I came across a passage by Martin Shaw recently, the mythologist and storyteller, where he asked “What if we reframed ‘living with uncertainty’ to ‘navigating mystery’? There’s more energy in that phrase. The hum of imaginative voltage.”
This reframe has stuck with me as I work on some (exciting!) news and offerings (stay tuned!).
We live in a time of great, beautiful, unsettling uncertainty. Reframing this as mystery – for me, at least – adds an element of adventure. In mystery lies possibility and imagination, two seeds of change.
This reframing also ties in nicely with a poem I want to share, written by Ayisha Siddiqa, titled On Another Panel About Climate, They Ask Me to Sell the Future and All I’ve Got is a Love Poem
What if the future is soft and revolution is so kind that there is no end to us in sight.
Whole cities breathe and bad luck is bested by a promise to the leaves.
To withstand your own end is difficult.
The future frolics about, promised to no one, as is her right.
Rage against injustice makes the voice grow harsher yet.
If the future leaves without us, the silence that will follow will be an unspeakable nothing.
What if we convince her to stay?
How rare and beautiful it is that we exist.
What if we stun existence one more time?
When I wake up, get out of bed, my seven year old cousin
with her ruptured belly tags along.
Then follows my grandmother, aunts, my other cousins
and the violent shape of their drinking water.
The earth remembers everything,
our bodies are the color of the earth and we
are nobodies.
Been born from so many apocalypses, what’s one more?
Love is still the only revenge. It grows each time the earth is set on fire.
But for what it’s worth, I’d do this again.
Gamble on humanity one hundred times over
Commit to life unto life, as the trees fall and take us with them.
I’d follow love into extinction.
Today I want to leave you with two questions: are you willing to gamble on humanity? And how can you navigate the mystery of your life – today – with courage, imagination and a sense of possibility?