2 February 2024, Day 604

IMBOLC & Ground Hog Day

Hi.  I always love sitting with you in my heart mind, to ponder and share what is important to me in this, and these, moments of life.

Speaking of which, I read a quote recently to the effect of ‘We have a certain number of days of life and so each one, each day, is precious’.  💫

I think of this as I recognise that so many people are currently in situations in which their lives are at best, challenging and at worst, threatened constantly .. in wars, or in poverty .. living with crime, violence, life-sapping illnesses and and and. 

As it is with so many issues these days, ‘answers’ or ‘solutions’ do not appear readily to suggest this might, or even could, change any time soon.

That said, simultaneously, I know myriad ‘good’ things are happening locally, nationally, globally to address many things begging resolution. 

So, while chaos seems to reign in our world these days, I know that love, true caring and honest compassion do too.  They often just don’t get our attention to the extent that dramatic, sensational issues and events do.

So, with our lives being ‘precious’ and with them being relatively brief (depending on the frame of reference one chooses while contemplating time and life together) .. it’s very easy for me to focus on what you, personally, represent to me – in my world and in ‘the’ world.

I thank you for this – for indeed, it is true, that you represent to me what is good about humanity.  Your love.  Your sense of responsibility for yourself and your sovereignty.  Your caring for others.  The fun, and sometimes funny, characteristics your unique self expresses from time to time.  Your talents, skills and interests.  Your curiosity about the world and other people.  Your particular intelligence.  Your willingness to awaken each day and give life another ‘go’ for another day. 

Bless you and Thank you.  🙏🏽

I am doing the same here in my current location on Earth, at this time. 

What I am freshly aware of in this moment, at 11pm on a Friday, is how uncertain everything is in life. 

Recently, in a Grand Council session, the wisdom holders who were speaking asserted that, essentially, nothing is ever ‘known’  in advance ..  that everything is ‘unknown’ until it is present and occurring.  That humans  throughout Time have ‘thought’ we knew what was going to happen and, while sometimes it did, most often it did not.

A known thing is that, today, in various parts of the world, a holiday was celebrated.  In some cultures it is called IMBOLC.  In others, Ground Hog Day.  There are possibly others observing it with other names. 

It is a recognition of Spring’s imminent arrival in the northern hemisphere after months of Winter. 

In the case of of Ground Hog Day, it is presumed that if sunshine is visible in early morning hours, there will be a 6-week extension of winter.  And, if no sun shines early, Spring is expected to start earlier than that.

I was curious this morning about the accuracy of this prediction since the inception of Ground Hog Day in 1887.  What I read on-line suggested a 30-39% accuracy rate since then.   So much for predicting the future, eh?

Consciously choosing to ‘co-create’, rather than ‘predict’ ‘the future’ is a strong theme in my life, as an individual and also with friends with whom I am in regular contact, in person and virtually, for awhile now.

Today was a great example of that.  I have been working a new part-time job over the past 3 weeks, and have enjoyed it.   This morning I fronted up just like the other days I worked.  And my boss told me she was ‘letting me go’. 

Knowing her as I do, I accepted that this was a good decision before hearing her reasoning.  How?  Because I’ve observed and experienced her being deeply intuitive, smart and a good decision maker.

She recognised that a key component of the job is something I am decidedly not enthusiastic about doing – computer data input and processing.  So true.  I was ready and willing to learn the system, knowing it is part of the job.   It would have taken some time (working only two days /week) for me to learn.  Because of who I am, I would have done this and diligently.  Just not enthusiastically.

My boss, whom I will call ‘❤️’ in this share, had observed how happily I do other duties and tasks of the job – dealing with people; organising things; ‘clearning’ – my term for cleaning and clearing places; taking inventory; walking the property looking for anomalies in the safety, order and other aspects of operational protocols in place.  In a short while, she has come to know ‘me’ when I am enthused and ‘me’ when I am not.

So, the ‘fit’ really isn’t the best one for me with the job.  It’s true.  Gratefully, ‘❤️’ saved all of us – me, her, colleagues, the business – a lot of time in training, coaching, before determining at some point that this actually is not the best fit for me or for the company.  Wow.  What a Ground Hog Day gift!  One of honest feedback and recognition that I have skills and preferences which can better and differently be utilised.

It’s possible that we may work together on projects at the company in future and, if we do, I know we’ll have fun doing that.  We will certainly continue our new friendship and association as it’s something we both value and enjoy.  And I will now co-create and/or seek other work that suits my preferences and talents more closely than the brief flirtation with this possibility did. 

Thank you, ‘❤️’.  For someone like me, you really are the best kind of boss – brave, honest, perceptive, straight-forward, compassionate and wise.  Bless!

And now .. I am on to what’s next in my life!   More about this as and once I have created it.

Not working today left me several hours to do errands I would have done on another day soon.  One of those was to visit a Whole Foods outlet in a nearby town.  This store has tasty hot soups for sale and a decent place to eat them, situated very near to the checkout area for customers. 

Interestingly, as I ate my Italian Wedding Soup, I watched a young woman with a basket of food and drinks hold up one of two boxes (of 8 canned drinks) for scanning.  I was close enough to hear what she said to the check-out cashier as she did that and there was no mention of ‘two boxes’.  The cashier could not see the other box in the bottom part of the basket. 

