Lately, I am aware of the small lives around me: butterflies, dragonflies, spiders and most profoundly, snails.  Unlike the creatures that fly, I often forget that there is life on the ground; simple, quiet life. Sometimes, when I leave the house going to the car or the backyard, I manage to take only a few steps before hearing an ominous sound… crunch. In that moment, I realize that I've stepped on a snail. A small life ended. I ask forgiveness and pray its next life includes a harder shell. 

I forget about the small lives on the ground because my mind is on where I’m going, not where I am, although try explaining that to the snail.  

I realize how easy it is to be where you’re going and not where you are. Have you ever looked around the house and realized that there are objects that haven’t moved in ages? Moving things to dust doesn't count, by the way. I’m thinking about the found button on the counter, the blender, the jewelry you wore throughout the week, taken off and carefully placed on your dresser to become its own little work of art by the end of the week. How often do we navigate through our homes unconscious of what’s around us because we are focused on where we are going, not where we are? Hurry up and get somewhere. Where?

You're asked, “Where are you going?” yet when is the last time someone asked, “Where are you?” 

My thought this week is to be more present; to be aware of where I am and, if I'm not, ask myself that question. Perhaps if I did that more often, if we all did that more often, there would be a lot less ominous crunching in the world. 

Certainly, there would be a lot more snails.
- Linda Lombardo 
​

​Bombs are for people who have lost the art of using words to convey their desires and intentions.

Bombs are for people who acknowledge no other story than the one they've made up, even if it's a lousy story.

Bombs are for those who have lost their connection to everything and everyone; for people who have forgotten that they are no more and no less than another.

Bombs are for people who want to own and control; who don't want someone else to own or control more than they do.

Bombs are for people who think the solution is quick and final; not realizing that bombs create a void that will quickly be filled by another threat, and another, and another.

Bombs are for people who are in the insecurity of security; who build walls, only to realize that now, nothing is certain or safe.
​
Bombs are not for people.

First published 12/22/12.

​It’s taken me a week to find words for the unimaginable tragedy in Newtown, Connecticut. Now that I’ve found words, I’m surprised at how they are revealing my personal perspective of being.

This is not a political blog. It is not a blog for improved mental health care. Important to say what it is not, since so many, in their personal sadness and outrage, are saying what it is. And I’m not making those blogs wrong, by the way. If you read on, you’ll see.

I believe that we are spiritual beings in human form; we are here to explore, to test, to feel and mostly, to remember that we are one and connected. We have created this life called human and become these wondrous beings called humanity. Imagine our spiritual life on another plane: formlessness, perfection, peace; oneness. What if … and here we are.

Believe or don’t believe. This is only one perspective and as I've heard said, “Some things are true even if you don’t believe them.” I’d like to believe this is one of those things.

The Children

The children of Newtown, Connecticut changed the world. The shooter changed the world. The teachers and the shooter’s parent changed the world. We talk about changing the world, our governments talk about changing the world and these 20 beautiful babies, 6 teachers, one shooter, and the shooter’s mother really changed the world.

And Now What?

I don’t usually meditate, although I tell myself I should and in a rare meditation yesterday, I had a vision of the world moving forward from this terrible human tragedy of Newtown:  a busy city street with masses of humanity in the middle of an ordinary day … and I saw the children and others, like a scene from City of Angels. They walked with us; some sat together in humanly-impossible places; watching us, curious as only children are about the impact they had on the world, on us, on you, on me.

I heard their voices, “I hope this one remembers; he is going to do something amazing”, “This one is thinking about us right now and wants to really listen to her son tonight”, or asking, “Did you see them all yesterday in a moment of silence for us?”, “They were all connected”.  And the words I hear most – because now I hear them without meditation - are “I hope they remember. I hope they do what they felt compelled to do when they heard”, “I hope we really did change the world”.

I hold those who lost their lives and their families in Newtown in my heart; I honor them first in a so very human way. Both the horror of the moment and the loss of life’s promise are unimaginable to me. My body physically shields itself and moves away from even the thought of that personal threat or the parent, who heard the news about a child who would not be coming out of the school. Secondly, I honor the courage of their souls to commit to an abbreviated human life; sacred contracts made and realized. The commitment of those souls to truncate their human lives is beyond my words right now. The words I have: courage, wisdom, sacrifice. They all got the lead in the spiritual play. We are merely their supporting characters in this event.

 Impact

Here is the impact it's had on me: now I know and knowing, cannot un-know. I am called to remember and act from my very soul. I remember and the world stays changed. I act and I change the world. It is my sacred contract to call myself forth; call us all forth, not only in remembering, in acting for positive, peaceful and radical change in the world; however simple or big it is for you or me. The only thing that will make this a truly senseless event is if we all go back to the way we were before it happened. 

