Recalibration time / Challenge time

Recalibrating towards (and for) a challenge

Towards and for a challenge, towards and for the challenge(s) that are incoming.

Recalibration powers, activate. Towards. Towards and for.

We see what is coming, and we are recalibrating to invite in the version of ourselves who needs to be at the forefront for this challenge, for this series of challenges.

What does it mean to gird up for a challenge? What does it mean to recalibrate for what is coming? There is something active happening here, something active and agile…

In the face of devastating news, whether it comes as a surprise or not

I have been in the many feelings: upset and numb, angry and so very sad, but not at all surprised, by the devastating news/confirmation that a second Trump administration is incoming.

And so I am thinking about what it means to recalibrate towards a challenge.

There are going to be a lot of challenges. So many challenges.

The challenges born of tumult, the challenges born of necessity

The next four years, the next however many years, possibly-probably all the next years.

I am feeling both the numbness and the belly-punch of this, the challenges on the horizon.

Tumult and chaos, pain, fear for myself and the people I love, and the land I love, and the earth itself.

There are other challenges as well of course

There are usual suspects of challenges for me living alone and very remote in the cold grey dark of winter without central heating, though blessedly with electricity.

I am familiar with these personal nemeses — the cold, the deep aching loneliness of the winter holidays, and existing inside of a culture that is built on exclusion…

This morning was 21 degrees Fahrenheit (a fun negative number in Celsius, -6 degrees!), moving my tiny space heater around in my little trailer by the woods, and jogging laps in the kitchen, I can see my breath.

It’s all related though

Last night I had to decide if I wanted to store jugs of water and turn off electricity to the well pump, or just wake up early and move the space heater into the front room to warm it up before the pipes freeze. I went with the path of least resistance.

These are feeling like much smaller challenges now, of course, compared to the absolute shitstorm of challenges, political, social and environmental, that are in the pipeline, but also it’s kind of all related…

For example, but not only, etc

When New Mexico experiences fires or flooding or whatever kind of new climate-related disaster, we aren’t going to get federal support from an administration that hates our governor.

Thinking about that while I think about trans friends, and disabled friends, and abortion, and the Supreme Court…

Thinking about that while I think about the environmental agencies that will be demolished, and the Center for Disease Control that is already mostly a joke but will either cease to exist or will be under the control of some loser clown (RFJ Jr) who thinks vaccines cause autism, among other unhinged and unsubstantiated theories.

Into the pot

Thinking about all that while I make a big pot of Pkaila, a Tunisian Jewish bean stew of sorts with blackened spinach and onions and spices, to keep my hands busy.

Keeping busy is part of the challenge right now, keep it moving.

Thinking about what it means to see the challenge that is coming.

Okay, so we have some big challenges, this is our starting point

We have our work cut out for us. And I don’t mean that in a cheery way but I also don’t mean that in an Eeyore way.

I almost want it to be neutral: there is a lot of work to be done. That’s the reality.

This will require resilience and agility. It will be really fucking challenging, yes, that’s the nature of a challenge. If it was easy, they’d call it something else I guess.

What do we know about a challenge? What do we know about orienting ourselves towards and for these challenges? How are we shifting modes as we know we are headed towards the challenge times…?

Aliveness

How are we staying alive and holding onto aliveness, cultivating life sparks and moments of joy and pleasure where we can get them?

That’s part of the challenge too, right?

It’s a question worth asking, even when the answer is hidden behind some clouds.

Etgar

If you are a Hebrew speaker, I highly recommend the extremely short-lived but very excellent podcast Sefer Echad. It was only two episodes, one featuring Etgar Keret about his first book of short stories, Tzinorot, and one with the late Amos Oz, about Oto Hayam, The Same Sea.

Anyway, in the interview with Etgar Keret, he tells the story of how he got his first name, Etgar, Challenge.

This is something I have often wondered about: Who names their child Challenge?

