How to Build a Fire in Your Life

As I'm considering how to be life-affirming in a life-destroying world, I'm continually drawn to how nature works, particularly noticing the larger patterns at play. How can we learn from what nature shows us?

This poem by Judy Brown captures something important that I think we lose sight of--that it's both the fuel and the absence of fuel that together create the fire. We are very focused on the logs--what information, inputs, actions, etc. can we put in the fire? What are we DOING? But the fire will not catch and grow if we also don't have the space in between. This means rest, reflection, slowing down, taking the time and space that can allow the fire to move in new directions. We are a culture that primarily thinks about the logs, not the space that allows the fuel to catch fire and burn.

I also observe that sometimes we're not putting great quality logs on the fire. Our busy-ness, a life in grind culture, the demands and sorrows of the world can mean that the fuel we're putting into the fire isn't actually the fuel we need for the fire we're building. Some types of wood burn better than others.

As we think about what is life-affirming, I think it can help to consider how both the logs and the space in your life are working together to create the fire you're looking for. This is an organizational question, as well. What might you need to remove to create space? What quality logs might you want to put on the fire?