Searching for the Ocean of Light

What we each can do to alleviate these dark times

The Hunter’s Moon setting this morning at dawn.

In the journal of George Fox, an Englishman who was one of the first Quakers, he writes of a vision he had when he was wrestling with “the nature of those things that were hurtful without, and within the hearts and minds” of human beings. He cried out in agony over the pain in the world, and was shown a vision:

I saw… that there was an ocean of darkness and death, but an infinite ocean of light and love, which flowed over the ocean of darkness.

Fox’s vision of the infinite ocean of light and love is hugely important to Quakerism, a religion based on the belief that we all have an individual relationship with the divine. By listening attentively to the “small, still voice” of the divine within, Quakers believe, we can express the best of ourselves as humans, and our everyday lives can increase that ocean of light and love.

What Fox saw in 1647, a time very different from today in some ways, and not in others, seems especially relevant and necessary in these times when the ocean of darkness seems to dominate our world. Especially in Israel and Gaza, in Ukraine, in Sudan and so many other places were we are killing each other simply because of our tribal affiliations, the arbitrary lines we draw between “us” and “them.”

That vision of an infinite ocean of light and love flowing over the ocean of darkness is especially important when we look at what happened last week in Lewiston, Maine, where a mentally ill Army Reservist killed 18 people and wounded others, and in the many other mass shootings in this country. And in the violent changes to our earth itself, our planet, the only home our species has ever known, from global climate change.

Some days I despair. I wonder if that infinite ocean of light and love still exists. And then I am reminded it does by ordinary interactions with other human beings.

Ordinary Kindness

The kindness of the cashier at the grocery store who called out to me as I rushed off, bags laden, from the self-checkout line, leaving my car keys on the counter: “Ma’am! Your keys!” The technician at the car dealership who shared a candy bar from the stash in his tool cabinet when my service work took an hour longer than expected. The school bus driver who waves as we pass each other—me walking, she driving—in the half-light before dawn on weekday mornings.

My neighbors, who brought me a beautiful bouquet of fall flowers to say how much they will miss me when I move. The smile from a stranger yesterday afternoon as I collected my mail at the mailboxes….

I am reminded that the ocean of light and love is a metaphor for the goodness that is inherent in humanity that we all carry as part of our being. Even when, especially when, that inner light is obscured by our descent into fear and hatred, or illness, whether physical or mental. By our struggles with money or addiction or any of the baggage we carry. When we behave toward each other in ways that are not loving and kind and thus, impose trauma on others.

The Goodness We Carry Matters

There is, still, within each of us, a core of goodness, a core of light and love. Finding that core and calling on it to enrich our every day actions and interactions is our challenge in this life: my challenge, your challenge, everyone’s challenge.

Each time we act from the light and love that we carry within—the sacredness that makes us human, the sacredness that impels ever life, human or moreso—we increase the world’s infinite ocean of light and love. Each time we act from that inner goodness, we reinforce the truth that the goodness in this world really can overcome the ocean of darkness and fear and death. Each time we act from our hearts, from lovingkindness, from our generosity, we increase the ocean of light and love in the world. That is our power, individually and collectively.

I cannot by myself fix the devastating atrocities that are happening around the world—none of us can as individuals. I grieve for my Palestinian friends and the trauma to Gaza, both the people and the land. I grieve for Israeli friends when I think of the horrors of the Hamas killings and kidnappings. I personally cannot make that horror stop, but I personally can resolve to act with light and love, each moment of each day.

I won’t be perfect. I will fail. I will pick myself up, dust myself off, and remind myself that what makes me human is not my big brain, but my heart. And being able to live with that heart outstretched. Being able to act in a way that increases the ocean of light and love in the world.

That ability to act with compassion and kindness is humanity’s gift. Our gift is not the ability to wreak our technological advances on this world and each other; our gift is our ability to love this world. And each of us can go forward every day with the faith that acting with our inherent light and love can heal pain and trauma and all manner of ills. That our inner goodness adds to the ocean of light and love, which will always overcome the ocean of darkness and fear.

Love always wins, not easily, not quickly, but eventually. If we work at it.

I am reminded of what I wrote about humanity’s gifts from my book The San Luis Valley: Sand Dunes and Sandhill Cranes (University of Arizona Press):

What we do best comes from not from our heads, but from our hearts, from an ineffable impulse that resists logic and definitions and calculation: love. Love is what connects us to the rest of the living world, the divine urging from within that guides our best steps in life.

And on a personal note…

I am juggling two real estate transactions right now. The purchase of Casa Contenta, the house outside town I am moving to, will close on November 8th. The sale of Treehouse, the condo where I live right now, is scheduled to close November 27th, the Monday after Thanksgiving.

And of course, there are bumps in the road. My personal moment of WTF! came on Thursday, when the heretofore always reliable coil-fin furnace in my condo chose to not work when the inspector tested it. It worked two weeks before when I checked it for the season; it doesn’t work now. Sigh.

Marcos from Pipeworks is due here tomorrow to see what’s wrong. In the meantime, I have no furnace. And the first cold wave of pre-winter hits tonight, when the temperature is supposed to drop to 24 degrees F. Good thing I have a gas fireplace and an electric space heater. I won’t freeze, but I will appreciate any good energy you can send toward my furnace fix being simple, quick and inexpensive.

Blessings!