Keeping the Sacred Flame

There are so many things we can be.  The possibilities spread out before us when we’re children, and we slowly whittle them down to a handful of possibilities when we grow up.  And even still, sometimes we find ourselves on a path we never expected.

We have a right and a need to explore these paths, to find our truest selves, to be the best we can be.  And yes, there will always be obstacles to these paths.  There’s never enough money, enough time, enough energy to explore them all.  We have to make choices.

We have to make choices.  But we need to make them fearlessly.  And, more, we need to make sure we are not standing in the way of other people’s choices.

We all have gifts and skills to grant the Divine.  But when we are blocked, not by lack of ability but by prejudice and arrogance, the Divine itself is blocked.  When people stand in our way by declaring us uppity and undeserving not through our own lack but because of our background, they deny the Divine itself.

And when we stand in people’s way and deny them and their Divine selves, we deny the universe of what they could have been.  Perhaps it’s a path they could not have completed anyway.  But that is their own choice to attempt – not ours to deny.  Not because of things that have no bearing on the subject.  (Denying someone admittance to a science program because they cannot do the science only makes sense.  Denying them because they come from a bad school does not).

Imagine what the would could be like if everyone was given a chance to be everything they could be, instead of giving only the children of the richest that opportunity.  Imagine what humanity could be.

Questions:
How do you stand in other people’s way?  Is it valid gatekeeping?  Or is it something else?
How do others stand in your way?  How do you deal with that?
What would you do if there were no barriers?

There is a belief in this society that we need to be individuals above all else.  We must pull ourselves up by our bootstraps and stride out into the jungle and bring home the bacon and whatever other metaphor I can mix in there.

It’s a lie.

We are a communal species.  We might not always agree and we might not always like what we are, but we are a communal species above all else.  Without other people, we are not fully human.

So what does this mean?  It means we have to engage with other people intelligently.  We can’t just say that they’re there to serve us.  Every person is Divine.  Every person has needs and desires and wants to be treated well.  When we treat other people well, we deepen our community.  When we treat people as items, we damage it.

Which is not to say that we can’t protect ourselves against those that would destroy our community.  But we cannot act preemptively to close people out of community to protect ourselves.  A person alone, a group alone, they are dangerous because they are needing.  We must be welcoming to those that need people, for we need people ourselves.

Be open.  Not stupid – but open.

Questions:
How can you be open to other people?  Are you?
How do you close yourself off from people?  Is this healthy?
Who do you treat as an object and why?

When have we done enough?  At what point can we look at the world around us and say “this I have done, and it is good.  I’m finished.”

There’s no such thing.  There’s always more to do, until the world is perfect – and that’s impossible.  So “enough” is a moving target, and it’s always farther than where we are.

Is this a bad thing?  I don’t think so.  I think it’s part of life, and even a good part.  It gives us reason to move, to work, to try and strive.  It is what we are.  But it means we cannot say that we are done, we are finished.

It’s easy to say we’ve done enough.  And sometimes, we need to take a break, to give ourselves a chance to reflect and rest.  But we need to come out of that reflection and resting and move forward again to make the world better.

It’s never enough.  But every bit helps more than we can ever imagine.

Questions:
What do you do to make things better?
What would you like to see done?  How and why?
What is the biggest obstacle you face towards doing?

There are those that choose to give their lives, either for a time or for their entire career, in the public sector.  They ask for us to vote for them, to choose one over another to give our power to.  But how do we choose?  What do we ask of those that we give power to?

This is not a small decision.  It can seem trivial.  After all, it’s only one vote against the entire system.  It’s only five minutes compared to four years.  And the corporations/special interests/parties rule everything anyway, right?

Wrong.  This is our government.  This is our power, and we have a right to it.  These people work for us.  We are their employers, and we have a right to demand that they work for us and do their jobs.  We have a right to examine their work and be sure they are doing what we want.

And what if we choose to give our lives in service?  This is an honorable task.  It is a life that will forever be rife with compromise and being unable to do what you desire, because one person cannot rule.  But it is honorable to do, if you give in service.  If your goal is power to rule, that is not honorable.  The goal is to serve, not to rule.  Those that wish to rule have no place in a democracy.  And this is not a place to pick someone because we like them personally.  This is a place for those we respect, those that are better than average.  We are giving our power to these people.  Shouldn’t it go to those that are more qualified to hold it?

Questions:
What does service mean to you?
Could you serve the public?  How?  (there are ways other than government!)  Who is your public?
What do you look for in an elected leader?  Why?

People speak sometimes of freedom, as though there is an absolute type of freedom to desire. And that if anything stands in the way of that freedom, it is wrong.

But freedom is always curtailed. Life has limits, and there is no way to avoid them. I cannot flap my arms and fly. I cannot run through the streets in the middle of winter without clothing without freezing. I cannot attack people without provocation without suffering consequences. In all things, I am embedded in a society, in a world full of other people and physical laws, and I cannot change that.

So what is freedom? What is justifiable, and what is extreme constraint? Where is the line?

