The Good We Can Do

On this very cold winter day, I find hope in the plucky little succulents that are thriving in my room, despite less-than-optimal conditions.

Like all plants, they’re nourished by what’s in the ground, the dark and messy stuff. For me these days, the real stuff includes anger, fear, sadness and grief. My own particular mulch can also include feelings of powerlessness and not-enough-ness. These depressive and self-critical thoughts may be related, I believe, to unexpressed or misdirected anger. Given how much anger arising these days, it’s good to make sure it’s going in the right direction!

In his excellent Substack today, Parker J. Palmer writes about the challenge of being an angry Quaker. His essay helped inspire today’s song (a short and spontaneous one).

He writes:

Anger can serve as a source of energy for the work we need to do, and a source of stamina to help us carry on in hard times.

For me, songwriting and creative expression are helpful ways of working with big emotions like anger. They provide an opportunity to be honest about what’s going on in me (to the extent I can) and renew my energy to do the particular good I’m called to do, in community with others. This is a central point of my brand new book: Songwriting as Soul Work: Songs and the Inner Life…which (I’m very excited to announce) is available now (as of today!).

This week, our1 Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney delivered an important speech at Davos about honesty and the strength of “middle powers,” especially when banded together, against the inhumane insanity now threatening the world.

He was speaking about geopolitics…but on the personal level, we too can “name reality…build our strength at home…[and] act together.”

Naming what we’re feeling (whether it be anger, grief, powerlessness…) building our strength at home (nourishing our bodies, minds and spirits) and acting together (joining with others for systemic change)…all of these keep me growing in good directions, one day at a time. Thanks for being here.

What’ll we do with the anger / Where’ll we put all the pain / As we witness a world in danger / The human being insane / What do we do with the fury / What do we do with the shock / Got to rewrite the story / Make most of what we’ve got

Banding, banding all together / Standing up for what is true / Rising up from every corner / Doing the good we can do…

Whatever you do with your anger / Don’t ever turn it within / Attend to the heart of the matter / Love will finally win / Put in your piece of the puzzle / Know that you are enough / Take a breath and another / Keep on showing up… (Chorus)

Songwriting & performance notes:

The metaphor of a puzzle has emerged as an important one for me…gesturing perhaps toward a Wholeness or Holy Mystery (that I can’t see in its entirety). And this week I finally finished a difficult 1000-piece puzzle, so there’s that!

My low “e” is tuned up to F#. The capo is on the third fret.

On the wall behind me is a framed copy of The Desiderata which includes the words “whatever your labours and aspirations in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace with your soul.”

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