We Need to Have Many Lightworkers

We Need to Have Many Lightworkers: In Memoriam of the passing of beloved teacher Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh, January 21, 2022.

A writing from fall, 2020, 3rd quarter Perspectives in Healing, Healing Beyond Borders by Lisa Anselme RN, BLS, HN-BC, CHTP, CHTI

“One Buddha is not enough; we need to have many Buddhas."??~Thich Nhat Hanh????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

'I have always been in love with the mountains.

Growing up along the rolling hills of the Mississippi valley at the Illinois/Wisconsin border, nearly all of our vacations involved traveling and camping: to the Rocky Mountains in the West or the Smoky Mountains in the East. As a young girl and young woman, I was fearless in perching on the edge, overlooking the steep canyons and terrain below.

Fast forward to the year 2000, Iowa City, Iowa.

I was providing an energy session for a colleague and friend. At one point, the field surrounding her body began to blur and then became quite clear, and a scene emerged as though on a projector.??I was now witnessing a series of events in high speed and high definition. Members of a leadership group were high atop a mountain ridge on a peninsula, jutting out into what I knew to be the Pacific Ocean. Tectonic plates were shifting…the mountains atop the peninsula were crumbling and cascading into the sea. People were leaping from the cliffs into the rolling water. Five individuals had managed to jump from the lower elevations and escape to their personal, private, luxury yachts. They were moving further out to sea and watching from afar. I observed myself and three others remaining atop the mountain; Diane Wardell, Maggie Freel, and Janet Mentgen. The three of us surrounded Janet, clasped her elbows and began to carry her, running as fast as possible atop the ridge, as though running a football into the endzone. There were several others whom I couldn’t identify, following behind us. We reached the mainland even as the peninsula was splitting off from it and dropping into the sea. The vision faded as we collapsed onto the shore of what appears to be northern California or Southern Oregon. I was left to wonder about the meaning of this. I shared it with my mentor, Maggie and was told, “this is simply for you to observe and watch its unfoldment. Who remains true to the core purpose? Who jumps loyalty? Who looks out for the self over the others?” I had the opportunity to watch the unfoldment and reflect upon this imagery over the many years to follow.

Imagery from the past?

On another occasion while receiving a session, I was looking through the eyes of a very tall man, who was myself, standing high upon a mountain ledge, staring down at the landscape below. No matter upon which direction I turned my gaze, there was indescribable devastation. The Earth below was rolling, shifting, splitting, burning; the vibrations, sounds and percussions of shock waves upon shock waves reverberating into the stone beneath my feet. The ocean waters were surging forward in a wave of immense height. My arms were outstretched with palms facing toward the sea; light poured into my crown and radiated from these hands. Overwhelming grief threatened to consume and collapse me. Only the light pouring through my body kept me upright, sustaining me. The sense of failure was absolute; I and others had been unable to complete our purpose: to bridge and heal the ever-widening chasm between science and spirituality, greed and service, hatred and love.?

In the remote distance, I heard someone call my name, holding my feet, calling me back into this present time. For that session, I had asked for clarity surrounding the sense of impending disaster and grief that was living in my chest. I shared this experience with my session partner, who confirmed having a similar impression upon working with me.

Step forward to the future: September 11, 2001, Lakewood, CO?

We had just moved to Colorado several weeks prior; mid-morning, I gathering items to be mailed from work, and drove to the post office near our office and adjacent to the Denver Federal Center (DFC) in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. There were multiple guards at the Gate 7 entrance and I wondered if that was standard operation, as I had never previously used this entrance. When I walked into the post office, I was greeted by absolute silence and stillness. Everyone standing in line was staring at the TV screens suspended from the ceiling, watching close captioned film of the towers collapsing at the World Trade Center. I finished my mailing and returned to the office, stunned. I advised staff to go home, connect with family and hold energy. I called the middle school to learn of their plan and ensure that my daughter was safe, and then I headed up to hike to the top of Green Mountain.??I knew that I had to climb and obtain a higher perspective. There was no one upon the trail. There were no planes or birds in the sky. There was an absolute stillness in the land. I was still adjusting to altitude, and so it took me awhile to reach the very top. Once there, I had a view that spanned the entire Front Range as well as West, deep into the Rockies. I could see all the way North to the Flat Iron Mountains and beyond, and all the way South to Colorado Springs and Pike’s Peak.??I had a clear view of the cities of Denver, Lakewood, Englewood, Littleton, Arvada. I was alone as I stood there. And my arms spontaneously lifted and my palms reached out to the East toward New York City, and I prayed for this Earth and its beings. And a column of light poured through my crown and my heart, and out through my hands. I truly don’t know how long I stood there and prayed, and offered energy to the world. At some point, the flow diminished, and I knew that my child's school had been recessed, and that I needed to hike back down to the car and return home.?

And now, 2020

Some have suggested that 2020 is like a Bingo game, or a dance card; a nihilistic game in which we are asked what particular global catastrophe might be on our personal or collective game cards? CoVid19, now surpassing 200,000 deaths in this country? Political strife and misdirection? Murder hornets? A plague of locusts? The deaths of Senator and Civil Rights Leader John Lewis and Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg? A Midwest derecho (an inland hurricane)? Excessive ocean hurricanes and cyclones this season (already tied with the most named storms of a season)? Fire cyclones? (The fires on the west coast and in Arizona and Colorado have been relentless. Even as I write this, the air quality index is nearing the red zone again due to the smoke and particulate organic matter upon the wind.)?

We humans have faced massive hardship before.??This time, we face it not only with our fellow humans, we face it with many other sentient beings, many who are approaching mass extinction or have become extinct.??At the core of some of our hardships lies an extreme lack of charity and kindness…towards each other, towards our fellow inhabitants on this planet, towards our very planet.?

Our organization, its many members, practitioners, instructors have faced numerous challenges through the years. And, collectively, our leadership and community, has worked together to meet those challenges. It has often not been an easy path. Yet we each have been gifted with the opportunity to study and practice Healing Touch, this work of service, adding it to our foundational trainings, education, professions and spiritual practice and broader communities. How privileged we are to have been afforded the time and teachers to study and learn this therapy that can be supportive to not only ourselves but to others.?

Thich Nhat Hanh(Vietnamese Buddhist monk, peace activist, founder of Plum Village, France, and now 93) writes that “civilizations have been destroyed many times and this civilization is no different; it can be destroyed. We can think of time in terms of millions of years and life will resume little by little. The cosmos operates for us very urgently, but geological time is different.??If you meditate on that, you will not go crazy. You accept that this civilization could be abolished and life will begin later on after a few thousand years because that is something that has happened in the history of this planet. When you have peace in yourself and accept, then you are calm enough to do something, but if you are carried by despair there is no hope.?

"One Buddha (teacher, wise one, compassionate one) is not enough; we need to have many Buddhas.” I would paraphrase and reframe that to say, “One lightworker (compassionate practitioner) is not enough; we need to have many lightworkers.” Indeed we do.?

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