Constraints are part of life. We are part of a society, and have to behave as such. What matters is that the constraints we place on each other, as a society, are reasonable ones. Not everyone can be the best at something. Not everyone can be first in a race. But that doesn’t mean that everyone shouldn’t have a chance to compete fairly.

What is fair, then? That’s hard to say. It isn’t everyone being forced into equality. It isn’t removing distinctions between people. It’s celebrating and encouraging the best of each person, and finding a way to reward them for what they do. It’s recognizing that we all have to work and live together, and embracing those that do the lowest jobs, not just the highest.

What is freedom? It’s the ability to work towards what makes us the best people we can be and enriches the universe as best we can. It’s the ability to live without undue constraint, without forcing such constraint upon others. It is living in community. It is accepting what cannot bend, and living as best as we can within what will.

Freedom is important. We need the ability to choose between right and wrong, to choose for ourselves what kind of life we wish for and strive for. But freedom is not absolute. Simply enough.

Questions:
What are your constraints? Why?
What would you do if freedom was absolute? What makes that different?
In an optimal world, what would be acceptable constraints upon people?

Honesty is important.  But how and why one is honest is also important.  One can use honesty as a weapon or as a way to make communication work better between people.  When honesty is a weapon, it’s being used incorrectly.

“I’m just being honest” “I’m a straight-shooter” “I’m just saying it like it is” – these are all words we use when honesty is our weapon.  They’re ways of saying “yes, these things are awful, but they’re true so you have to live with it”.  It’s using honesty to hurt people, and that’s a misuse of honesty.

Communication is powerful.  The same discussion can be loving or hurtful, depending on how it’s done.  The same truth can be used as a weapon or as a place of deepening conversation between people.

We have to ask ourselves sometimes, why are we telling someone this?  Is it because we care, or is it because we want to hurt someone?  Are we being truthful because it’s the right thing to do or because we cannot be blamed for it later?

Honesty is important.  When we are honest, we can deepen our understanding of ourselves and each other, and grow as people.  But when honesty is used as a weapon, it shrinks us and lessens the truth and the person delivering it.

Questions:
How do you use honesty?  Why?
How can honesty make you grow as a person?
How can honesty make you shrink?

What a bizarre word for death.  “Lost”.  Like they’re wandering around somewhere, if we could only find them again.

And yet, there’s truth to that.  There is no absolute death, no complete ending.  We leave this world, and that is horrible to those left behind.  But we are still in the universe.  Our breath still teases the wind, our voice lingers in the quiet of the night.  There is no ending.  There is a loss for those left behind, but there is no absolute ending.

Cold comfort, of course, for those left behind.  We cannot touch, cannot hold one that is gone.  Hearing a whisper on the wind reminds us of our pain, not the everlasting life of the soul.  But there comes a time when we can remember the good, not just the pain.  There comes a time when the voice on the wind is a comfort and not a trial.  There comes a time when we find it in ourselves to believe again in hope and life moves forwards.

Grief hurts.  There is no shame in missing the one we love, for we want them with us and not out in the Universe, scattered throughout the cosmos.  But grief is not eternal.  We are eternal and of the Divine, and when we lose our bodies, we gain the universe.

We are not lost.  We are not forgotten.  And our souls will shine again in the eyes of children to come.

It is hard, to love.  It is worse to love and lose.  And yet, if we do not love, if we armor ourselves against caring, we lose completely.

Love is absolute.  We want to treasure the person we love, care for them.  Protect them.

And yet, the Divine only lends us those we love for a time.  We cannot hold them, we cannot force them to stay.  We love, but we do not control.  We are each a piece of the Divine, separate for a time as individual beings, then drawn back together into one great Whole.

But what we love is the individual.  The Divine is too abstract, too big.  We attach to individuals, and then we lose them.  Be it a fight, a death, a moving away, or a hundred other things, we cannot hold to those we love forever.

Treasure those you love.  Hold them close without stifling them.  Celebrate them often.  Because we are only granted those we love for a time.  And then they leave, and we must go on.

One of the prime duties of FlameKeeping is to improve the Universe.  Of course, at the moment we’re rather limited in what parts of the universe we can reach, so practically, it’s a call to improve our world.  Our society.  But what does that mean, practically?

It means we cannot disengage.  It’s easy to say “this is not my problem” and step away.  It’s easy to say that what we do doesn’t matter, because there are so many people that surely someone else will pick up the slack.  We are busy, after all.  We have so many things to do.  Surely it doesn’t matter that we don’t recycle/vote/turn off lights/take the bus/look out for our neighbors/whatever.

Only problem is, we’re ALL doing it.  If one or two people coast, it’s not a big deal.  But we all coast to some extent.  One person is adamant about voting issues, but doesn’t look to their own community to help solve problems.  Another cares for the people around them, but throws away an astounding amount of waste that they don’t need to.  Etc.  (and in no way am I excluding myself from this!)

So what can we do?  Clearly, none of us is perfect, and no one can do everything perfectly.  But we can do a little more than we do, and then maybe a little more than that.  We can stop assuming someone else will do things.  We can look at our heroes as people to emulate, not impossible saints that we simply admire from afar.

