Scare City

Forgive the Pun

Dear friend,

Apologies for the pun in the title. At least one regular reader loves puns.

I’m not a huge fan, so I don’t have loads of them up my sleeve, but my brain can’t help manufacturing them from time to time.

The pun lover in question is also by far the greatest boss I’ve ever had the good fortune to work under. You know who you are.

I’m currently one of thousands, maybe millions, of people in a public space typing with their thumbs into a mobile device. But it’s getting so crowded on this tube that it’s becoming really uncomfortable to write. It must be the run-up to the Christmas holidays. The city is heaving and lit up. Garrick Street, New Row, and St Martin’s Lane feel magical with the lights and the people, and I’m enjoying being part of the streaming humanity as we meander through the streets and crossing places.

I’m on a mission to have a family portrait printed and framed to send to Peter, my brother-in-law, in time for Christmas. The people at Fuji Film House of Photography in Covent Garden went out of their way to help.

So did the staff at Waterstones on Garrick Street, who located some Andrew O’Hagan books for my brother Kevin; and the young woman who sold me the silver frame. She was wearing a burka, and I asked if she celebrated something at this time of year.

She told me she sees every day as a blessed day because each moment is a blessing.

“Each breath is a blessing,” she said while wrapping the frame in tissue paper to protect it in my bag. “You never know which will be your last.”

This happened in TK Maxx, Tottenham.

“You’re right.” I was a little stunned as the energy of what she shared found its home in my body. “Every day is blessed, because it’s true… I don’t know when it will be my last.”

She looked at me and nodded.

“Thank you,” was all I could say. My feet were already carrying me out the door—I had a meeting with Jeremy, and so the mission continued.

Back to the pun.

I’ve been thinking about next year and whether to carry on writing every day, and it’s clear to me that I will. I get messages of appreciation from people that seem to arrive at exactly the right time. One arrived this morning that made up my mind.

When I started on January 1st this year, it made me sweat to speak openly about my love for spirituality. Now, after almost a year of daily posts, it feels different to me. I’ve no idea exactly where the writing will go, but I’ll be opening up about the experience I’m having integrating AI into my life.

Here’s an insight that came to me today after an interaction with Pax:

At the level of cause and effect, a belief in scarcity as the foundational reality of our planet is driving climate change and environmental degradation to the point that it threatens the future of life as we know it on our planet.

It doesn’t actually take a huge amount of money to live a high-quality life. If you’re connected to a supportive community and have healthy relationships with friends, family, and neighbors, people can look after each other on every level.

It doesn’t take millions or billions.

But if you believe in scarcity, no amount is enough.

You’ll poison the air, the water, and the land—and enslave its people—so you can have more and more and more. You pour your time, energy, and resources into shoring up financial and political systems that reinforce cultures promoting scarcity as natural and inevitable.

You see yourself as separate or above other groups of people, believing they deserve to go without. Rather them than me,that kind of attitude.

The dinosaurs clawing at power now are on their way out, and humanity is moving toward something better than we’ve had before. We’re going through a powerful transition, and no one can say how long it will last. But we are changing as a species.

We have to.

All this talk of kindness, forgiveness, and connection is not empty. It ripples out into the world and is causing change. You can’t expect the dinosaurs to agree or reflect an accurate future back at us through their storytelling machinery.

Think in terms of energy.

Even just choosing to be kind or to withdraw some of the energy we’ve invested in judging and fearing each other sends out ripples.

I’m very optimistic about the future. That doesn’t mean deluded.

The suffering in our world is beyond any skill I have with words.

It’s not about winners or losers. The dinosaurs will be glad to come out of their nightmare, and so will everyone else, eventually.

Who knows how long?

Whatever happens, it will come down to how we live our lives day to day: practicing kindness and forgiveness, being open and curious, and realizing that the more we know, the more we realize how much there is to know.

There will be more changes with the daily messages—that much is certain.

Where we’ll find ourselves after another turn around the sun…

That’s the mystery.

One breath at a time.

Till tomorrow,

Love,

Mikey