Usually, I don’t respond to things on the Santa Rosa, California, Nextdoor site, but recently I came across a post while on the toilet that began innocently enough:
Yes, rain is a huge relief; after some ellipses, the poster herself suddenly ducks out of the rain into a new age bookstore. While visualization is not a bad idea, it effectively does not rain here from early May through October[1]. I decide to read the responses; lower down, the original poster writes to someone else who is concerned about going overboard with the prayer and causing floods:
. . . whatever we think about and believe collectively will materialize from the infinite source of creation so let’s all together think think think day and night about rain falling outside our windows and smell the fragrance of wet ground outside… [sic-these are the poster’s ellipses here] that’ll bring us heavy rains if we so SEEK WITH BELIEF collectively! No harm trying! As for the floods, let our attention NOT go towards what we don’t want!
. . . .
Our Himalayan master teaches us that we unknowingly constantly keep creating all incidences in our lives . . . . so if we think about floods or fires, we do it with negative emotions and that gets created . . . . wherever our attention goes repeatedly, all day along… [sic] that manifests around us so let’s try to channelize our attention towards things that we want!
Wait a second, Dr. Bronner! The half year drought of this part of California has been the regular thing for thousands of years, unrelated to human consciousness. It’s true that there’s no harm in trying, but once a guru is introduced, my skepticism of spiritual leaders rears its Jamestown-avoiding head. After that, someone mentions Capital C Consciousness, and the original poster chimes in again:
. . . Our master teaches that ‘We are the creator of our own destiny!’ Our subconscious mind which is a storehouse of our belief system creates incidences and every single object that we see around us day and night! . . . . Back in India, our master tells us that our ancestors and present day yogis in the Himalayas knew how to create rain or stop floods etc…. [sic] there is a wealth of ancient wisdom to be discovered and learnt but Mother Nature only reveals its secrets to those who become simple as a child and abandon the logic mind!
This is where I can’t resist jumping in. After the 2017 fires, the 2018 smoke from Paradise, the 2019 Kincade fire, and the 2020 fires, is it really time to “abandon the logic mind?” Spock would say that fires are very likely this year and that many things need to change in how California takes care of its forests, builds its houses, and gets its water.
She also doubles down on the centrality of human consciousness. Am I watching the movie The Secret? Nothing existed before humans came on the scene? This new age philosophy is turning into some Himalayan guru-based version of creationism in which the world didn’t start with Adam and Eve; it started with a human’s subconscious beliefs.
I don’t disagree with the power of the human mind. But observable reality has to be taken into account; I think this is where many spiritual points of view fail. If you abandon the logical mind entirely, you could end up freeing your soul so you can join a UFO flying behind a comet[2]; this is known to the non-believer as committing suicide.
While I am keenly aware how hard it is to face the reality of water shortages and fires squarely, I think that expecting miracles is not spiritual at all. Let’s say that California’s drinkable water runs out during September. If I can harvest oceanwater and buy a distillation system at that point, is it wise to ignore that and choose prayer? To me, that doesn’t seem like a very spiritual mindset; it seems like the mindset of either a lazy victim or someone who defines the word hubris. Plus, aren’t distillation systems enough of a deus ex machina?
Also, I have to wonder if the person who mentions floods is covertly alluding to the flood parable that you probably know: the one where people offer a guy on a roof a boat ride, a helicopter ride, and whatever. He refuses, saying, “God will rescue me.” Then he dies in the flood. He finally meets God, who says, “I sent all those people to rescue you. Also, I tend to help out more in floods than droughts for some reason. Don’t ask me why. People make up all kinds of stories about me. So, before you can enter heaven, I need you to go to earth as a ghost and tell everyone to stop projecting their shit onto me. Also, tell them to stop wasting time arguing on Nextdoor.”
Speaking of roofs, years ago I did a calculation on gallons per year falling on a roof when I was a landscaper. I was amazed by the number of gallons available[3], and now I don’t understand why rainwater harvesting is so rare. Some people use barrels, which is good, but they harvest a tiny fraction available of all the rainwater. And clearly, rainwater harvesting could solve a lot of the drought if we learned how to clean that water. I hope people are working on installing big rainwater systems for buildings; I also hope they are fighting political inertia.
Changing things in the real world is hard, and that’s why this Nextdoor post bugs me; I would love to take the spiritual bypass off the highway of reality. I wish I could just do nothing while claiming some spiritually evolved mindset, denying my anxiety, and praying for miracles. However, WWJD: Even though Jesus allegedly walked on water once, he didn’t rely on that every day but usually rode in a boat. I am putting everything my family absolutely wants to save in one place, ready for fleeing another frigging fire. At the same time, we are exploring new places to live out of state. That said, I don’t know what anyone else should do; I respect any solution that involves both reality and prayer.
Because miracles do happen, just not in the blind faith way. After four seasons of fires and smoke, believing in a positive outcome constitutes a big one.
[1] http://cesonoma.ucanr.edu/about/weather/?station=83&weather=station
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heaven%27s_Gate_(religious_group)
[3] Here is the equation for the year 2020, a very low rain year with only 9.95 inches of rain (See reference in footnote 1 for data), based on my current roof: 2,000 sq. ft. roof * (12 inches/foot)^2 [squared] * 9.95 inches rain * (2.54 cm/in)^3 * ml/cubic centimeter * L/1000 ml * quart/.9464 liter * gallon/four quarts = 12,404.58. My roof is over 2,000 square feet; rounding to three significant figures based on the three significant figures of 9.95 inches gives a result of 12,400 gallons. When I replied to this post on Nextdoor I pulled 10 inches out of my ass (on so many levels. Like I said, I was on the toilet) as a low number and didn’t realize how close that was to 2020 actual numbers. Also notable from the cesonoma.ucanr.edu page are the years 2018 and 2019, where annual rainfall was well over twice 2020’s rainfall.
Not Another Frigging Blog 