Will you remember? I know you will. Will you act, in whatever personal, peaceful way has meaning for you? I hope you act from your hearts. 

Remember, they are among us. 

Post-script: As I completed this blog, I received an email with this poem. I don't believe in coincidence so I want to share it with you: 

The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you. 
Don't go back to sleep. 
 
You must ask for what you really want. 
Don't go back to sleep. 
 
People are going back and forth across the doorsill 
where the two worlds touch. 
 
The door is round and open. 
Don't go back to sleep. 
 
From Essential Rumi by Coleman Barks

In love and light,
Linda Lombardo, CPCC

Among Us is a professional printed giclee from an original painting by Jeanie Tomanek. Used with permission of the artist.  
​http://www.etsy.com/listing/117826075/among-us-a-8x10-professionally-printed

In the Souls Waiting Room began with this blog, first published in January 2016. Here’s the blog in its entirety:

Imagine that you are sitting in the soul’s waiting room. This is the waiting room where your soul and all souls sit and wait with their little tickets until their number is called and you go off to become an Earth*ling in the Realm that we call Human.

Before that happens, though, there’s a list; a list of the souls purposes that are needed and available in the Earthly Realm right now. The list is designed to keep things in balance, although on occasion someone screws up and we end up with too many politicians or cicadas. This list is recited out loud by someone of extreme importance in the soul world –- the Keeper of Soul’s Purpose -- and the Keeper says, “Okay. Here’s what we have available. We have … working for children’s rights. Takers? Any takers? Who wants it” And everyone’s raising their hands, including you, because we all know how important children’s rights are. And someone gets picked by the Keeper, who then moves on down the list. “We’ve got a spot for hunger in the world; an advocate to end poverty; and help people grow their own food. Who wants poverty and hunger?” Everyone’s raising their hands – they can’t wait. They’re going ooh, ooh, pick me, please pick me. And the Keeper picks the person who is meant to do this work by a higher power than those of us raising our hands, or even the Keeper.

This goes on for quite some time:  great purpose is offered - fighting corruption in government, building homes for the homeless, slowing climate change and more; there are even some, Colossal Purposes, or at least that’s what it’s called in the Souls Realm; those purposes that require incredibly courageous souls whose soul (sole) purpose is to activate Humanity itself through emotions of sadness, grief, anger and outrage. In the waiting room, all souls gather in reverence and silence when one of these souls is chosen to honor that courageous purpose. 

At the same time, you’re anticipating that you’ll hear the thing that you’d like to return to the Realm to experience; your purpose. And you’ve got choice; you can always say no by not raising your hand; you can always wait … the caveat is that if you don’t raise your hand, you’ve got to wait until the next group gets called. And while you’re willing to wait, you’re also feeling a sense of urgency and excitement about being back in the Human Realm … because, like others, you’ve been there before and know just how beautiful it can be there in ways that the real world; the soul world can never be. Both are exquisitely beautiful, yet so different.

So, the Keeper of Souls’ Purpose keeps reading from the list and people are raising their hands and getting up and getting on line to the Realm. And then the very important Keeper of Souls Purpose says “Aright, there’s one last one on the list.”
​
You see the Keeper’s head shake for a moment, and then you hear a sigh. “Okay. Some backfill. There’s just beginning a big movement towards consciousness in the Realm. There’s a Sixth Mass Extinction that’s already begun. Hopefully, you’ve all read your email. Humanity’s on the brink. There’s a calling for everyone to become a Conscious Evolutionary if Humanity is going to survive. And here’s the thing: this has never been asked of Humanity before. So here’s the purpose description: a big yet gentle voice that’s going to stand for Conscious Evolutionaries everywhere; amplify the voices of the ones already on their paths and teach the ones that don’t know how yet to get on a Conscious Evolutionary path, find what awakens, inspires and activates them into a life purpose for the sake of something bigger than themselves. You may never be famous or rich and this will be something you cannot not do.”

Silence. As you look around the room, nobody’s raised their hand. And you’re sitting there and sitting there, thinking, “oh crap, somebody raise their hand. It can’t be me. It can’t be me. Please don’t make it be me. Ah, shit.” You know?
​
“Am I really going to say yes to this? I don’t know how, for Pete’s sake. I know I probably can do it and yet, I was hoping I could go there and be a bee keeper or gypsy moon dancer or a someone who paints seashells and rocks” … and suddenly, in that moment, torn between urgency, reluctance and excitement … your hand goes up … and the Keeper of Soul’s Purpose smiles and says, “You got it, Conscious Evolutionary; the Voice of Evolution.” As you stand up and get into the line to go to the Human Realm, you shrug and say quietly to the soul ahead of you, “Yeah, well … maybe a Reluctant Evolutionary.”