It turns out that the answer is: a holocaust survivor who lost her entire family as a child, and when she was told that giving birth to this baby would possibly kill her, and the baby almost certainly wouldn’t live, she was like, Okay, let’s do this.

And she named the baby Challenge, the challenge in question being: STAY ALIVE.

Let’s do this thing

LIVE. That’s our challenge.

Let’s do this. Let’s fucking go.

Let’s live. That’s the challenge.

There are other challenges, but that’s the starting challenge, and the most important one.

Let’s do what we can to focus on whatever beauty and pleasures are available in this world, sometimes in very small doses, in whatever time we have here. Is it enough? Nope! Are we doing it anyway? Yes, that’s the challenge.

Challenges & Contingency Plans: 2024 and onward

I am thinking about how often I can disappear into the Forest Focus app: how many trees can I grow while I disconnect from the attention demands of my phone?

And I am thinking about strength training, or what I call assassin training, and agility, mobility, range of motion. Endurance. Being embodied and here.

Also something about protective spheres…

Like not listening to the radio in the car, maybe taking a break from most podcasts, definitely hermit-ing more but also connecting more with people I care about. More going for walks. More plotting and scheming. Fewer distractions.

I don’t want to be that guy but wow I kind of want to be that guy

Remember back in 2016 that one guy in maybe Colorado who was like, I simply shall not consume news until someone tells me he’s no longer president…

And we were all like, oh god what a privileged asshole.

There is a part of me who wants to be that guy and just get really into composting and solar and turning my piece of land into a sanctuary space for trans people or people needing to get to reproductive health care…

And obviously there is too much to be done to fully turn away from the world, so part of my challenge is going to be to stay in it and stay informed while also grounding myself in nature, ritual and cowboy chore hour.

Plus there are other challenges we can choose to play with because we want to!

Let’s name some possible challenges (here are some of mine)

Among the challenges I could choose to engage with:

• no radio
• morning and evening jog even if it’s just five minutes or a song or a walk
• staying off phone for two hour periods of forest focus, growing as many trees as possibly
• unsubscribing like a mofo, especially from everyone who is business as usual the day or days immediately after this disaster
• making a delicious morning or afternoon beverage and really taking the time to enjoy it
• assassin training for the league of assassins (sun salutations, bobcat stretching, endurance, balance challenges)
• making more soup: it’s soup and stew season, let’s gooooooo

A word about the nature of motivation

The purpose of a challnge, its raison d’être is to motivate.

And so, if you are thinking about a particular challenge, and your response is that you want to curl up in a ball and put pillows over your head, that’s not the right challenge for you, and that’s fine, that’s good and useful information!

Instead of berating ourselves for not being up for the challenge, we can just change the challenge. Lower that bar so it’s on the ground, or change the entire playing field.

Keep going until you come up with something that sounds like it might feel intriguing, like it sparks something for you. That’s a challenge that motivates.

Also this is not about results

As always we are process-oriented not results-oriented.

Things will happen how they happen. We will recalibrate and regroup and try again, and keep going.

This is not yet another reason to beat ourselves up. Part of the challenge is going to be starting again, or rethinking our approach, or changing the parameters as needed.

Part of the challenge is going to be giving ourselves some grace, ideally a lot of grace.

As wise friends and people I admire keep reminding me: These motherfuckers don’t get my despair. I will feel what I’m feeling, and I will stay mad, and I will meet the challenge.

What we can play with…

Choosing challenges that feel meaningful to keep us company alongside the other challenges, what are the challenges we want to play with?

For example: rituals, obsessions, new routines, strength training, supporting each other, cultivating what we want to cultivate…

And, as always, safety first. If something is too big, too scary, too much, we do less.

As ever, approach is everything. Let’s approach with kindness and curiosity where we can, compassion, Loving Clarity, a breath for this.

