There has been resistance deep in my soul. I, like so many, have always found it agonizing when people are hateful to one another, when we act in ways that are beyond this sensitive’s ability to comprehend. It wounds me in ways no words could ever truly express when humans act like monsters, when my kind are not kind, when greed overcomes our humanity, when we are more animal than animals ever were. It’s like every cell in my body cries, but no tears escape. It is a revolt of my precious humanity, an explosion of loving kindness with no place to discharge but inward.  

My heart cracks wide, my mind washes with compassion, craving liberation from depravity, begging for sanity, praying to awaken from this nightmare, but no way out can be found. I hear myself screaming silently in horror. No words pass my lips. Not even a hoarse cry escapes.

However much I write, I feel voiceless. Whatever words flow, they are inadequate. They have done nothing to heal the cruelty. The sentences, no matter how well formed, have not tamed the wild waves on which we now surf. My disbelief, my unwillingness to accept the downward spiral, masquerading as love, calls out man’s inhumanity, putting the emphasis on hate.

See that’s it. My ‘unwillingness to accept’ feels like a good thing, so much so that it is intoxicating, addicting. I have to fight, to stand up, to be counted, right? That’s what a loving human would do, isn’t it?

There are many ways to fight that do not tear down. There are many ways to be counted that do not include becoming that which pierces my heart. There are many ways to be a vessel for peace that do not include war, that do not wound us more deeply.

I am new to the underground rebellion, not the inner one, but the outer. I know the inner rebellion well, the one where I walk straight into the shadow, where I face down my personal demons. Even so, I have lived in relative peace—in programmed ignorance—my entire life. I had nothing concrete in my personal experience that proved evil truly did exist. It was still possible to live in my safe reality that didn’t include evil. That is no longer possible. Evil exists, even if it is only a distortion held in the minds of man. Acknowledging evil’s presence now, a requisite for moving forward, for moving beyond anger and blame, is resetting this body mind cell by cell.

How do I now walk straight into the next rebellion, a rebellion that will set us all free from the distortion of cruelty, from the evils of separation—the only ties that bind—in a way that doesn’t end up hogtying us all?    

I have run out of the compulsion to continue on the path I’ve been scrambling down. The heartbreak sitting quietly, profoundly, at the core of outrage will no longer be silenced. It begs me to feel it, to listen to its sad song, to hear its deep message. My world is imbued with sadness. It is present in my impotence. It is viscerally present in its wholeness. It swamps me, leaving little room for anything else. It is good. Yes, it hurts, but it is real. The anger and incredulity consuming so many hearts and minds is melting away like a light dusting of snow on a sunny day. Its absence not surprisingly reveals the ground of our being—simple basic unconditional love.

Anything other than love, other than being love, acting from and as love, hurts. It breaks us asunder, creating multitudes where there is not even two.

Under the self-protection, the anger and hate, love is. Admitting this, granting it admittance to our entire being, contrary to what the mind fears, does not destroy us, does not siphon off our humanness. It is painful, but it is a good painful, for we see all the ways we have not lived our potential, the many times we acted contrary to our real nature, our true nature, the ways we set aside the truth of us for a lesser story. It sets us free.  

I am an empath, so feeling my experience, especially when it’s intense like it is now, when life offers no time outs, can feel precarious. To remain open, to stand on the ledge and let life in, to let any and all fear that is mine to experience play on my nervous system as it passes through, takes a little time to acclimate to. These times are overloaded, pushing the limits, expanding capacities. For me, at least, the inability, my unwillingness to actually accept what is happening was one of the ways I gave myself time to adjust. It wasn’t conscious. If it had been, the shift would have happened quicker. You may be doing the same thing, but in your own unique way.

Accepting something doesn’t mean it has to stay that way. Nothing is immune to change. Bringing love to the equation isn’t a cop out, a giving up. It is our best hope of creating a loving outcome.

What’s happening now is another winding down, a new level of letting go. It is occurring as more recognition sinks in. It is becoming more vividly clear that the time of standing against, of pointing out harm, of trying to incite awareness, of fighting what is actually here, of attempting to shine a light on what’s cruel in order to illuminate what’s more loving, is passing into legend. It was my way to delay letting the cruelty in, to not feel the grotesque lack of kindness until my nervous system re-regulated. It was as necessary as rain, but eventually the rain stops falling, and the sun shines through the remaining clouds.    

I love life, all of life, even the parts I don’t especially like. Incarnating is a miracle, so far beyond my ability to truly understand. Fully experiencing this life I adore, how can I not live each breath I am given to its fullest? How can I not use each moment to learn how to love more fully? Understanding anew the many creative ways love is already manifesting, I open to a deeper listening that speaks to me in the silence. I learn to trust this slower pace being thrust upon me and grok its necessity. My part of the story is reinventing itself.

No longer swimming against the flow, I float into this gentler way to move through our wounded world, and it lights up the horizon with awareness that reveals the healing power of simple kindness, the true authority of love.   

The chalked line of separation outlining bodies lying face down on the ground, victims of crimes against humanity, is serving its purpose, if I can use that word. It’s as good as any and as inaccurate as all. My wailing was never about spreading the word or reaching the so-called perpetrators even though it might have seemed that way. We’re all victims here just as we’re all perpetrators. There is no other and it’s time, for me at least, to remember that, to settle into the trust that lives deep in my bones. It’s transition time, a readying for transformation, transfiguration right here on Earth.

I’m worn to the nub trying to play small, keeping my attention on just one aspect of life, the so-called material view, so isn’t it grand that life appears to be tiring of the game too. Having dredged up all that could be mined, this time anyway, the purposelessness, the story nestled into the bottom of the righteousness bin, I find there is no gold to separate out from the pile of tin.

Amaya Gayle is the author of 6 books, the latest Actuality; infinity at play, published by New Saram Press. https://amzn.to/3Rd4CTY

Image: AI generated by Amaya Gayle in WordPress