That soul leans in and asks, “Why, what were you hoping for?”

“I don’t know.” You say, “Maybe a bee keeper, or a seashell gatherer or a gypsy moon dancer.”

“What’s that?” the other soul asks. “What’s a gypsy moon dancer?”

“I don’t know.” You say. ”I was going to invent it.”   

​“Well, maybe you could invent this one, too.” The other soul suggests as the line begins to move.”

Today, I want to talk about the Reluctant Evolutionary. That’s me. That’s all of us, I make up. Even if you’re saying, “Hell no, that’s not me”, I believe it is. And it’s okay that we believe different things because in the end, believing doesn’t make something true or false. What’s true will always be true even if we don’t believe it.

Our reluctance lives in the things we talk about as a culture, as an age in all the ages of Human history. Stone Age, Bronze Age, Iron Age, Age of Invention (the Agricultural Age, The Industrial Revolution Age, The Technology Age, the Information Age, and what I’ll call the Age of Enlightenment or Chaos, since both apply.

What DID we talk about over the ages? Actually, when did we first start talking?

According to my research, speech began anywhere from 2 million years ago (you’d think we’d be better at it by now, wouldn’t you?) to 50,000 years ago (I can give us some slack if this is the case). The Hominids or Hominins (they’re not around to correct us so we can move on from here) who began making tools that required some conversation, apparently, are our first talking ancestors.

Social groups increased the need for speech. Perhaps grunting and whining, like chimpanzees at first. Or even sign language (let’s point at the wild boar before we run like hell to survive. Let’s thumbs up a really delicious berry we found in the forest and thumbs down if that really delicious berry killed Bert, who was the first to taste it. Survival Conversation, if you will.)
Research also tells us that our machinery – vocal cords, mouth, tongue and throat weren’t equipped for today’s sophisticated speech. So grunting and other noises were all we had at first.

I want to jump ahead to what we’d all recognize as human speech and talk about what we talked about in each era of Human evolution.

Let’s start with the Agricultural Age. (10, 000 BC) Think of conversations in the Agricultural Age. You’re a farmer. What do you talk about to your other farmer friends? How are your crops? Will it rain this week? Sure could use some rain. The plow needs a new … (who knows what a plow might need?) or the milking cow’s gone dry. Boy is she in trouble. Likely to be next Sunday’s dinner. Or maybe the price of seed went up, and the price of wheat went down due to overproduction. Basic things. Survival things.
 
What about the Industrial Age? Lots more to talk about there. As the wealthy purchased land in Britain, for example, small scale farmers were pushed to the cities to look for work^. Now the conversation was about wages, poor working conditions, child labor, building factories, materials, trade to get the materials, travel by sea, storms and piracy, accidents with machinery, tenements, and immigrants, the idea of human rights starting to enter the conversation, political machines controlling a city’s politics and influencing government, competition for jobs among the poorer classes, wars. Now we’re talking, right? Our problems were getting bigger and more of them showed up every day. And that’s progress, isn’t it? It’s also survival. We are still in a struggle for survival even though we call it progress.

Now leaping forward to the Technology Age or the Age of Information. This was the shift from traditional industry to information computerization. We’ve become a knowledge-based society surrounded by a hi-tech global economy. Cities have expanded to become global cities; we are global citizens, many of us. Industry has become information-intense.

What do we talk about in the Age of Information? We talk about our devices: phones, smart or otherwise; our smart tvs, iPads, our pcs and our macs, gaming devices, the cloud, and even then, there are no clear boundaries anymore as we all seek to homogenize our technology into something more streamline and compact. We also talk about Personalization, as not to get lost in the sea of Humanity, all using the same devices to communicate and connect. 

We also must talk about security. Phishing, hacking, identity theft now that so much of what we used to do in person is done through technology. We’ve connected, and not always with the right people. We even date online and not always with the right people there, by the way.
We talk about our cars and to a lesser degree, public transportation. How fast can we get somewhere and the tragedy of being “stranded” when our car breaks down or weather conditions delay our flights. Stranded. We are still worried about survival.  

This brings me to The Age of Consequence. My term, not anyone else’s and an overlapping with the Information Age, as I’m sure all ages experienced in the past.  

