Counting up to the election: Yesod and Malchut

[sonia]

rosefox's post on Yesod

Yesod is located in the pelvis, and to me it is about earthy, messy embodiment. No seriously, here we are, right here, exactly like this.

Yes, I want to pay land tax! Here's my post about it from last year as a step toward paying this year. Shuumi Land Tax. (ETA: paid!)

Reading here on dreamwidth (for example this series of posts from rosefox!) informs and inspires my activism, and I hope my posts pass some of that along. I definitely want more close personal connections in my life with positive feedback loops, but that is sadly lacking.

I donated $100 to Act Blue State Slate Supplemental via the Panic Decision Matrix. More or less on impulse, and it might make a difference. Mostly these combined Act Blue donations give a lot of people my contact info to ask for more money, so I have to do a lot of unsubscribing afterwards. I hate that we're in a world where donations just enable more fundraising, and it is truly unclear whether anything positive gets done.

I am working on a new book, and I got a chunk of work done on it. (A small chip of work? Progress is slow but I worked for several hours.) I am also on a committee putting together an online folk dance festival, and I took notes and wrote them up for our meeting. This is creation of the very practical sort! I do a lot of work like that, supporting collaboration.

This doesn't directly answer any of the prompts, but I think it answers the essence of it, living our convictions, even when it's uncomfortable: In a zoom dance gathering I was helping to run (so I couldn't leave), I turned my video off to protest two people dancing together on video without masks even though they're not in the same household. They left the zoom call, which is a good enough outcome. I can't make anyone wear a mask, but I can be public about my passionate conviction that it's the right thing to do. At least I didn't have to watch them flaunting it and being a bad example to everyone on the call, like last time this came up.

rosefox's post on Malchut

Malchut is our embodiment of the divine, our connection to all that is, not from above coming into us, but toward the earth. All that *IS*, concretely, with dirt under our fingernails.

Here, have story that feels relevant, Pocosin by Ursula Vernon. Ran across it again today.

Is there something about Malchut and anxiety? Medicine in Malchut for anxiety? OMG the anxiety! One step, one breath at a time.

For the day to support something that supports everyone, I gave $20 to a houseless man who told me a long story about having cancer for 15 years and applying for a job tomorrow as a long distance trucker. He wanted to do odd jobs, but I didn't have anything in particular that needed doing. I usually don't just hand over money, but this time it felt like the right thing to do, and I'm retroactively applying it as this action. Let's help everyone who needs help, whether their story is true or whether it's a tool to get what they need. Oddly, I didn't feel manipulated, even though I doubt his story.

Again with Gevurah/boundaries and something that is part of my life all the time. I am figuring out what to eat within constraints of what doesn't make me ill. Writing articles and putting them together into a book one bit of work at a time. Scraping together bits of connection and support and calling it enough even though it is woefully short of what I imagined and desired. I like the idea of finding Shekhinah in that. It does feel like the determined spark of life, finding a way forward bit by bit.

This has been a couple of days of taking a stand and then working through the conflict that follows. I'm now getting the emails about not "publicly shaming" people dancing together without masks. If it's "shaming" just to say what they're doing, maybe it's not my speaking up that's the problem, eh? Staying focused on my goals of both connection and standing up for what's right feels like an aspect of focus in manifestation. And I could sure use divine support for both effectiveness and comforting!

Friday. OMG what a difficult, intense day. Lots of tears. Lots of showing up and communicating as best as I possibly could. I persisted. And I persist in facilitating lots of Zoom folk dancing, which may sound trivial, but is a major social connection for many people in isolation, including me. Also the 3 year anniversary of an ending where I finally put down a relationship I had persisted with at great cost to myself. I still mourn for what could have been and the good parts of what was.

Saturday. I like seeing myself as a conduit of goodness. I try really hard to be that.

An update: I have a No Soliciting sign by my front door, and I MEAN it. Amazingly, it mostly works. When the occasional fundraising person (mostly young white dudes, shockingly) thinks their cause is more important than my boundaries, I open the door, point at the sign, and shut the door emphatically. Today the older white dude I gave money to a few days ago knocked on the door, thanked me for my earlier generosity, and asked if he could rake my leaves for $10 "so he could get to Seattle." I said brightly, "No thanks!" and he looked that mix of angry and disappointed that goes with entitlement. This is why I don't often give money to people coming by my house.

Have I mentioned that I don't like that giving money is an opening for people to try to get more money. When I donate on a website they angle for a monthly donation. What happened to appreciating what you get. I don't like being treated like something to be pillaged, as I try be a conduit of goodness in the world.

Sunday: I'm going to say that writing and sending out an article on time despite everything counts as creation within inspiration. I'm not sure what that phrase means for the usual meaning of inspiration, but that word also means breathing in. I keep having to remind myself to breathe. That I am still breathing. Life is continuing one breath at a time and I will find out soon what happens, what will change, what won't.

Monday: I keep telling myself, "Everyone is extremely stressed. So am I." My vet's office assistant called me to fire me as a client for being... "harsh"? Insufficiently submissive to an inexperienced vet? SIGH. It's emotionally painful and logistically inconvenient and I do wish people wouldn't take their stress out on me. I try really hard. Awe. Awe at the messes we humans are and how we've continued to trundle along anyway. So far.

Election Day: I woke up thinking that sometimes not-knowing is the best part, as uncomfortable as it is, so I might as well enjoy the last few hours of it. So far nothing bad has happened, that I know of anyway (2:45pm PST). I would like this to be a Y2K scenario: a no big deal outcome because of all the work people put into preventing disaster.

Thanks again for doing this, rosefox. It was interesting and useful as an activity to get through the time until the election, and a window on someone else's take on Kabbalah, and a reminder that the skills I worked very hard to acquire on my first run through a few years ago are still there.

Comments

[rosefox]

Oddly, I didn't feel manipulated, even though I doubt his story.

I adopted an "everyone gets a dollar no matter what" policy a while back and was astonished by how well it liberated me from any feeling of being manipulated or scammed, as well as from the burden of having to decide who was worthy of money. I'm glad you got to have that good feeling too!

[sonia]

That sounds like it works well!

I think in this particular interaction, he wasn't demanding that I believe him or give him money. There was a mutual recognition of both of us as people that I appreciated.

[adrian_turtle]

I love what you're doing with this. I'm not sure if this is relevant, but I've been saying it when I text bank as well as when I filled out my absentee ballot.
http://neohasid.org/resources/votingprayer/

(The larger website has problematic parts, starting with Carlebach, and I am not recommending it overall. But I like that prayer.)

[sonia]

I thought I replied to this! I must not have hit Post.

I'm glad this is resonating for you. Thank you for your text banking and your vote!

Thank you for sharing the link. It made me cry, and realize I feel forsaken by God even though I don't (officially) believe in that kind of God who answers prayers. I think of prayers as actions rather than petitions. How is it that so much harm is being done with no consequences (that we can see)? When does this turn around?