WINN – What is Needed Now

Tough Hope

By Celia Coates When people think about hope they often remember Emily Dickinson’s lines about “the thing with feathers.” Our times demand a kind of hope that is stronger and more active than,“ the little Bird that kept so many warm.” I’d call this more forceful form Tough Hope – like the Tough Love that is called…

Angels and Marie Kondo’s Tidying

By Celia Coates I was surprised to find advice on de-cluttering in a book about angels: “The first and most important step in making a strong connection with the angelic realm is to purify yourself and your environment.” The author, Hazel Raven, went on to write, “This is because angels live in the world of…

Dark Times and Brave Spirits

By Celia Coates There are more predictions about dark times than suggestions about what to do to get through them. Because I want to know more about what’s called for, I’ve begun collecting some ideas. Margaret Wheatley published a book in 2012 (a year approached with many, many predictions of doom) that includes some useful…

From Abundance to Selfishness

By Celia Coates In 1998 an Ann Landers column mentioned a cycle of rise and fall in history. It really caught my attention and I mentioned it to Elmer Green who thought it was “entertaining.” That’s a word he often used in response to something that he thought was useful, intriguing, and not foolish. I…

Meeting the Lizard

By Frank DiPerna Driving from Zacatecas to San Louis Potosi I did more daydreaming than photographing as miles of cactus fields drifted past. It was about mid-day, the sky slightly overcast, the light bright. The air was a little chilly and the wind light. I was thinking of photographing something I had seen a couple…

Many Grandmothers

By Celia Coates It’s been a while – in a 1997 magazine article Molly Giles asked, “Where are the old ladies now?” She described where they were when she was a child, “They used to be everywhere. One sat on every front porch, park bench and bus stop of the town where I grew up….

Consciousness and Healing

By Celia Coates In medical school Rajiv Parti was taught that, “If you can’t touch it, hear it, or see it on a monitor, send it to psych.” It was a maxim that made sense to him until he died and came back to life. Near Death Experiences (NDEs) such as the one he had,…

Nature Teaches

By Judith Dreyer Virtually all native cultures that have survived without fouling their nests have acknowledged that nature knows best, and have had the humility to ask the bears and wolves and ravens and redwoods for guidance. Janine Benyus, Biomimicry Institute I wanted to know “the woods” more: to be in the forest and know…

Words’ Worth

By Celia Coates The computer problem that kept me from publishing all of last week’s post may have been another example of “just the right wrong thing” – one of my favorite ideas. This was to have been the first line: I wish I could write this post without sounding preachy or crabby but I…

From Wordsworth

This week I came across some poetry I had not read since I was in college – a long time ago. I did remember that Wordsworth’s Ode: Intimations of Immortality was beautiful, but I had not remembered how significant these lines were: The soul that rises with us, our life’s star, Hath had elsewhere its setting…

Two Gifts

By Celia Coates I’ve written before about “just the right wrong thing” – about times when something difficult or painful becomes a gift. Here’s another story about an event like that. A year or so ago a very dear friend told me about what had happened that day at work. She runs a program for…

The “Don’t Mess With Me” Chakra

By Celia Coates If you’ve read WINN before, you know that “kindness” has been the subject of many posts. It is very important and of great value, but there are ways we can have too much of a good thing. We can end up living distorted lives if we try to be kind without a…