change is the only constant: adapt or die.

Boy has our world changed a lot in the last month, it’s still changing! What’s happening now with lockdowns and isolations is just the catalyst for it, we ain’t seen nothing yet.

Whatever your stance on covid, the conditions in our environment are forcing us to adapt and anything that doesn’t, will die — metaphorically speaking. Because any action we take, any behaviour,

any expression of ours if a reflection of the formless internal goings on within our minds, souls and bodies.

Generally speaking, we’re living ‘he kai kei aku ringa’ (there’s an abundance of opportunities in my hands/what’s possible is within my grasp). We’re innovating and reimagining new ways to do what we’ve always done or reevaluating what’s important, worth our energy and attention vs what’s not — then make changes accordingly.

Or not. But that’s the natural order of things. We adapt, or something in us/about us dies in one way or another. So it should! Only then can something new grow in its place. Would you plant fresh new vegetables in the māra (garden) if it were still riddled with weeds which will compete with your new plants for nutrients, space and other resources?

If you want your kai (food) to have the best chance of growing and therefore sustaining and nourishing you and your whānau — probably not.

Reflect now on the māra that is your mind. What is the state of it? How have you organised it in there? Your thoughts, fears, dreams and beliefs? Do you tend to them and weed through them frequently to mitigate obstacles that might get in your way? Do you experiment with different techniques to cultivate different thoughts you’ve planted in there?

The potential for whatever those seeds of thought grow into is activated in isolation. Just like the vegetable seeds we sow in our māra, they come to life in the darkness, in confinement deep within the earth. Christine Caine said it well,

“sometimes when you're in a dark place you think you've been buried, but you've actually been planted.”

How will you ensure your seeds, of thought and/or of kai, will grow well and therefore sustain you to be able to adapt and thrive as you need?

Tēnā tātou,

Hana.