Active Hope (revised): How to Face the Mess We’re in with Unexpected Resilience and Creative Power

The spiral of the Work That Reconnects maps out an empowerment process that journeys through four successive movements, or stations: coming from gratitude, honoring our pain for the world, seeing with new eyes, and going forth

6. I feel paralyzed. I’m aware of the danger, but I don’t know what to do.

we focus on what we truly, deeply long for, and then we proceed to take determined steps in that direction. This is the second thread we follow.

Our pain for the world not only alerts us to danger but also reveals our profound caring. And this caring derives from our interconnectedness with all life. We need not fear it.

When we face the mess we’re in, we realize that Business as Usual can’t go on. What helps us rise to the occasion is experiencing our rootedness in something much larger than ourselves.

Along with stopping the damage, we need to replace or transform the systems that cause the harm. This is the work of the second dimension.

If we are to survive as a species, we need to understand how our active responses to danger get blocked and also how we can prevent this from happening.

the Work That Reconnects.7 By helping us to develop our inner resources and our outer community, the Work That Reconnects strengthens our capacity to face disturbing information and respond with unexpected resilience.

We can honor our feelings of pain for the world by developing our own ceremonies to mark them.

When we experience pain for the world, the world is feeling through us.