My greatest fear.

Our greatest fear is not that we’re inadequate. Our greatest fear is that we’re powerful beyond measure. - Marianne Williamson. 

I was about 11 when my step-mum had the whole verse printed out in her study. 

It spoke to the ambition in me. It also spoke to the shame in me.

I ignored the part of the verse where she says “We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.”

I didn’t understand what that meant, but I got the gist - don’t be scared of greatness.

But what is great?

The following decade or so of my life looked like outward career-oriented ambition and greatness, and the decade after that looked like inward self-awareness ambition and greatness.

This next decade will probably look like surrendering all ambition and greatness.

Perhaps it’s just my age. 

Perhaps it’s just the age. 

After returning home from a beautiful trip away, that allowed us to live in a modern version of the Village Model, surrounded by many tiers of family, generations of history and traditions, shared local customs and values, that have centred around a place and region, and all embody one of the most important elements - proximity, I found myself pondering.

Pondering about my current life, location, choices, trajectory.

What is truly most important in life? Family? Peers? Place? Freedom? Mastery?

What about traditions and customs that are not mere tribalism of the moment, but are lasting and replicable throughout the generations? It feels in these modern times our lives, our families, our communities are so torn apart by physical distance, a lack of uniting social norms and intergenerational lore.

As much as the new age, personal and professional development world might market to you about “having it all”, I don’t believe it’s possible. There are too many conflicts.

The conflict of Independence and Tradition.

They sit on the opposite sides of the see saw of the values spectrum.

Any “conscious” new mum will know this intimately. The letter they sent out to the grandparents and family for their first child’s first birthday expressly stipulating to only receive certain types of open-ended nature-based presents (i.e. not the plastic, beeping ones). Then being totally ignored (or mocked, “I’ll get you a rock for your birthday, and see how you like it!”), and realising that having grandparents part and close to you and your child means Acceptance and Surrender. Intimacy means you can’t have it all your way. You need to let people do it their way too.

i.e. Intergenerational support is in opposition to strict parenting dogma.

Of course, we’re all super protective of our first child. The poor 4th child is found eating hot chips off the public floor, instead of organic hand-crafted Weston A Price, for their first foods.

(p.s. The chip thing didn’t really happen, I only have two kids by the way).

I digress.

When we choose to engage one value, prioritise it, we disengage others.

Just like we can only have one primary attachment, and we’ll develop a natural counterwill to everything else.

Point being, we can’t have it all.

We must choose. Or eventually we’ll short-circuit.

Because our brains are just designed this way.

We must choose for our own soul’s wellbeing and also for our children’s sake. A world of chaos and uncertainty is not what they need. They need us to guide them and say - this is where you belong in the world, these are our customs, this is how we do life.

With certainty.

You know what happens when we don’t? Our children develop the same psychological vulnerability defences in relating, as children who come from severe abuse and trauma. This ain’t a joke of - “lets just see where the wind takes us, honey!”.

Our generation freaks out at commitment.

But truthfully, after the year we’ve had, I’m craaaaving it.

Craving commitment to One Path.

Not to say we won’t travel and explore the world and do lots of different things in this life (our family is split across the entire country and multiple continents) - but I want to have unwavering, unchanging certainty with the Who, What, When, Where of our foundational layer. Until the end.

God. Family. Village. Lands.

What’s the ultimate end goal?

I’ve been reading the Christian Bible, cover to cover, as of late. 

Because classical theology is cool and informative, and also trumps peer tribalism.

Nothing like the horses mouth! 

The first chapter of the Bible, Genesis, is where the Garden of Eden is introduced. 

Sidenote: if you’re a devout Christian who has spent many years studying your Bible, I’m sorry if I get this utterly wrong (in your humble perspective). 

But this story has had a profound impact me.

How I perceive the Garden of Eden is heaven. 

It is a world of absolute perfection, harmony, peace and Oneness. The earth, the plants, the animals, the humans are living in perfect harmony as One. There is no separation. It is bliss. Adam and Eve still have to “work” and tend to the garden (they’re not lazy slobs who get to sit back and exploit and have everything served to them). They’re not idle, sipping coconuts, digital nomads. But their work is in service and joy and effortless tending to the Earth with their hands and hearts. They don’t even think about it. It just is.

Because living in true harmony with the Earth and each other, just is. 

Like that beautiful Native American poem:

Man did not weave the web of life, he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web, he does to himself.

So in the Garden of Eden, there is only one rule in this perfect world of bliss - do not eat the fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

The fruit from this tree gives you the power to know. To see. To judge. To discern. To see the difference between right and wrong, good and bad. It gives you polarity.

It enables you to live from the Mind

Because, before this moment, humans only lived from the Heart. 

It provokes our desire to know everything, to try to explain, quantify, analyse, understand the Universe and mysteries of life with reductionist science, to try to control Nature, to try to supersede the natural order of things.

Eating this fruit provokes our desire to essentially play God.

To become God. To see, know and judge like God.

Right now in The Garden, there is no need for Adam and Eve to eat this fruit - their sole / soul purpose is just to exist and live in harmony.

To live from their hearts (not minds). 

To be at peace. To share love. To be One.

The don’t need this fruit. They are already whole.

But then along comes the first “distraction”. An agitating serpent. Who tells them to eat the fruit. Distractions are good at knocking you from your centre. Even when your centre is bliss. Humans have such a weak spot for distractions.

