To be just human, we need to remember what it means to be a human being in the first place. Unfortunately, I think we have lost track of that but I don’t think it’s too late. In fact, I think the world is giving us an opportunity now to take a look around us and really take in what this desire to be superhuman has cost us, not only us as humans but Nature too along with all her elements and beings.

From a very young age as children, we have been primed to desire to be more, to be better, to be stronger, to be smarter, to be like all those superheroes we watched and read about. Superhuman wasn’t just a fantasy. It became the epitome of what we believed the future held for us. It was the expected course of progress — we would evolve and become Superhuman. And what a let down this pursuit for more has been. We wanted to be on top of every other species to the extent that we disregarded what Nature wanted completely. We took charge of something that wasn’t ours to control. We forgot that we share this planet with so much other life. And when we remind those who abuse the Earth that this planet is not theirs for the taking, we are often ignored or told we need to be more practical if we want to be part of the “real” world. But you see this thing people refer to as the “real world” is precisely the fantasy world of superheroes which is made up of conglomerates which are made up of individuals all so scared to be “just” human, all so desperately trying to prove that they are better, that they are worth more than they actually feel. I am definitely not sorry to say that there is nothing more real, nothing more realistic, nothing more practical than Nature herself. Yes, perhaps life is about nothing more than eating, drinking, sleeping, having sex, having babies, dying, and living again. Perhaps all the fun and all the purpose is in telling stories about all those ordinary things. And it is those everyday things that give meaning to that which is otherwise meaningless. To be just right, to have just enough, to desire nothing more than what is around you, to just be exactly who you are, an ordinary human being is perhaps the most humane thing you can be and do for the world. To be just human is what we were born to be. Being just human is how we can fit into the bigger story of this planet and find our place in Nature once again.

We weren’t created to be the greatest. We were created to be a part of something great. We were created to cooperate with Nature, not to compete with her. So I say relax, let go of the pressure to be more than human and enjoy being just human. Of course, it’s not a button we can press and just relax. It takes a lot of work to get to a place where we can trust ourselves enough to relax. We have to undo decades of telling ourselves not to relax. So many of us carry so much stress in our bodies and put so much pressure on our minds all in pursuit of a “better” us. We need to ask ourselves why we feel this need to become better. We need to ask ourselves what is it that we are hoping to achieve from all this pushing of ourselves? These are some of the questions we might ask ourselves before we can just trust and relax into a new set of beliefs. I suggest communicating with your ancestors, (especially those that you’ve never met) who walked this Earth centuries ago, those who knew the Earth at Her rawest. Sit with them. Write to them. Ask them for guidance. Ask them all the questions you have, whatever they are, and however ridiculous and “unrealistic” they may seem. And when you have asked everything you want to ask, just sit back and listen deeply. Listen to the answers already within you. Listen to the yearning inside of you to return home, to return to your roots. Listen to what it is you are really longing for. Listen to the sounds of your limits, to the beautiful boundaries that protect us. I believe we all long for the return of joy. We all long for peace of mind. We all long for a body that can play. And I believe too that all those things do not come when chased. In fact it is quite the opposite, they come with stillness, not physical stillness but a stillness of heart. A stillness inside that washes over us when we finally stop running and escaping, when we finally accept that we are part of this cycle of life and death, that no one is special enough not to die, that no one can invent something to bypass death, that we will all perish just like Nature does. And Nature does it so gracefully, so why can’t we? I believe it is living with grace that prepares us for dying with grace. Shamans say we die the same way we live. And what a privilege it would be to live consciously and to die consciously. When we can finally open our arms and our hearts to greet death, only then can we step in and fully experience the state of being alive.

I share my words with you always with the intention to share and spread peace. I share these words with you with the intention of deconstructing our fears until they are palatable enough to digest and transform back to love.

Till next time,

S.A.