July/August, 2020
During this pandemic, everyone is talking about it. It’s affected all of the people in the world. When I go on a walk and pass by two people walking and talking with each other, it’s about covid. When bike riders whiz by, they’re yelling at each other about where to buy masks, or where to eat outside. A hairdresser friend hasn’t been working for months. The handyman around our house had to go to the local church food bank to feed his family, because the landlord laid him off for several months.
Then there’s Black Lives Matter, a much needed movement for our times. It’s creating social soul searching and change in our world.
You put together the pandemic, the re-awakening about systemic racism and killing of black folks, and the free-fall of our economy, and there is a lot of disturbance, activity, and survival in our world. There is fear, and anxiety, but also hope and excitement.
There is fear, and anxiety, but also hope and excitement
Even here at Psychic Horizons, where we know about and teach grounding and being centered and having boundaries, we get a bit ungrounded given what’s going on out there. But we pull our attention back out of it, clean out the energy of the outside world out of our space and get back to ourselves. Last night in healing clinic, one of the readers was feeling anxious and didn’t know why. It was because she had the energy of all this stuff going on in her space. I advised her to clean it out and re-form her boundaries, and re-ground, and then her anxiety dissipated.
I just finished reading a blog by Rev. Dawn Hutching, a progressive Christian minister from Ontario, Canada. She was talking about how some people describe the times we’re living In as “chaotic”, and that in Genesis the breath of the Creator hovered over the formless void, and called forth light out of the chaos of darkness. She wondered what it would take to bring forth light out of the chaos which is swirling around us.
A small change in one place can result in a huge difference in a later state
She went on to describe the invention of “chaos theory”, where tiny seemingly inconsequential things have significant impacts. This mathematician Edward Lorenz coined the phrase “The Butterfly Effect”. This describes how a small change in one place can result in a huge difference in a later state. For example, how the flapping of a butterfly’s wing has a ripple effect which can multiply over time and can change weather patterns thousands of mile away.
So we can look at what’s happened in our world today. One person in China died and a worldwide pandemic was created. A police office murdered a black man named George Floyd in Minneapolis. This is not an uncommon phenomenon, but this time it had a huge effect and Black Lives Matter became a worldwide call to action, and of course the “law and order” forces in power responded.
So some people think we are now living in a time of darkness. That can be true, but remember that in winter, when it is dark and cold, the seeds of the plants are developing, the seeds of life are stirring. This can be true today as well.
Remember that there are many “butterfly effects”. Jesus was a poor, brown Jewish rabbi who was killed in the times of the Roman Empire, a killing that was like many others. Mohammad was an illiterate merchant in what is now Saudi Arabia. These are huge butterfly effects. Most of us don’t have effects that huge, but we all have these “butterfly effects” to a greater or lesser degree.
We all affect others
We all affect others. As we become more grounded, people notice, and it affects them. As we get more centered, less reactive, and more neutral, we affect and heal not only ourselves but those within our bubble and beyond. As we create our own boundaries, and can clean out the influences of others in our space, we become more authentic, and we have more of our own space, but those around us are affected as well.
Maybe you have become more active politically, so you have been affected by what’s going on around you, and you are affecting others. Maybe you are affecting others because you gave a homeless guy some food like Rev. Bob did last night. Maybe you’re moving beyond your comfort zone, or giving a tourist directions. Maybe you’re not matching the energy spewing out of the divisiveness of our President and communicating with people through love, compassion and understanding. All of these things are bringing light into the darkness.
We can see that all of our lives are significant, and all of us our flapping our wings in one way or another. We don’t always know the effect of our flapping, nor do we need to, but know that there is one. We can plant our own seeds of self-healing, and kindness and compassion towards ourselves and others, which will create effects in the world.
Our chaotic time will eventually pass
Because we all flap our wings, our “chaotic” time will eventually pass and a different world will emerge. We don’t know what that different world will be, but we can stay present, and centered, and grounded during it all, so that as we flap our wings we know that as we heal ourselves, we also heal others and even the world around us.
As always, thanks for supporting Psychic Horizons & the Church of Natural Grace with your sustainable giving! It truly makes a difference, both for us and for you.
Best regards,
Rev. Laura Hopper