The sadness of the events Japanese people are experiencing since the Quakes and Tsunami on March 11 has washed across the hearts and minds of the rest of the world.  In the midst of your feelings of grief, sorrow, and maybe even anger, your friends from far away places can offer so little by way of tangible relief–which in turn fills us with grief, sorrow, and, yes, even a bit of anger–we feel so helpless.

But two well-known characteristics of the Japanese people–their perseverance and their compassion for each other–provide a basis for believing–and hoping–that these crises and challenges will be met with vigor and, with time, overcome.

This morning, I read in the New York Times a short essay written by MITSUYOSHI NUMANO, professor of literature at the University of Tokyo (translated into English) about the power of hope.  The title of his essay is “Beyond Expectations.”  It is a beautiful piece about how humans can emerge and overcome through hope–when technology and science have failed us.  May I share with you the last two paragraphs of his essay:

Every one of the images of the victims that we have seen on television has been gripping, but the one that has made the deepest impression on my heart is that of a little girl tearfully calling out for her missing mother. I believe in the purity of this girl’s heart more than I believe in the pledges of any politician, no matter how sincere. A cry of despair, to be sure, but also a sign of her unshakable will to face reality in its very harshest form.

And yet, in the end, what else is there for each of us to do but to keep on doing what we have been doing, as long and as hard as we can? From within the daily lives of each one of us, a small light of hope will begin to glow. This is what I want to believe. Would it be too much to say that a person’s ability to harbor such an unlikely belief in the power of hope is also something “beyond all expectation”?

We wish for you great strength and courage.  We love; we believe; we hope.

The Melander family, Gene, Jackie, Jody, Leigh, and Lynn

It got me thinking about movement and moving. Which I’ve done since the last time I posted here! My husband and moved from the golden hills of California to the green (well, sometime green — this winter they’ve been snow-covered) mountains of New York.

I moved because I love the yowling wind, both literally and metaphorically. Mark and I had gotten to a point in our lives in California where we were comfortable, easy, able to live in our lives without thinking too hard.

But imagination is never about stasis. It is about flow, even when it it is loud and untamable and a little scary like the wind last night (our house was creaking…).

Imagination is about adventures, and like a big wind, adventures aren’t comfortable. And they aren’t safe.

I fear that we’ve convinced ourselves that comfort and safety are the highest accomplishments possible in our lives, and in so doing, we kill the adventures we need to be more than just waiting around for death. We kill the instinct to imagine other ways of being, of being curious about what’s beyond that next ridge, of wanting to grow and change, and be blown by the wind.

I think we all need to part of a Dylan lyric from time to time. Answers shouldn’t be the only thing that the wind blows.

I did that today and scored, stumbling across the creative world of Paul Neave:

http://www.neave.com

Seriously yummy playfulness…

He’s got an extraordinary story, and extraordinary energy that he brings to people as they’re trying to figure out how to navigate their lives.

Check out his website here.

“People need to start finding joy in movement again…”

YES!!! Somewhere in our bizarre need to equate virtue with a Puritanical misery, we’ve turned the delight of moving — running, jumping, leaping, dancing, skipping, even riding silly surf/skate boards — into brutal sessions at the gym or on the treadmill.

It so misses the point.

So cheers to Mr. Anthony, as he reminds us that movement IS play.

…had a conversation with a friend today about how fantastical a mythology humans perpetuate about our advanced progress as compared to the rest of the animals in the world. We struggle daily with things that animals seem to do as easily as breathing, without worry or self-consciousness or losing course.

A case in point:

The imaginal activists of the invertebrate community — and here I thought the song was “put the lime in the coconut…”