It’s Earth Day today, a day when we try to stop doing all the things we normally do which f*** up the planet but which at the moment we are largely not able to do anyway; and it occurred to me that there’s a profound connection between caring about the earth and being grounded. If you have a connection with the soil; if you walk on it, grow stuff in it and nurture it, you become quite literally earthed. You are more stable, less likely to short-circuit, less likely to fly away into realms of psychosis. Nowadays if I ever feel a psychotic episode coming on I stop whatever I’m doing and just stand, feeling myself connected to a particular point in space and time. I am also convinced that our habit of flying not only damages the planet but disconnects us in every way from the earth.
Right now though I’m quite connected to ancient Greece: yes, my long-awaited book came yesterday and I plunged right in.
It’s a little daunting as it’s designed by Warwick University for philosophy students to learn Greek so they can read Plato in the original, and has chapters on various declensions, conjugations and tenses. Greek has three voices (practically a Greek chorus, lol) – active, passive and ‘middle voice’ and an ‘aurist’ tense about which I know nothing whatsoever. But hey, if philosophy students can do it, so can I.
I get extra brownie points today because I started work at 6 am. Yes, you read that right – 6 am. From time to time I get these ideas about getting up early and working right through: this is quite unrealistic because I generally work best in fairly short bursts, but today when I woke at 5.30 and felt I wouldn’t get back to sleep, it seemed meant to be. So I dressed and got to my desk and lo! by half past I’d run out of notebook. So another careful trip to the shops is in the offing.
Incidentally from a mental health point of view I’ve found that getting up early or going to bed late can induce psychosis. These are times when other people are not around and when daily activity is suspended, so they’re good times if you want to meditate but bad times if you need to be earthed.
Happy Earth Day.
Kirk out
Sarada Gray 