I posted the following on my Facebook profile this morning:
Hello my friends. These have been some very challenging months lately, no? Without quite knowing how to judge the information that travels every which way about covid-19 I’ve been in social isolation up on our hill for longer than is emotionally healthy. My defenses are eroding.
I’ve sought respite from news and the panic it triggers here on Facebook. It feels like it works but it’s usually just a temporary fix that can teeter towards knocking what equanimity I have left off kilter. It takes hours, even the occasional entirely sleepless night to get back to the new-normal. There’s so much dissent, disinformation and disrespect permeating public discourse lately. There’s some good things too, don’t get me wrong. There’s so much to love about so many of your posts! But those others, they really hit me hard right now.
With the protests I, along with so many others, have finally been made to understand how the systemic racism that permeates American life has caused relentless suffering throughout the lives of our black compatriots. I am grateful for all the announcements, links, posts and stories I have learned from here about this. About #blacklivesmatter. It has changed me once and for all, forever. I will continue with this learning off site.
Now I have hard work to do. I need to completely reconsider who I am - who I have been - in light of these new heart felt considerations.
I need to do this politically. I need to do this personally. I need to do this in a meditative frame of mind. And it’s going to take a lot of introspection as well as working my way through a heap of mindfully and carefully validated and broadly curated information to create the foundation from which I can regrow.
In this current state of identity crisis, I don’t know how to filter through the sometimes truly thoughtless blather that has become the larger portion of the stuff in my feed without some of it sticking like tar to my heart.
But I need human connection! So I am planning to turn to email and phone calls to replace the commonly truncated exchanges typical of this platform. I may ask for your opinion on something or simply check in. I invite you to do the same
I will be maintaining my blog at http://happyart.com. Maybe weekly. But likely less. Only when I think I have something of value to share. Insights. How tos.
I will continue to run my private art groups set up on Facebook. I’m unsure if I’ll do anything with my pages. But my Facebook profile? It’s going dormant for the foreseeable future. Instagram too. Thank you.
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