A LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL
Well, shit. This season of change aint playin - beating down upon the people in a way that feels faster and more furious with each turn of current events.
If we'd talked last month, I would have said I believe that the wave of weed’s legalization was the force majeure, kicking up the change the world was in desperate need of. That Mary Jane going mainstream was delivering us kind of collective message opportunities for us to heal and awaken with every sesh.
It was an aha! moment when I learned that as the growing community cultivates the cannabis crop, they sometimes refer to the process as "elevating the female"—changing the conditions of the growing environment so that the female plant can survive and thrive.To me, this felt like a lesson the world should heed: that the conditions we are currently growing in must evolve, carefully changed.
Honestly? I’d sort of expected that the gifts the plant was delivering the world might start to hold a larger symbolism for people. That the plant would show us a higher lesson about ourselves, and our connection to mother nature. The power of the flower. That perhaps a female’s tendency to heal would be more highly regarded. That maybe the masses might start to see the capacity for alchemy and magic we are each capable of. That we’d return to nature again. And today we’re all in quarantine.
Only weeks ago we were shaking hands with strangers and hugging loved ones hello; these connections suddenly became a past version of our realities, at least for now.
The shared joint—one of the most sincere moments of human connection that remains in mainstream culture; where strangers become friends, experiencing the ritual of smoke, sharing mouth to mouth like they would no other way, revealing insight and thoughtful conversation as the spirit of the spiritual experience takes them somewhere new—also a thing of the past. At least for now.
In a time where it’s tough not to mourn what our lives were just a moment ago, it’s critical to try and find the light in things.
What’s the lesson, the truth illuminated for us to go and grow towards, as both plants and humans tend to do?
“While the problems of the world are increasingly complex, the solutions remain embarrassingly simple.”
(Bill Mollison, co-originator of Permaculture)
I can’t drop the idea of nature’s resiliency—how hard we’d (weed) push to continue to grow, up toward the light, regardless of the state of things. The natural will and fight, survive and thrive.
I believe this is the lesson we can take from the plant: the reminder to adapt. To find new ways forward. Transforming within our conditions in order to grow. And to bloom where we are planted, revealing our own impressions, gifts, flavours and intensities to the world around us.
There’s no denying that (now more than ever) we must collectively pause and ponder how the hell we’ve gotten here, re-examining our choices, re-considering our points of view. Otherwise, how will we ever rebuild better? The return to plants—the gifts our natural world brings us, the secrets and truths Mother Nature has held all along—feels like the only rational way forward. Maybe nature is what saves us after all.
I hope that the next time I write to you the world feels like a safer and more peaceful place. Until then, please write to me with your questions, thoughts or just a word up.
holla@hightea.life