As I have been doing Joanna Macy's Work That Reconnects for 10 years I cannot help but see this catastrophe through that lens designed to help us face "the Mess we are in without going Crazy" or with Active Hope (the title of her last book). It feels to me like sharing some of these thoughts would be helpful to others as well.
As someone who has been doing climate work now for 13 years I have been long been staring down grim scenarios for humanity and our planet. The worst case scenarios all involve the total breakdown of society as the environment itself fails. Logically there is a terrible economic fall out of such scenarios and the breakdown of various societal structures, but even the worst case scenarios did not see things like that happening for 10 to 15 years. Some of those scenarios also envisioned old epidemics literally rising out of the permafrost or no longer enough vaccinations to suppress.
But what is actually happening is a scenario no one but a science fiction writer envisioned and would appear unrelated to Climate Change. Yet Joanna's words still powerfully apply for me. She has talked for a long time about non-linear time, the idea coming forth from quantum mechanics of parallel time, and she has said: our ancestors and our descendants are trying to help us, and the non human beings. I had the dawning realization the first time I listened to her "why do I think all the solutions will come from the minds of humans living right now?" During the sHell No campaign in the NW in 2015 - Kayactvists tried to stop Shell from parking a rig in Seattle and going up to Alaska and testing to drill off the coast of Alaska, and activists hung off a bridge in Portland to stop the ice breaker coming for repair. I had several experiences then that felt powerfully to speak about what Joanna was speaking of.
The rig alluded the two dozen Kayactivists trying to block it in Seattle but by the time it got across from Port Townsend some Kayactivists - only 4 or 5 came out and it swerved slightly to miss them and ground. It was only stuck a short time, but I felt as if the earth had reached up and grabbed it! I felt as if the earth were trying to help. Later, the ice breaker was damaged (apparently by ice) and had to be brought down to Portland for repairs...causing delay. (Again I felt the frozen ocean had reached up ripping the ice breaker and was helping us.) It was further delayed as it left by activists hanging on ropes from the bridge blocking their path and by kayactivts that also darted out and blocked their path. That whole delay only took two days, but added to the time lost on the repair and Shell wound up not having enough time to do their test drilling and without that info their board cancelled the whole project (partly also aware of the negative public outcry.) In the end I felt the earth had puts its finger on the scale and helped ups to win that battle.
For those of you very scientific this account will drive you mad. This is a spiritual story. It is a story of how beings from another time are conspiring on behalf of all life to save us.
What you say does this have to do with the Coronovirus? Well I want to be clear I am not celebrating anyone's death. I am not oblivious to the untold suffering that the virus is bringing by stopping the global economy in its tracks....but I will say this: look at a list of the industries currently in a tail spin:
airlines, the oil industry, cruise ships, the financial industry....all of these are leading contributors to climate change. We are literally seeing as the flying and way less driving is happening as people are compelled to stay home the green house gases reducing and the deep smog over China and Italy lifting. The animals are returning and water is clearing. The eco system has produced a virus that is both reducing the population of the beings in charge of climate change and it is also changing our most climate destroying behaviors.
Sure when the epidemic is over people will go back to flying and driving and spending money....but maybe just maybe we will begin to realize that much more telecommuting could normally occur, that it is crazy to fly across the country for a convention where we listen to a talking head that we could easily have listened to on a screen. Maybe we will think twice about flying across many states to go to a sports game or watch a play. Maybe we can hold flying a privilege for weddings and funerals and to see the dying. Maybe we will learn how quickly we can change policies when we really KNOW we are in an emergency (she says with the anger of being told for three years that we will protect the trees next session or being told by portfolio managers that they know oil will become a stranded asset put policy prohibits divesting from it.) Maybe in the ashes of this mess we will decide we might as well reconstruct things in a way that will survive climate change. Maybe just maybe we can learn from this experience about the way we have been living and how we need to live.
Joanna Macy is a whole systems thinker. One of the "games" she has us do in workshops to illustrate systems theory involves each of us secretly picking two people in the group of 20. When we say go you are to place yourself equa-distantly from those two as the group moves (that can be in a line or a triangle). The group keeps moving and moving trying to establish this perfect equilibrium. Then one predesignated person drops to the ground and the facilitator says: "if you are connected to someone on the ground you must drop too." Within seconds the entire group is on the ground. This is a powerful lesson that we are all connected to each other in the web of life. This is why the moment the ban on travel to Europe was announced I knew our economy was going down. I knew it would force airlines into bankruptcy, that as they lessened flights other things would go wrong, etc. I knew that as we restricted movement in order to stop the spread of the virus that it would stop economic activity and close businesses, many forever. This is the painful side of the generally beautiful truth that we are all connected to each other.
It is also why it is so important for how we now respond to this. It we act as every person for themselves we will create a hell. Like the person who knew they had the Covi-19 and flew on a Jet Blue plane anyway exposing every person on that plane. An unbelievably selfish act destroying the web they belong to. But I also see people right now reaching out to get groceries and meds for those who cannot do it, and trying to figure out how to help those who are becoming unemployed over night. Several NBA players responded to the cancelling of their season by donating to replace the incomes for the season of the minimum wage janitors and hotdog sellers, etc. associated with the stadium. We are all payed millions, but how can we help those who are struggling right now?
History is full of crises. Crises that pivoted us as a people in a good way and crises that pivoted us in a bad way. Example - the poor resolution of WWI leading to economic hardship in Germany made ripe the rise of Hitler promising a new bright future for Germany. The worldwide recession was responded to by Roosevelt in a transformational way of creating social security, public works projects, unemployment insurance, etc. We will choose what comes out of this crisis. We can let the rich use it to snap up even more resources or we can recreate a society that provides universal health care, sick leave and maternity leave for all, and that begins to really seriously address climate change. Some may find what I say to be an incredible tale of silver linings or fairy tales. But we are the ones who will decide what the final outcome of this story will be.
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