COMMENTARY BY: MARTI
WRITER, PHOTOGRAPHER, EARTH GUARDIAN
PARIS, FRANCE

ON SPIRITUAL ACTIVISM

• • •

           A spiritual activist always carries nature in the heart.

I play an antara, an ancient string instrument that resembles a flat harp that sits snugly on my lap or on the ground. I tune my antara so that all 24 strings are on the same pitch -- a G sharp--which I have been told is the sound of our planet rotating on its axis. (Pythagoras used the antara to create the mathematical chord progressions known in Western music today.) 

On this particular day, some years ago, I sat lazily strumming this beautiful instrument with my spine against an enormous concave boulder on an isolated rocky beach in Southern Africa. I plucked the strings evenly, taking care to strike each of the chords with the same intensity. Gradually the sounds began to swell, octave upon octave, creating deep harmonic sounds that swept across the waves. To my joy and astonishment, a pod of whales came to listen. 

Sometimes I imagine myself still sitting on that rocky beach. I can feel the moon tugging at the great waves of the ocean, the tides rising and falling, and bursts of water exploding everywhere. The longer I sit, the more I feel at one with the nearby mountains, rivers, lakes, trees, and the great cetaceans circling our globe.

DISCRETIONARY CARE 

I try to choose my actions and paths in life with great care. It’s not always easy. In today’s overly noisy world we are easily diverted from our true path. But if I focus on the reality like a mantra: I am what I am and I become what I do,  I know that whatever I put my energy into, whatever motivates me, this is what I will manifest. If I call for abundance rather than prosperity, I may have less than I dream of, but much more than I really need.

I know from my teachers, be they children or ancient wise ones, that true motivation comes from compassion, love, playfulness, and higher collective purpose and not from anger, fear, or personal ambition. We are unique. Being accepted or not accepted for who we are is more honorable than being liked or loved for who we are not. It reminds me of something that Kurt Cobain, the lead singer for the group Nirvana, once said before his last days:

             I’d rather be hated for who I am than loved for who I am not.

Learning not to demonize others is a key to our own integrity. Demonizing arises out of arrogance and fear. When our minds are free from fear, we can hold our heads high. When we are respectful, we have the right to be respected in turn. Learning to have compassion for our enemies is having compassion for ourselves. Understanding that there is no us and them, that we live on the same planet, breathe in and out to the same tides. If our neighborhood is not covered in industrial smoke, we see the same moon in all her phases and gaze at the same stars. We are all ultimately far more alike than we are different. 

ADJUSTING OUR MINDSET

Integrity is a form of inner protection. One of my dearest friends, an amazing human being and exemplary activist, was Steven Biko. Steve suffered unspeakable torture at the hands of the South African apartheid government. He could not be broken, and sadly, he died in prison. But his death was not in vain. It inspired and led to the Soweto riots, sparked South African independence and liberated people from the horrible chains of apartheid. I remember one time Steve told me that his own hero and mentor was the elder black activist Robert Sobukwe. <Why?> I asked. (There were many heroes and martyrs in this movement. Steve was himself an inspiring leader who was studying medicine to help his people.) <Because Robert Sobukwe had high principles and refused to become a black racist,> Steve replied. 

A noble goal can only be achieved through noble means. Then negative energy passes through us, but doesn’t rest within us. The struggle may still be there, but the shift from fighting AGAINST harm to working FOR respect and love is crucial in how we look at what we are doing. Then even if we walk around unhindered, we are not stuck in the illusionary prisons of the mind. 

When Nelson Mandela was finally freed from prison, he invited his jailors to his inauguration party as the first black president in the history of South Africa. He was criticized for extending this invitation. How could you invite your oppressors? his friends asked. Mandela paused. Then he said, <Listen, I spent 27 years in prison, I won’t spend another minute there.>  

When we forgive ourselves and others we are empowered and we are free. This process may be difficult, but deeply liberating. Our willingness to forgive allows us to live in the present and free our minds for the tasks at hand.

ALL MY RELATIONS

For the Lakota, when two children fight over the same object, they are taken outside and told to look up at the sky. After some time, the children understand that we share the same sky, the same clouds, feel the same overpowering heat of the sun and the same strong winds that can knock us flat. They understand that it is relations not objects that matter. Nature is our teacher. And she teaches us to share and look after each other.

When I am at home in the beautiful South Dakota Black Hills, I listen for the dark thunder-swollen clouds and the winds that bring piercing hailstones that drive me inside and push great red hawks to soar beyond streaks of lightning over the mountains and into faraway prairies. Here in the chaos of a storm, within the period of a few scant minutes, the sky becomes calm and clear once more. The ground is covered with white hailstones the size of bird’s eggs but the sky is clear and light blue, reminding me that our consciousness is vast, never ending, and always just beginning. We are like miniscule drops of water that float into the vast turbulent ocean of life. Suddenly we can look up at a clear sky at night and we can see a sea of galaxies.

IN NATURE and OF NATURE

Whether I am in an alleyway, in a park, or a forest, I try to keep in stride with nature’s burning beauty and my passion for life before, behind, above, below, around, and within. From my neighborhood in Paris up on the hill in Montmartre, I sometimes walk where rivers run underground, where trees stand tall as witness to who we really are. We need to cultivate trust in the unknown and cast off our prisons of the mind. Essential to all true learning is non-attachment to the outcome, not measuring in terms of success and failure but rather in terms of listening to the winds that carry us afar and refine our consciousness. This is the true path.

GRATITUDE

When I am not swayed and dispersed by the flurry of life around me, I watch each day unfold and feel immeasurable gratitude and a sense of wonder for all the beautiful places I have seen in this world. I love the white light in the Arctic and the vast shades of blue of the South Pacific, but all places have their beauty when we are open to seeing it. I am here. We are here.

Every day I give thanks for our universe that it is incomprehensible, extravagant, without boundaries, and sacred.  I gave thanks that you are here, as well.