When this customer turned and saw me ‘seeing’ her, she quickly busied herself with bagging the rest of the items she and her companion were buying.   They then paid and left, somewhat rapidly.

In that moment, I was reminded that six days ago, my awareness of the benefits of being fully aligned with my own personal mastery was heightened.  Accordingly, I am still wonderfully conscious of it.

What prompted an intensifying of my awareness was an event I attended at our local library.  It was a HumanLibrary.org (HLO) gathering.  About 60 people showed up to participate with 6 presenters.  The presenters were briefed to be ‘the book’ that we participants who became ‘readers’ were ‘reading’ by asking questions of our ‘books’. 

Without going on too much about this wonderful experience, suffice it to say that this, for me, was a life-enhancing 3.5 hours on a Sunday morning. 

Each group of 10 ‘readers’ had 45 minutes with each of 3 ‘books’, during which time we asked any, all questions we had of our ‘book’.  The ‘books’ had prepared through pre-work with the library staff and HLO facilitators to field our curiosities while maintaining any boundaries they had, should our questions veer into areas of their lives they preferred to keep private.  That wasn’t necessary with any of the 3 conversations our group had.  This, I believe was partially because we, as ‘readers’, were genuinely interested in and grateful to our ‘books’ for sharing, very candidly, what they did with us.

If you are intrigued by what I am briefly sharing here, please have a look at HumanLibrary.org and ask or tell me via email if you’d like to share your thoughts with me.  I am genuinely interested.

The staff and facilitators of this event wore black tee-shirts with white letters spelling out ‘unjudge someone’.  That is the overall goal of these sessions which, as I understand it, are being conducted in many parts of the US and elsewhere in the world. 

Begun in Denmark, the process is a method for bringing together people with lifestyles, choices, values perhaps very different from each other, to encourage dialogue and learning as a way of bridging people by increasing knowledge, understanding and appreciation for myriad life choices.

I asked one of our ‘books’ if she had any questions for, or requests of, us.  She replied that it is exhausting to have to constantly stand up and advocate for her right and the rights of others to make life choices that she and they are making which are currently neither tolerated nor accepted by a great many people or societies worldwide.

She asked that, after this session of connecting, learning and understanding, if we heard someone criticising people making choices she has made to speak up for her, and their, rights to make these choices for themselves, as human beings.   ‘That is’, she said, ‘if you feel that is ‘right action’ to take.

This is how my personal mastery quotient got topped up freshly.  I had an opportunity to speak to this with a dear friend the other day when I was listening to his strong criticisms of the lifestyle this ‘book’ has chosen.

Again, earlier today when I witnessed what seemed to be blatant theft of groceries, I was presented with an opportunity to ‘speak up’ to someone and say ‘something’ .. or not.  Neither choice necessarily more masterful than the other, in general terms.  Yes, one necessarily more masterful for me. 

We almost always have a choice to speak up, or not.  And, I seem to be having plenty of opportunities to make these sorts of choices lately.

Just as I finished eating my soup, I was helped to decide to speak up after I overheard a Whole Foods staff, pushing a shopping cart with 7-8 items in to the store from the parking lot. Within my hearing, he explained to his manager that he’d followed a woman out of the store into the parking lot and to her car, after noticing she didn’t go through the check-out process.

He said he’d done that with her once before and so was alert to the possibility that she might be doing the same thing again.  The manager asked how she responded when this staff brought the situation to her attention.  The staff said that she acted like she wasn’t aware that she’d done anything out of the ordinary.  The staff added that he’s very sure she knows exactly what she’s doing.

A few minutes later, I spoke with another manager at Whole Foods and described what I had witnessed with the drinks box customer.  After listening, she replied, ‘Oh, we are experiencing a LOT of that these days.  Thank you for telling me.’

I asked if the store has in-house monitors to observe those behaviours and cut down on loss through theft.  She said ‘No’.

Prices for goods at Whole Foods suggest they are covering their losses by inflating costs to paying customers. So, clearly there was a certain self-interest in my decision to say something and to suggest in-store watchers to track and stop this sort of customer behaviour. 

If someone, in my way of thinking, shops at stores where prices are quite high, when there are less-expensive and good-quality alternatives nearby in other grocery outlets, then thieving suggests (to me) more of an attitude of entitlement than a strategy to prevent hunger / starvation.

What do you think of this?

I simultaneously believe that everyone deserves to be nourished and have enough to eat every day of their lives.   I am familiar with what it is to not have resources on hand to buy food.  With other costs of living high and rising, the issues of hunger and starvation become even thornier to resolve worldwide .. especially for people on their own and families with children and other dependents.

My experiences of this day brings me to conclude that today has been an event-full Ground Hog Day for me and my experience of being human.  Thanks for listening.

On to a bit about another and upcoming holiday which is an all-time wonderful time of year for those who enjoy and understand a bit about it.

Lunar New Year celebrated by many cultures (especially in Asia and known also as Chinese New Year) begins soon this year – on 10 February.  It is the Year of the Wooden Dragon. 

Each day of the holiday (at least in Chinese culture) has ‘do and do not’ guidelines to ensure best-possible outcomes for everyone. 

If you are interested to know about the holiday, I invite you to google Year of Wood Dragon 2024, and you will find many entries and information about the meaning of the animal Dragon and the element of Wood.

You will also find historical information like this holiday is believed to have begun 3,000 years ago and much of it is predicated on astrological calculations.