The Antidote…
“The antidote for fifty enemies is one friend.” —Aristotle
Some times we feel called to sit with and even welcome in our pain and suffering in order to gain any wisdom it offers before letting it go.
Other times we need an antidote to counter the poison of our fear, anxiousness, rage, or despair, so we don’t sink further down into the depths of those thoughts and emotions.
The news of the day and challenges friends are facing had me thinking about the antidotes I turn towards when I sense I’m spiraling down.
I’m sure it comes as no surprise that engaging with animals, especially dogs, is a powerful mood-shifter, healer, and antidote for me. So much so that I made a fool of myself yesterday. Heading out to run errands, I saw a beloved dog I hadn’t seen in too long, pulled the car over, got out and joyfully loved on my four-legged friend, Red, a Corgi puppy.
I’m sure Red’s owner thought I was a nut (and maybe you do too), but I don’t really care. The happiness that encounter brought lifted me for the rest of the day.
Heartened by the wise words of Aristotle in the quote above extolling the power of friendship (even the four-legged kind) being such that one friend can be the antidote for fifty enemies (or fifty stories in the news that horrify us), our antidotes don’t need to be big, extravagant things. We just need to be willing to reach for them, even if they make us appear foolish.
“Action is the antidote to despair.”
— Joan Baez
We don’t need a lot of experiences or engagements to counteract whatever poison has us in its grip. We just need one or maybe two. What’s your antidote? Remember to call on it when you need it!
May you be shown the way to powerful antidotes whenever you need them, reminding you that you are not alone on this journey through these stressful times.
A Spiritual Necessity…
“Wilderness to the people of America is a spiritual necessity, an antidote to the high pressure of modern life, a means of regaining serenity and equilibrium.”
—Sigurd F. Olson
Laughter is the Antidote!
“Laughter relieves us of superfluous energy, which, if it remained unused, might become negative, that is, poison. Laughter is the antidote.”
―G. I. Gurdjieff
Blessing of Breathing
That the first breath
will come without fear.
That the second breath
will come without pain.
The third breath:
that it will come without despair.
And the fourth,
without anxiety.
That the fifth breath
will come with no bitterness.
That the sixth breath
will come for joy.
Breath seven:
that it will come for love.
May the eighth breath
come for freedom.
And the ninth,
for delight.
When the tenth breath comes,
may it be for us
to breathe together,
and the next,
and the next,
until our breathing
is as one,
until our breathing
is no more.
―Jan Richardson, from her book The Cure for Sorrow: A Book of Blessings for Times of Grief.
May we offer our prayers and take action as called to do so for all those suffering from senseless acts of violence, the ravages of war, the devastation of storms and fires, the loss of loved ones, and the persecution of innocent people.
One breath, one prayer, one people, together.