Recalibrating our approach, recalibrating towards the challenge

Combining RECALIBRATION with the eight qualities in my fierce bobcat compass:

Fierce: I am fierce and recalibrating my fierceness

Fearless: I am invoking fearlessness and recalibrating my relationship to my own courage

Powerful powers: I remain powerful and am recalibrating my sense of my own powers

Striking: Yes, I am STRIKING, and am recalibrating how I wish to strike

Grounded: Staying grounded and of the earth, recalibrating my relationship with the earth, recalibrating how I draw power from the earth, how I am of the earth

Wild: I am wild and recalibrating my wildness to be that much more wild and of the wilds

Glowing: I am glowing my glow powers and recalibrating my ability to be a glowing beacon of light in hard times

Alive: I am alive in my aliveness, recalibrating my relationship to life and aliveness, alive and recalibrating how I want to live, alive and rejoicing in life, recalibrating my ability to access this life force that is sourced in joy!

Amen, or whatever your word for that is

Amen:

Peace peace peace, compromise compromise compromise, miracles, miracles miracles, recalibration recalibration recalibration…

May it be so or something even better…

Additional powers I am channeling

Along with THESE MOTHERFUCKERS DO NOT GET MY DESPAIR, powers I am channeling now include:

I AM PATIENT (I play the long game)
I AM RESILIENT (we trained for this)
FUELED BY FURY, FUELED BY HOPE SPARKS, whichever I can access in the moment…
HEDONISM AT THE END OF THE WORLD (find my pleasures where I can, treasure each moment of deliciousness)
WELCOMING ALL MIRACLES OF IT SOLVES ITSELF
STAY GLOWING (cultivate glow sparks, find the helpers, be a beacon of good)

Mighty work ahead of us

As my friend Cate said, “Are you okay? We have some mighty work ahead of us.”

We really do.

From my journal notes:

Wow, what a rough hard challenging day, a rough challenging time.

So okay: I am challenging myself to meet the challenges with [whatever I can muster].

Feels like first day of Challenge Year, but there are only challenge years from now on, though I guess that was going to be true either way.

So I guess the question becomes: what is the treasure in the challenge, or, if I’m not ready for that question, what are the skillsets I have that are going to be useful in meeting this challenge?

Or: what other challenges can I focus on or welcome or engage with…?

What is next

I don’t know, but I know that part of the challenge is staying present, finding any amount of focus amid the numbness when I can, and, again, giving myself grace.

Grief times call for whatever helps, and for me that is going to be naming some personal challenges that motivate me to help anchor and guide me as I have to meet these other, bigger and scarier challenges.

We need each other, we need your good heart and mine, we need to keep on keeping on, and to help each other do that, and I am here for this exact challenge too.

Come play in the comments, I appreciate the company

You are welcome to share anything that sparked for you while reading, anything that helped or anything on your mind, wish some wishes, process what’s percolating…

I am lighting a candle for us and our beautiful heart-wishes. What a brave thing it is to allow ourselves to want something better for us and for the world.

Or if there’s anything you’d like to toss into the wishing pot, the healing power of the collective is no small thing, companionship helps.

Whatever comes to mind or heart. Let’s support each other’s hope-sparks…

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Aka fun bonus material on how I relate to time and map out my quarters for the year.

Anyone who gives to the Discretionary this week (see below) will get this by email as a pdf. I am only checking email twice a week because I no longer have wifi at my place, long story, so be patient with me but if it doesn’t show up within the week then let me know!

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A request!

If you received clues or perspective or want to send appreciation for the writing and work/play we do here, I appreciate it tremendously. Between Long Covid and traumatic brain injury recovery, things are slow going.

I am accepting support (with joy & gratitude) in the form of Appreciation Money to the Discretionary Fund. Asking is not where my strength resides but Brave & Stalwart is the theme these days, and pattern-rewriting is the work, it all helps with fixing the many broken things.

And if those aren’t options, I get it, you can light a candle for support (or light one in your mind!), share this with someone who loves words, tell people about these techniques, approaches and themes, send them here, it all helps, it’s all welcome, and I appreciate it and you so much. ❤️