I am approaching my favorite time of season, the ending of an old year while moving into the birthing of a new year. It becomes an important season to be in recognition of the value and sacredness of our natural cycle of living life. It is an intentional portal of the reflection of the passing year while stepping into the visioning process of the honoring of the coming year.
It is a time of examination of who we were in the midst of being ourselves in 2017 and we get to vision for who we want to be in our next echo of being in 2018.
I start the season of love starting Christmas day and it includes a special ceremony I have celebrating Kwanzaa for over 30 years and it is the “Feast of Thanksgiving.” This celebration is one of ritual starting on the 26th of December, ending on January 1st each year. Seven days and seven principles based on African traditions of being community, it is a chance to reinforce and support important relationships surrounding family, businesses and community. It starts by embracing different subject matter focussing in on a singular focus of the day, such as unity, self-determination, collective work and responsibility, cooperative economics, purpose, creativity and faith. This practice has opened my heart and enriched my life by me gaining a deeper meaning of “being community.” I take the time to visit the development of my human personality and revisit the purpose of my personality, in this modern world.
Seven days of being thankful for the breath of life and the traditions of life.
Seven days to be in a peaceful place to hold sacred space of respect.
Seven days to be thankful of the past, present and future. Seven days to vision your possibilities, hopes and dreams, for yourself and your community.
As a Black Man in America, I must have my wits about me and my conscious living it is a must, a lust for equality for myself, my people as a culture, including all the cultures of the world. Respect, echoes of respect is my creed of living. Every voice in this culture, in this world matters and is a gift of the divine, a gift of creation. Not honoring any voice begins to silence our living world and the harmony of our earth song sings a sour note. I have learned to live in a circle of being love.
Being community means to be supportive of each and every member of the community in an effort to allow them to gain their most advantageous measure of success. Being in community is to be in an on-going conversation which produces mutual support and acknowledgement. Being in community creates a thankful environment for all people, a strong sense of self worth in a place of belonging. The success of one is the success of all involved.
We have to acknowledge the imbalance of power in our society, the inequality, mass incarceration, mass shootings, mass examples of sexual harassment coming to light and the mass of people are saying no to the corruption and misuse of power. We are in the midst of a
historical transformation, an evolution of human thought and action. We are in a full state of “becoming,” being more than we were yesterday. It is time to create a new foundation of trust, honor and celebration.
In the process of becoming, we would need to create new rituals of living that redefine the purpose of our living and being.
I have added and been focused on nine points of being present for the expansion and gifting of life. These focus points gives you a sense of creating a foundation for a plan of action to enhance our society’s unfolding transformation in nine words of support: courage, integrity, honesty, passion, humility, selflessness, confidence, patience and caring.
Courage
You must have the courage to have forward thinking, be in integrity in your daily actions in the process of visioning a working future for all people of the planet. It is necessary to have the courage to be authentic and open with compassionate ears, be vulnerable to understand the concept of and meaning of the human story.
Integrity
To know in thought and action the integral aspect of life being rooted from the root to the tree, and on to the leaves. We want the integrity of land, air, water and minerals of this planet to be respected and used with discretion. We would want to respect the value of human and planetary life. We should be able to sustain lives of justice and freedom.
Honesty
We, as a people, should be able to maintain the ability to listen with compassionate ears and an open heart which are the basic skills to create a container of honesty. Having the ability to express oneself in organic honesty creates a safe place of trust which allows us as human to experience intimacy.
Passion
The passion for healing, to elevate and not negate. The passion to have faith in the evolution of the human state and its process. The passion to gather and build principals and laws of operation based in honesty and integrity. The passion to be present in life to honor personal and societal relationships.
Humility
Being able to know oneself by understanding your own personal story and your placement as a working part of the whole society. Being able to execute your function in the art of living. Being about to work with others, as a team, village or tribe. Being able to realize your worth is intertwined with the worth of the whole.
Selflessness
Being of service to your family, community is the greatest gift of life you can give. Being able to give before it is given to you is a beautiful exchange of pay it forward in faith. When we recognize we live in a web of life, attached by story and purpose. We are united like granules of sand on a beach as we all support the land that frames the sunset. When I help myself, I am helping my community.
Confidence
Be able to find compassion in the story of life and have the confidence to stay of the path of support. Be passionate with your confidence and selfless in your gifting. Think of confidence as faith unseen.
Patience
Be able to express the faith in the unfolding of life, the art of being organic. Be able to live your life like you would care for a garden. Be able to have the patience of a teacher or a loving parent. Treat moments in time as their were sacred prayers. Value the rhythm of your breath.
Caring
To hold the sacredness of life in honor and compassion is an act of caring for the healing of the planet and its people. It takes the previous eight points of being in action to create a foundational sense of support. Caring deeply and consciously allows us to gain confidence and patience to continually have the courage to have the passion of loving while we maintain the integrity of humility, selflessness.
The honesty and the application of these principal are the healing aspects I feel are needed to create an evolving wholeness of our modern society.
We are becoming the gift to be distributed and granted to all human beings. We are the people who have the want to access and embrace the wholeness of breathing and creating beauty and rituals of divine personal and societal freedom. We should be thankful we have this space in time to learn and evolve as a true gifting.
It has been said, in seven days a new world was created.
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This post is republished on Medium.
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