Keeping Your Spirits Up During Difficult Times

With all that’s threatening so many of us with imminent extinction, I thought I’d look up some helpful hints about how to keep our spirits up during difficult times.

 

Alas! It seems all of the articles on keeping one’s spirits up pre-date Trump, corona virus, election shenanigans of the highest order, stock market crashes, Wall Street bailouts, and the scientific assessment that we’re just 12 years (fewer, now) away from irreversible climate change  that will negatively impact every generation that must somehow manage to survive in the coming years.

 

It’s depressing as hell, all of it… so, what can we  do to get through it without succumbing to despair? Because despair will get us nowhere.  We need spiritual energy reserves and hope to keep fighting the good fight.

 

But these days, if I take a few hours to “chill out” and reinvigorate myself (read, watch a movie, nap, or exercise), I feel guilty for not using the time  more “wisely” to keep people’s attention on the existential threats facing us.

 

Back in the day, “let go and let God” used to do it for me.

 

Back in the day, “Just be sure to vote” used to do it for me.

 

Back in the day, Buddhist teachings used to do it for me.

 

Back in the day, having a great day didn’t seem to require turning my back on reality and ignoring what must no longer be ignored.

 

We are in a lifeboat with gaping holes in it.

 

We are on a spaceship with no Planet B to go to.

 

When it seems that the most of the powers-that-be are blissfully (or willfully) unaware of what their activities and policies are doing to this planet and its populations (human/animal, vegetable and mineral) and that the few politicians who are awake and keenly aware are being thwarted by oligarchs, plutocrats and corporations from attaining sufficient power to stop the bleeding and triage our way out of this mess, it’s damned hard to see a light at the end of the tunnel. The only light we see there is the headlight of an oncoming train!

 

I understand why so many people are committing suicide.

 

But as an eternal optimist who believes in the capacity of our most vulnerable and marginalized people to demand better conditions and outcomes, I simply cannot  and will not succumb to that degree of despair.   It was average Joe’s and Josephine’s who fought for labor unions, women’s suffrage, civil rights, birth control, eight hour days, child labor laws, minimum wage (inadequate and underfunded as some of these are these days) and every other advance we’ve made as a culture.

 

I need to look at these skirmishes, these battles, as spirit-refreshing adventures. I need to change my mindset from “beleaguered” to “becoming,” from where we are now to where we’re determined to end up.

 

Bernie Sanders has been fighting battles like these his entire career. I’ve been writing about noble causes since I first learned to write stories and articles, doing what I do best (stringing words together) to rally the forces needed to triumph, not for Bernie and me, or even for you and me, but for the generations to come.

 

We won’t live long enough to sit under the trees we plant today. But unless we plant them, there will be no shade for those who come after.

 

I need to make “keeping my spirits up” to include trying one more time, every day, to make the world a better place for everyone to live.  Instead of seeing it as a drain on my spirit, I need to see it as a refreshing rain from my spirit.

 

Sure, I’ll still read books, watch movies, take naps and hang with my critters and friends as often as necessary to manufacture some smiles and additional energy. I just won’t allow any of that to lull me into a sense of “all is right with the world” until all is a helluva lot better in the world.

 

I can’t change the minds of the willfully ignorant (those who stay drunk on their favorite flavor of kool-aid: the Fox watchers, far-right evangelicals, Trump cultists, the corporate media consumers who take everything they read and hear as gospel truth, and greedy corporations that screw their employees on their way to prominence), but I can encourage everyone else to stay in the fight until it’s won or lost.

 

When it’s lost, I’ll surrender and die. But we’re not quite there yet, are we? It won’t be long before it’s decided one way or the other but, until then,  I’m in it to win it, and I need to make that my spirit-lifter.

 

We need to keep fighting. We need to keep going. We’re reaching a tipping point, and unless we stay in the game, it won’t fall our way.

 

Stay in the game and do your best to make it a game instead of a battle of ideologies. Use good sportsmanship because whatever happens, we need to find ways to feel good about each other, even those who have been drinking the kool-aid. They’re victims of lies, misinformation, disinformation and the fears that have been instilled in their hearts, not enemies.

 

They think it’s them versus us, good versus evil.

 

We cannot afford the luxury of feeling the same way about them.

 

They’ve been hoodwinked, that’s all.

 

And that’s something worth fighting against, too.

 

But they shouldn’t be the recipients of our wrath.

 

We all have the same enemy. They just don’t know it. Yet.

 

Part of my job is showing them who’s really to blame for their anxiety and unhappiness.

 

It isn’t us, or immigrants, or people of color, or homeless people, or atheists or Muslims or any of their other usual suspects/scapegoats.  It’s their overlords, the ones they worship and adore. The ones they listen to as though sitting at the feet of Christ. The ones who are lying to them.

 

They deserve to be unshackled and set free, too.

 

Handle them with care and compassion. It’s hard being weaned from a teat that they believe has nourished and sustained them for so long… even though it’s been offering the milk of human depravity instead of human kindness.

 

I’m sad for them and sad for us.  We should all be on the same page now. We’re in the same leaky boat, but far too few of us are presently bailing feverishly to keep us all afloat…

 

Don’t hit them with an oar. Help them understand in any way you can.

 

That’s our job now, getting them to understand and to grab a bucket or help fix the leaks.