loved

living only in flickers

this small fawn with bones and hair

and teeth rattling its tiny,

dark frame

and with a sigh I surrender

and even still we die

ANCIENT KNOWLEDGE

We are facing a pandemic and we wait for science to help us. We believe in Science our world now is based, but wisdom understands the traditional cultures and ancient knowledge hold many forgotten truths that must always be listened to keep us in relationship with this earth.

NOURISHED BY THE MYSTERY

We are living in a time with so many agonizing questions that are not being answered. They are causing fear and panic. Never forget the wonder of this world. The mystery of its gifts. The integrity of languages that do not belong to words or intellect but reside in the fields between time and space.

AS WE SPROUT STEMS AND CLOSE OUR EYES FOREVER

This is Phoebe’s last piece of artwork before she left her body. It is her goodbye. It is her reminder that we evolve, we become part of the mycelium, the forest, the web of nature. We are in relationship to all living things.