Reflections, commentaries, critiques and ideas from 40 years experience in the fields of Community Development, Community Education and Social Justice. Useful tools and techniques that I have learnt also added occassionally.
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The name of this blog, Rainbow Juice, is intentional.
The rainbow signifies unity from diversity. It is holistic. The arch suggests the idea of looking at the over-arching concepts: the big picture. To create a rainbow requires air, fire (the sun) and water (raindrops) and us to see it from the earth.
Juice suggests an extract; hence rainbow juice is extracting the elements from the rainbow, translating them and making them accessible to us. Juice also refreshes us and here it symbolises our nutritional quest for understanding, compassion and enlightenment.
The rainbow signifies unity from diversity. It is holistic. The arch suggests the idea of looking at the over-arching concepts: the big picture. To create a rainbow requires air, fire (the sun) and water (raindrops) and us to see it from the earth.
Juice suggests an extract; hence rainbow juice is extracting the elements from the rainbow, translating them and making them accessible to us. Juice also refreshes us and here it symbolises our nutritional quest for understanding, compassion and enlightenment.
Wednesday, 13 February 2019
Flying The Flag
On National Days all over the world we see flags being raised possibly saluted. We see them atop flagpoles outside government buildings, hanging out the windows of residential housing, or fluttering from a mast attached to the bonnet of a car. With the raising and waving of these national flags often come exhortations to “respect the flag.”
Alongside the raising of flags come calls for national pride and an honouring of state constitutions. Often too, calls to trust, respect, or follow the leadership of the country.
All of this asks, sometimes coerces, us to put “my country first.” We are asked to be patriotic, and to do our duty for god, king (or queen), and country.
Perhaps, just maybe, such sentiments, and exhortations, were appropriate half a century or more ago.
Today, however, they verge (at worst) on xenophobia and extreme forms of nationalism. At best they fly in the face of an increasing awareness that we are all global citizens, and that we inhabit and thrive (or collapse) on this planet, together. Indeed, we are more than citizens, we are participants in a highly inter-connected world-wide web of life. We are part of an eco-centric community of plants, animals, rocks, and seas.
So, for me, I want fly a different flag, I want to read a different constitution, and I want to acknowledge a different leadership.
Instead of flags, I wish to watch leaves flutter in a light breeze, or be blown to and fro by a storm through the canopy. I can watch leaves change colour. Up close, I can appreciate the fine fractals of their veins.
Instead of constitutions I would prefer to read the Constitution of the Constellations. Gazing into the night sky, each constellation is a story: a story of struggles and triumphs, or of heroic journeys and discoveries. Others tell of our connection with the natural world and our intimate place in it. These constellations offer more wisdom in one night than all our human-writ constitutions put together.
As to leadership, I would eschew those we currently bestow the title “leader” upon. I will look for leadership in Grandfather Sky and Grandmother Earth, to Gaia and Uranus. The Earth and Sky have ever sustained and guided us, asking nothing in return. They have offered their unconditional love since before humans began treading upon the earth and drinking from the rains from the sky. I will accept Mother Earth and Father Sky as my leaders.
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