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On this episode of Living Myth, Michael Meade addresses individual and collective issues that arise when considering how to return from the separations, losses and ordeals of the Covid pandemic:

“When I hear people talking about returning to normal, I find myself repeating the idea that normal cannot know itself. Normal is not a place anyone really wants to be, especially if a person wants to be themselves. Since there is no normal self, the idea of living in normal is truly self-defeating.

Rather, we have a desperate need to figure out how to go forward, which means finding our way to a better place, one that is more inclusive of all kinds of people, but also more inclusive of the various parts of our own selves that are often excluded from the ideas and the practices of normal. There is also a danger in trying to return too quickly in ways that are not healing or reassuring to our own souls.

Part of a return both to self and to community can be found through a meaningful sharing of stories; yet there is a danger of missing the opportunity to be vulnerable and bring to others a true sense of what we lost during our time of separation. From the view of the soul there needs to be a recognition of what has been lost before there can be a celebration of what might be found.

Deep down we are looking for rituals of return that bring us not just reconnection, but soulful restoration; that bring us not just a sense of relief, but a genuine sense of renewal and a greater sense of purpose in our lives. If there is a genuine ritual of return, there can be a renewal of vitality, a sense of being restored to potentials in our lives as well as a deeper feeling of communitas, of genuine human community.

We are invited to practice ways of returning to ourselves and to each other in deeper, more conscious ways. And we are being asked to learn how to return collective culture to meaningful and healing connections to nature. In that sense, we are part of a much greater project of restoration, renewal and return. Our individual attempts to find ways to return to community life at this point, can also be seen as part of a greater learning that needs to happen collectively, for the sake of our humanity and also for the sake of the earth that also waits for our return.”

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