What are we talking about now? We’re still talking about security: the phishing and hacking. We’re still talking about politics and big business, and a greater divide between classes. Now we’re also talking about the environment, what we’ve done to the air, the water, the forests; our never ending production and consumption of plastic. We’re talking about the extinction of species and the sixth mass extinction on the planet. Yes, we talk about others things, too.

We’re celebrity obsessed and we love to see them fall and fail. We cry briefly when an icon dies and then go back to business as usual. We talk about videos and tweets going viral. We share photos of our most recent meal on Facebook.

In all of this, the most impactful and relevant conversations are those around how we are consciously facing a concern about our actions of the past and how they are impacting us today. No one worried about their impact on the next 7 generations in the agricultural age or the industrial age, except perhaps the Indigenous People of the World, who have lived one age in parallel with our many ages. Impact beyond personal within my family, was not in my wheelhouse growing up.

Now we are all this and more. Survival and safety are heightened senses with everything around us being called unsafe, our homes, our neighborhoods, who lives next to us – a murderer, a pedophile or a terrorist? We talk our employers, our banks, our business structures, who has the biggest guns and weapons of mass destruction. We’re told that it’s a rigged game to make someone rich, and it’s usually not us. We must be concerned about what we did in the past, before we were even born, bearing the guilt of our ancestors who came to most places as conquerors, takers, seeking freedom by taking it away from others.

We are in the Age of Consequence. What a guilt trip to lay on Humanity. Be afraid of everything and oh by the way, you’ve screwed up everything you’ve done so far, so good luck with sorting that out or the future will be pretty much screwed, too.

Life isn’t about living it – okay, a generalization, I know. Yes, of course, it’s about living it and it’s also about surviving it. I just got off the phone with someone who called her situation at work, “just trying to survive”. At the end of the call, she said, “Hang in there.” Where? Where am I hanging?

I’ve always just wanted to live my life and enjoy it. And yet, I’m in survival mode like the cave dwellers, the farmers, and the early industrial workers. Maybe we’ve always been in survival mode; maybe it’s just in our DNA. The fear gene. And maybe without it, we don’t know how to live. Our brains are wired to seek out the threats and pay little attention to the things that don’t appear to threaten us. The problem is the brain needs a bigger threat as we evolve to get activated. We are on threat overload.

Here’s where my Reluctant Evolutionary comes in. Maybe yours, too. I’m in the consequence mode and often feel that I’ve got to solve all the world’s problems by last Tuesday.
​
And course we all know that it’s not possible. We always know that, unlike planting a crop or building a widget, as reluctant evolutionaries, we may not even see the end result of our work in the world. We are doing legacy work that may take decades or centuries to evolve into a new age. We may not see the impact in our lifetime. And yet, we know what our purpose is here in the world and we must do what we are activated to do, even knowing that we may never know our impact on the future. It’s a reluctant evolutionary who is the hero in my eyes; the one who says yes to that kind of work because who doesn’t want the acknowledgment or pat on the back that says great job; thanks for saving Gotham, Batman.
 

Everything I do – my entire purpose in this life - is about being seen … andbeing heard for who I really am. 

As a little girl, it was best that I was seen and not heard. No, wait. It was best that I wasn’t seen AND wasn’t heard. If you grew up when I did in the early 50’s, parental punishment was still pretty much left up to the imagination of the parent, and not a contrived taking away of an electronic communication device, like a cell phone, or a gaming device, like an X-Box or PlayStation. Back then, punishment was real. Parents got angry, and there wasn’t anything to take away (television only had about 10 channels so what would have been the point?) There wasn’t anything to take away except perhaps our self-esteem, which, as it turns out, is a lot harder to give back than any X-Box or cell phone. 

I remember being punished most often for the times that I was most like myself … not because I did horrid things … but because I was too exuberant; too loud; too excited … too afraid … and so, after a while, I stopped being most like myself. I learned to be quiet, be still, and be indifferent. 

Did anyone else have that experience? And so, you know that what it does to our souls is force us to choose betweenbeing most like ourselves and being loved and accepted. What (No) child should have to make that choice. 

As we grow older, that shell, or veneer we’ve built around ourselves starts to feel like the real deal. It grows thicker when we get to school, where the best shell wins, and my shell can beat the crap out of your shell, or my shell got invited to the prom, so you better work on yours. It begins to be you, and me,and all of us, until we can no longer differentiate between who we really are, and the veneer that we’ve built around ourselves for the sake of being loved and accepted.

