Spreading Abundance in a Pandemic

Originally published on April 12, 2020

What follows is the text of a Happy Goat Productions newsletter that I sent out yesterday. To those of you who missed it, here it is….

My dear friends, colleagues, supporters, and students! 

For these past few weeks, I have been sitting in silence, unsuccessful in my attempts to make rational sense of a rapidly changing world. I owe you all a statement, some sort of wise response to this pandemic, some distillation of the numerous gems of insight found in the ancient texts. I know there is much in these texts, and in what I have learned from them over the past few decades, that would be helpful in answering to people’s desire for learning right now. As a writer I am normally comfortable just sitting down, trusting that words will pour out and do their thing if I can step out of the way, cranking out blog posts, course proposals, and page after page of book manuscripts. Right now, I am working on making peace with my inability these past few weeks to respond with meaningful writing to this situation.

I see the suffering around me and so want to do my share, contribute something, to make us all feel a little better. And yet, this crisis is so big and complex and deep, so full of suffering and fear and hope and potential and kindness and beauty, with unknown and unknowable changes to our notions of bodily boundaries, connection and intimacy, economic survival, the meaning of life, and medicine and healing, of the earth, of society, of the family and individual, and the body and the spirit. I have not found anything meaningful to add to what I experience at times as a cacophony of noise out there in all the Zoom meetings, blogs, Facebook live messages, and recorded lectures, rooted as they often are in a sincere desire to do something meaningful in this time of crisis. We are all wanting to help each other, which is a beautiful thing. And there are many real treasures sprouting out of the mud of our shared forced hunkering down, from Arundhati Roy’s “The Pandemic is a Portal” to Charles Eisenstein’s “The Coronation” to music shared on balconies porches, and countless free Zoom offerings on yoga, meditation, singing, dancing, etc. from all over the world. 

We truly are in this together and we ARE all connected in a way that has never been more apparent, from our families to the body’s relationship with the immediate environment, to our local communities, to international actions, with both positive and negative lessons for those of us taking the time to see. Cruise ships or whales, airplanes or eagles, dashing to the office or digging compost into the garden, frantic consumption or asthma relief for little kids growing up in LA smog, rat race or resting? Might we actually have a choice here? Could that more beautiful world really be possible?

I don’t know anything, that really is all I know. And I am truly sorry that I am not more productive and effective at this time when so many of you acupuncturists are forced to stay still at home, unable to practice what Lillian Bridges calls your “Golden Path,” your 天命 tiānmìng (heavenly destiny or mandate) and could spend this time reading the Daodejing or learning classical Chinese. 

I have been sitting with this persistent feeling that I have been letting you down, especially those of you who are paying members of my Imperial Tutor program. And I have lost a few of you, some of you having shared heart-breaking stories with me of losing your beloved livelihood as practitioners of Chinese medicine and just not having those extra $6 a month right now. So many challenges, so different for each of us. And so many potential responses, all of which understandable and made with the best tools each of us have to navigate any particular moment. Please get in touch with me if you are in that position where you need those $6 to survive and at the same time would like to continue or start being a member. Of if you know somebody who would benefit from this offering right now.

I personally am feeling the impact of the closure of my treasured local public library here, which in my world is absolutely an essential service, especially for lower-income people, voracious readers like myself, and families with kids out of school who can’t afford to buy books. It is inconceivable to me why my state or county has not figured out a way to dispense books safely to keep this vital service going at this time, especially when gun stores are still open. This lesson teaches me the importance of education as a basic right. I guess we all have different values, and this crisis is bringing them all into plain view. I swim in the ocean almost every day and feel immense gratitude for having that access to water and to the forest full of life and quietness and smells, fiddlehead fern and good Qi, and to my garden and the dirt under my nails. For a kind caring community and very much devoted old dog who puts up with my huge need for snuggling right now. For technology so I can stay in touch through video chats with my parents in Germany and my daughter in Oregon. And for a simple life that grants me the stillness I crave more than anything right now. May you find your own abundance of blessings in spite of it all!

In other news, I have been unable to find a printer for my forthcoming book, Channeling the Moon, Part Two, which I had so hoped to share with you all by the Chinese New Year. The stars will shift and it will happen eventually. Given that all my conferences and book signings, lectures and seminars are canceled anyway, it just is. Like with so many other areas of our lives right now, I have learned to surrender and let it go. For now, what I can contribute is silence and stillness. 

As a seasoned recluse and “Yin cultivator,” I invite you to join me in reflecting on the beauty of the moment, the emerging blade of grass or first strawberry blossom of the season, the peaceful clucking of hens, the mating cries of the eagles and barking of the sea lions, the sweetness of the kale after cold nights, and the unique preciousness of a neighbor’s smile in a brief interaction across a safe distance. The situation calls on each of us, to the best of our ability, to practice a Yin way of being in the world right now, to “do by non-doing” 為無為. To replace the fluffy white bread made from instant-rise commercial yeast and high-gluten bleached flour with the real sustenance of “brick bread” made from hand-ground ancient grains and sprouted seeds with the slow and unpredictable but much more forgiving and persistent fermentation of a natural sourdough starter, cultivated from local wild yeasts, shared among neighbors, and taking several days to become real food that keeps longer, tastes better, and is healthier for you and the environment. Or whatever your own equivalent of Yin action may be. And that does not mean skipping the marshmallows!

Be kind, be gentle, be still. And, as Wang Fengyi said, “Do Not Blame” and “Do Not Judge”! Focus on your own ability to respond to each moment's challenge with grace, patience, clarity, and love. Right now, none of us know what the other person is carrying. Cultivate trust in the universe in whatever ways you can and, as you are able, share whatever gifts you may have, no matter how small or large they may seem to you. Let us create that new world that some of us are sensing on a quiet morning interrupted only by a humming bird’s approach to the wild current flower.

Let us receive, share, and be love.
Welcome to my world, fellow Yin cultivators!

Sabine