I write this to you from the brink.
Poised at my dimply lit desk by the open window. Cat purring on the sill. Here in the final throes of late-stage-capitalism, poised on the brink of collapse (both as a civilisation, and just personally some days). Poised alongside you on our giant wet rock, rolling through the cosmos, all trying to stay balanced like tiny circus elephants.
Being human is a messy business.
Full of big feelings and complexity. Each of us temporarily navigating the outside world from inside our organic skin suit. Driven by electrical impulses behind our eyes that we interpret as the stories of our lives. Pushed and pulled by relentless wanting and not wanting for 4000 weeks or so until we are composted, in the end, along with all our beloved belongings, and assumedly our sense of self importance.
I am still trying to make sense of it all.
Always have been. I was the kid who perpetually asked “why?” and never stopped. And sometimes “what’s the point?” these days too if I’m honest. Forever a seeker and cartographer of meaning, the answers to this question have led me here. A meditation teacher, psychotherapy masters student, E-RYT500 yoga facilitator, award winning Co-Founder of Human.Kind studios, an acclaimed artist, spiritual activist, and philosopher poet.
It is a tender and tumultuous time.
Trump recently began his second presidency in the U.S and we’re hurtling towards a critical federal election here in Oz. Reading the news often brings me to the brink of tears. Staying porous to global events is becoming hard heart-work.
As planetary citizens, we are all fluent in the narrative of catastrophe. We must also stay fluent in the narrative of love.
Our survival (perhaps as a species, perhaps just getting through the night), might depend on it.
Big love is a project to keep me tilting towards interconnection and care. To avoid the slippery dip into cynicism upon which I feel myself often teetering on the brink.
It will be a collection of letters on the pursuit of beauty, perspective, meaning, (and a healthy dose of WTF). It is a way to help me stay sane, and even better, stay loving, here on the brink.
I offer this blend of spiritual teachings, contemplative sciences and cultural review as a lamp, a ladder, a life-raft for the human heart. It will explore the various ways we experience being here together in the late Anthropocene, and serve as a guide to facing each other, and the world today, with fierce tenderness and a relentlessly open heart.
My hope is that it reminds you how deeply you belong here.
In the world, I mean. If only fleetingly. How we are woven into this time together. Stitched into the weave of the universe alongside the spider webs and the milky way, the mother-of-pearl and the Andes. Embedded in an inescapable reciprocity with the pollinators responsible for the contents of your fruit bowl and the stranger who tended the apple tree. You are in the same dance of influence with every body (human and more-than human) around you. And this means you matter, just as much as everything else. Which is to say, both not at all, and enormously.
May these letters be an invitation to turn towards moral beauty.
To fall in love with uncertainty. To find fluency in our humanity. To keep romancing the mystery. May they be a consolation. A reason to keep going. A way to wake up.
A reminder that participating is an act of love. Staying engaged is love. Protesting is love. Resting is love. Bearing witness is love. Grief too, is love.
Welcome to the brink, dear friends. The view is wonderful from here. Don’t worry, there will be dance breaks. Let your hair down and take a deep breath.
x Tessa