So they’re distracted from their bliss, they eat the fruit, and God is sad at them - like “WTF guys?! What’s wrong with you? You are literally in heaven, why are you seeking more?” 

And just like that - Adam and Eve are woke. 

Oh, how high-and-mighty it is to be woke. 

So the first sin is not that they disobeyed God (he’s just sad they’d throw out their divinity and Oneness with Him and the Universe and now he has to kick them out of what was essentially heaven, because that was the deal - wouldn’t you be?). 

No, the first sin is actually shame. 

Because the first thing they “realise” once they have this omnipotent ability for knowledge is not that they “did something wrong” (although they innately learnt all about that by doing breaking the rules), but actually the first thing they realise, is that they are naked. Vulnerable. Separate. 

Before this, they were one. The masculine and feminine - One Flesh. Yin and Yang. 

Now, they’re separate. Two people. Naked. Different bits. 

They’re separate from everything, because they have the observer perspective now. Rather than just truly living in their ‘being’, they are living in their ‘thinking’. 

So they are shameful that they are naked, and they try to start covering themselves up to hide themselves from each other. 

Shame. 

The root of all suffering.

The root of all sin.

I have a lot more to say about this story. But at the core of it, I just feel it is so darn relevant to where we are at as a current society. Always distracted. Always seeking. Always trying to play God. Always experiencing variations and expressions of shame. Always overcompensating for it. Always trying to be greater.

And what I love about this story is - it’s the very first chapter in the Bible. 

It sets the scene for our downfall as a humanity - and also reminds us of what we all truly want and need at the end of the day. Oneness. Harmony. Peace. Inner and Outer. The Garden of Eden.

Yet, we seem to be obsessed with following the contrary path.

The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.

And, so aside from having a relationship with God, the rest of the Old Testament basically goes on about all the crazy things humans did from that point forward once they tried to continue to solve the problem of sin and distraction, with more sin and distraction - not realising that the answer was simply just to love, to return to Oneness - until Jesus came along and rectified this.

And then in the New Testament still, the only real message, the only real salvation, the only real solution is - just freaking love one another. Love.

That, and Trust and Surrender (to God, stop trying to play Him).

But there is one unequivocal message in all the teachings:

The point of life is relationships.

(And faith)

There, I said it.

You heard it here first.

(Or maybe you read it in the Bible first)

No but seriously, in every direction I look, in every ancient text, in every modern parenting resource, in every “state of the planet” analysis I read, it all comes back to the same things - healthy relationships with each other and the Earth.

But mostly with each other.

And the antithesis to this is shame. Fear of true intimacy and vulnerability.

Fear of committing to one truth path.
(and getting distracted by the possibility of all paths).

Healing this first sin may just be the solution to all the world’s “problems”.

So put your ambitions and greatness aside for a moment, and just start with yourself.

Then your partner (because “One Flesh”).

Then your kids.

Then your parents.

Then your neighbours.

Then your village.

Start with what matters.

Stop getting distracted.

Death has been at the forefront of my mind again lately.

I guess grieving comes in waves, over time.

At the end of my life - what do I want to feel? And what don’t I want to regret?

Somehow focussing on the ultimate end goal, really helps me get clarity in my life’s path. Maybe it’s a dark Scorpio thing, I don’t know.

But seriously, you should try writing your own eulogy sometime. Potent stuff.

Nowadays I care less about myself and my life and my “greatness”, those fears are long gone, and now I care more about my children and the legacy I’m leaving behind in them.

Note how I said, in them, not for them.

Because sure, I’d like to leave a legacy that enhances the prosperity of the next generation (materially and spiritually), but the greatest legacy one can leave is in the Hearts of others. For that is what will go on to shape the world.

For that is where we came from (the Garden of Eden) and where we are going after this slipperily slide called life.

At the end of my life, my greatest fear is that I was distracted by things that didn’t matter, and that distraction came at the expense of the quality and depth of my most important and intimate relationships.

Now, I am the type of person who has 500 real life friends in my physical community.

I like people.

Sometimes they like me too.

But often what happens is I get stretched thin. Because I’m distracted by activities, cooking dinner, other friends, moving house, travelling, projects, businesses, you name it. I tend to fill up my life with lots of things. People and activities.

But it’s time to settle down.

Not in a place, but in relationships.

Because when I think about the end goal, I realise I can live with the idea of not living in the perfect place that meets all my personal desires (walk to the beach, remote, but close to community and cafes, shared with neighbours, off-grid, food forest, self-sustaining, etc), I can live with not having a career (despite having many gifts that could impact the world and how natural and life-force giving it feels to me), I can compromise and live without many things…

… Of course sunshine, ocean-swims, nature, organic food, aligned-friends, etc, all make me deeply happy, increase my vitality and will probably prolong my life.

But when push comes to shove, at the end of my life - I just want my people by my side. And I want them to know that they were the most important thing to me.

Not because of what I did for them, but because of how I made them feel.

With my presence and my proximity.

It’s a cliche for a reason - people remember how you made them feel.

This is my greatest service to the World.

This is what Jesus and the Bible is all about (or so I’ve come to believe in my fumbling exploration of this).

Not about worldly experiences or greatness or glory.

About relationships.

My greatest fear is not that I’m inadequate (…or powerful beyond measure). My greatest fear is that I’ll be distracted from focussing on what (and whom) matters most.