One of the first awakenings that something is wrong happens when someone has the nerve to diss your veneer. Can you imagine? “Hey, I don’t like you.” And you’re thinking, “What do mean? Me? I’ve worked hard to create this person; this façade. How could you not like this image of moderation and mediocrity I’ve created?” Well, my veneer doesn’t like your veneer. So there. 

Another awakening is the sheer exhaustion from the God-awful strength it takes to keep up your veneer … even when you think you’ve got it on auto-pilot, it takes a tremendous amount of energy  - maybe not to keep up the veneer, as much as repress your true soul; that gleeful, eager, sometimes too loud, being; that wild, untamed child that lives within you still, despite the fact that you haven’t fed or watered him; you haven’t kissed or tickled her, or traded hugely grotesque faces in the mirror that your mother or father promised you would get stuck that way if you kept it up. 

It lives and waits, despite the neglect. 

Our untamed soul, our wild child soul waits for us. If you’ve ever had a dog as a pet, you know their waiting, and their welcoming: it doesn’t matter if you’ve been gone 5 minutes or 5 months. The joy just flows from their very being, and they don’t apologize for being exuberant, loud, or oh so very excited that you’ve come back to them. Sometimes, they even pee they’re so excited – right in front of you.

So waits our soul, for the sound of the car pulling into the driveway, the sound of the door knob turning. It doesn’t matter how long it’s been – it waits ready to show its joy – unashamed, knowing that its pure love is your true self – exactly as it was when you were a child, before you learned you had to choose between it and love and acceptance. 

And now that many of us have reached an age, where those who came before us may no longer be with us; or may no longer hold provenance over us; the veneer doesn’t feel quite as reassuring as it once did, like a support garment that rides up in all the wrong places (souncomfortable), and we wonder who the veneer is for anymore. As if suddenly, we are aware of a voice; a tiny voice calling our name. A voice inside us, asking us to come out and play. And we let that veneer drop, smashing into a million pieces on the floor (and no, we don’t have to clean it up); That voice is louder now. Come out and play! Take that first deep, clean breath and run, skip, and twirl to join it, all the while singing a made up song at the top of your lungs. 

I was lucky enough to have someone really see me; hear my voice, and take the marksman shot that cracked the veneer wide open. Who will do that for you? 

Will you? I hope for the day that each of you can say, “See me for who I really am; hear my voice. I am love and acceptance. I am me for the first time in a long time, and I’m here to stay.”  
​

I'm currently enrolled in a Game Changer Intensive through the Pachamama Alliance. The question about privilege and repression was asked in the most recent discussion forum. I want to share my response here, because it feels very important at this moment in time. 

It began with, "Are you ready?" Here is my response: 

I'm not sure if I'm ready for this, and ... I'm going to write anyway. (with deep respect to Lynne Twist, who I heard say something similar at the Bigger Game Expo in 2013: "I don't know if I have the answer to that, and I'm going to speak anyway." So brilliant.) 

I remember being about 8 or 9 years old, and making a trip with my parents to Mexico. Typical tourists, we had our photo taken in a cart with a gentleman dressed in a broad sombrero and a sarape. After the photo was taken, and I began to step down from the cart, a young boy approached me and held out his hand. I thought he was offering his hand to help me out of the cart, so I took it and stepped down. It was only years later that I realized he might have been the one looking for an offering. I had no idea that people, children, begged on the street to sustain and survive. 

I was raised in a relatively upper middle class privilege, and never knew that others weren't living the same way. There was no spoken gratitude for what we had, or any instruction that others did not have the same privilege as we did; I grew up in such total naivete, that it still astonishes me, especially since my parents were first gen. Americans, lived through the "Great Depression" and two world wars. How could there not be gratitude??

I also remember being a few years older, pre-teen perhaps, watching television with my mother and my maternal grandmother, and my grandmother made a comment about the "number of Negroes (her word) on tv". Too many in her opinion. I still remember turning around to look at her, and at that moment, truly knew how narrow-minded she was, even hated her at the moment, not having the skills to understand that she just didn't know any better,  as I wished desperately for another family. 

This would have been mid 1960s. The representation of any minority on television was scarce at best. 

How did I know that what she said was so morally and ethically wrong? I just did.I just did. My heart ached when she said it, and rejected it. I wasn't influenced by my family's prejudices and for that, I'm so grateful. They were all allies in me finding my voice, my own opinions; my own knowing about who we are to each other and how we can be connected. 

I'm not sure I answered the question in the forum, and I know that this Game Changer Intensive is for me; to really explore my voice and how it shows up in leadership in the world. So, I express my gratitude to any one who reads this, and wants to reply. And if not, I know it's my journey, my work that shows up here, and that's really what matters in the end for any of us, isn't it? ​