Evolution is happening. Be a part of it
09/28/2009

It’s the 56^th anniversary of my birth and I’m feeling profoundly grateful for the courage my loved ones are demonstrating in the face of global uncertainty.  My husband Micheal, who hasn’t had a job all year, is building us a magnificent home in Washington.  My son Hudson, who enjoyed a hedonist’s lifestyle in Santa Barbara, has willingly gone cold, broke and friendless to pursue his writing career in London.  My 76-year-old Mom, who let go of a deeply unsatisfying marriage to sleep on my sister’s couch in Yuma, is dreaming of a better life.  That sister, a single mother of quadruplets who has 12 escrows to close before the end of the year, still devotes energy to the new life she dreams for her family in Washington.

I am blessed to be surrounded by people who not only dream, but who act.

My son Noah has started his second year of medical school, fully committed to the sacrifice and discipline his chosen path requires—not for the money he hopes to make, but for the good he hopes to do.  (“For-profit healthcare is a bad idea,” he says.)  My stepson Ryan, who has already experienced the physical and mental hardship of BUDS training, has been accepted to try again in December.  Despite the incredible demands, he is committed to being a Navy SEAL.  My sister Jackie, who has overcome ovarian cancer, narcolepsy, and chronic fatigue syndrome, is working fulltime for a domestic violence agency while in her spare time working with brother John to create a new magazine, American Riviera.   

My brother-in-law Chris is closing down a successful law practice to become a novelist.  His son Alex is a newly inducted Peace Corps volunteer assigned to Armenia.  My brother Ron, a living monument to discipline and the established order, has married a Vietnamese woman he barely knows, sincerely pledging her his full love and commitment.  She pledges hers in return. 

Are these unusual times, or what?

Virtually everyone I know is undergoing major transition, acutely aware that the future will probably be unlike the past.  Yet they are not sitting around wringing their hands.  They are transforming breakdowns into breakthroughs.  They are embracing change as the opportunity to live the life they have imagined. 

Last week I met an enlightened man who assured me that the Earth herself is undergoing a vibratory quickening to manifest love and light.  While I’m not entirely sure what that means, I think the gist of it is:  Evolution is happening and we have the opportunity to be a part of it.  Doing so requires that we seriously consider for what purpose we are here.  Then we must be about it.

As that old prophet Dylan said,

Thanks to my five-year-old niece Laila for helping me with today's artwork!