Good
Hearts
“...in a
time lacking in truth and certainty and filled with anguish and
despair, no woman should be shamefaced in attempting to give back to
the world, through her work, a portion of its lost heart.”
Louise
Bogan
Louise Bogan was
appointed Poet Laureate of the United States in 1945, when the
country was trying to recover from World War II. Her lines quoted
above are the opening words of Sarah Ban Breathnach's book, Simple
Abundance—A Daybook of Comfort and Joy. When times are difficult,
it is the feminine, whether in women or in men, that brings
heart/soul back into a culture that has lost it. Hear these words of
Willa Cather: “Her eye, her ear, were tuning forks, burning
glasses, which caught the minutest refraction or echo of a thought or
feeling...She heard a deeper vibration, a kind of composite echo...”
What is needed in the world right now is revival of the deep
feminine. It seems as though we have strayed off course into the
harshest sort of self-interest, and we must find our way back.
When a nation loses its
feminine heart, it begins to value money and power over humanity. It
is indifferent to the plight and suffering of the most vulnerable of
its people. Life is reduced to grasping, and those who cannot grasp
are considered to be “collateral damage.” I had a conversation
with my friend, Anna, last night about the way the world has changed
just in our lifetime. Of course, we both grew up in small Southern
towns, she in Mississippi, and I in North Carolina. During our
childhoods, businesses were people centered—companies cared about
their employees and their communities, before their bottom line.
Maybe that was because they lived with the people who worked for
them, went to church together, ran into each other in the grocery
store and at the ballpark. There were few if any shareholders to
please, no boards or corporate structures. Just people to people.
Even the factory owners, who held all the power, knew that if they
didn't take care of their people, they themselves would suffer, as
would their product.
We don't have to continue
down this path. We can revive the feminine soulfulness of business.
It will not be done by governments. It will be done by people who
have beating hearts; people willing to take a portion of what they
have and share it. We have some good role models in America—Warren
Buffet, Bill Gates, and many others. But you don't have to be a
billionaire to lend a helping hand where it's needed. You can be a
good neighbor, a kind person, someone who speaks hope and values
relationship over self-interest. We are decent people, by and large,
and as good-hearted human beings, we need to step up.
In the Spirit,
Jane
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