What would the ancestors do?

blog

1 Feb

Sometimes life just feels crappy and getting positive can be hard to do. It's not always as simple as being able to name the "problem" and moving on. Acknowledgment takes many forms. What if there is nothing wrong with feeling crappy? What if it's simply a process of getting to the next phase? What's right about the crappy that you're just not seeing?

There's a lot of woo woo about "negative" and "positive" energy. Some people will tell you crappy feelings come from "dark energy" or something you've done to create them. I say poo poo to that idea. What if energy is just energy? What if there's no positive or negative? What if it's all simply wild energy shifting and turning and flowing in a chaos that is designed to replicate the natural states of living on Earth? What if sometimes feeling awesome and sometimes feeling crappy is actually about always being wild..? Where there is no right or wrong, no exactness or control, just a continuing ebb and flow of all things…

What if it's all perfectly wild?

When the ickiness raises it's head, I find it's usually due to loss of my own flow. At these times I refer back to my "What would the ancestors do?" check-list. This isn't some sort of re-enacting, romanticised notion that the Old People were way more magickal and able than we. It's actually about knowing that my ancestors come from a long line (probably about 150,000 years worth) of humans who evolved with the same underlying foundations that optimise wellness. Feeling crappy translates to feeling unwell. The Rhythm of Life is an ebb and flow of physical, mental, emotional, environmental and spiritual health. If I'm feeling crappy, I'm not in that flow.

So in other words, what building blocks did humans have for the 150,000 years of evolution that I am not doing right now? Modern spiritual thinking may suggest that we are "evolving" past form and structure and everything that has ever been. This is bull shit. We have bodies. And our bodies have foundations in 150,000 years of human evolution. We are not suddenly different that we could ignore the past ways humans have lived. Our ancestors are wild humans. Every one of us has wild human ancestors, no matter what colour our skin or where our grandmother's were born. Being outside, feet on the earth, eating wild food, drinking wild water and following a wild heart are the foundations of our ancestors and of Being Human. We are not immune to those foundations just because we now have electricity, bottled water and supermarkets.

So in my check list for "What would the ancestors do?" I visit my 52 points of Wellness. They each fall into one of 5 categories : nutrition, light, water, movement, and rhythm. What's going into my body? What's coming out of my body? Am I in flow with the natural cycles of light and dark? Am I drinking enough? Am I moving enough? Am I outside more than I am inside? What rhythm am I cycling with : man-made or natural?

The checklist serves to remind me that the same things that my wild ancestors did are available to me now. They are not difficult, and they don't cost any money. It's simply about taking my "should" brain and re-wilding it to the Rhythm of Life. The Rhythm of Life is gentle and natural. The "should" is complicated and controlling and not even my own. I don't need research or details in the Rhythm of Life. It can be seen in all the elements of nature - that which is unchanged by humans. That which rises above human thinking and structure.

What would life be if you were willing to flow with the wild rhythms of life?

In the Self Crafting Year Book I've provided a bunch of tools to inspire anyone to move from slump to surrender, and get back on track for joy-full living. These tools can contribute to your happiness and help you re-member your Vision (aka your Wild View of Being in this time and place).

This list includes :