We can be heroes to those around us, if we reach out and try.  And if we try hard enough?  We can be heroes to ourselves.

Questions
What have you done that’s heroic?  What would you like to do?
How do you improve the world around you?  What don’t you do?
How can you view the people around you as potential heroes, and nurture their heroism as well?

We are all gateways for each other to the Divine.  I allow you into the Divine through me, and you allow me into the Divine through you.

It is easy to see ourselves as separate, individual.  This god comes to me and not to you, that one comes to you and not to me.  We are separate.  But if I open my heart, and open my soul, I become a gateway for the gods into the world of humanity.

This is not self-abnegation.  It isn’t destroying the self to serve.  It is opening the self and being more.  It is finding the power inside yourself to open, even knowing that it will lead to hurt.  Our souls are flowers, and a flower can only live if it unfurls.  We can hold tight to what we are, petals curled over our tender innards, and never let anything near them.  Or we can open to the sun and those that pass by, and I can enrich you, and you can enrich me.

It’s easy to deny, to curl ourselves into balls on our stems and hold what we have for ourselves.  But it is the nature of a flower to share.  When we hold to ourselves, we rob ourselves and others of what we can be.

Open to the sun, and let the world in.

Questions:
Do you keep yourself contained, or do you allow yourself to be open?
What is the risk of being open?  What is the benefit?
How are you a gateway for the Divine?

Humans make laws, and then they break them. People frequently say that the punishment given is insufficient or even too much – especially too much in the case of a death sentence.

The purpose of a punishment is threefold, which are most simply described as Revenge, Recompense and Deterrence.

The three principles need to balance, as closely and fairly as possible in every case but what guides should we look at when enforcing our rules? (I’m assuming that none of my readers are judges or otherwise enforcing law directly, but the same principles apply to smaller groups rule sets where judgment requires more finesse.)

When looking at deterrence and revenge, the punishment needs to let people know what they are facing and ensure that they do not feel that “its worth the chance”. It’s easy to go overboard and hand out an excessive punishment regardless of the severity of a crime simply to deter and gain revenge.

Recompense therefore becomes key – what is fair? The punishment for theft should attempt to ensure that the person stolen from gets their goods returned if possible, but how to you repay someone for the damage they suffered in an attack?

Care must be taken to be moderate, which is why it is always a Flame-Keeper’s responsibility to judge rather than blindly seek revenge. Once society says a person has been rehabilitated we must accept them back into society instead of attempting to extend their punishment.  This does not mean we forget to think, of course: one does not give a former thief one’s wallet and walk away!  Still, if we do not allow a person to rejoin society, we stifle rehabilitation and encourage more lawbreaking.

Questions:
Do I seek to punish excessively? Do I seek a just punishment?
Do I evade my responsibility to judge? Do I seek to continue punishment by refusal to associate?
Am I willing to take responsibility for my own law-breaking, be those societal laws or smaller group mores?

I’ve recently made a big thing of social rules (“laws”) and punishment. However there is another social contract that we need to accept.

We have to share the work of maintaining our society, especially in the small areas. This is easy – but I often overlook it, and end up forcing others to do my share of the work.  This is both unfair and against the Flames of the other people.

In a small, shared house there are a number of jobs that need to be done, and some have to be your responsibility. In a town or village people are needed for social committees and to look after children (and endless other tasks). You may not have time to take part in everything, but you should be able to say “I do THIS for my community.”

I work 7 and a half hours then go home and collapse, and my own community contributions are often limited to those I can arrange through work time – but taking an active role in organizing or participating in just those events helps your bright flame AND the flames of those around you.

Questions

Do I contribute to my home? Do I often allow myself to let the flames of those I live with suffer from my laziness?
Do I contribute to my community? Do I allow myself to be open to helping my neighbors?
What are the costs incurred when I don’t do my fair share?

When 2 people are in the same place working on the same thing they need to co-operate, and so they make agreements about how they will behave. The more people there are the more they need to co-operate and the more force those agreements take.

In a small society the rule may not be explicit but they are present and if broken can result in expulsion from that group. In a larger group the rules must be clearly defined and accepted in order for the group to continue working together. Laws are the backbone of a society, stressing behaviors that MUST not be allowed for the society to function.

As Flame-Keepers we have responsibilities to our groups, adhering to the rules that allow our societies to function and develop. We do not follow those rules blindly – understanding WHY a rule is in place is important, and making value judgments may well be necessary.

When we are developing new rules we need to ensure that they are consistent with those already in place. Without consistency a person can be punished multiple times for the same wrong doing or slip through a gap between those rules.

Questions:

Do I assault society? Do I take part in behavior that damages the groups of people around me?  Why?
Do I follow blindly? Do I obey a law without ever asking if it is just or needed?
Do I insist on arbitrary justice? Do I wish to use the rules as a weapon against people who have wronged me?  Why?

A simple phrase.  An unexpectedly complex issue.

With power comes responsibility.  If we have the ability to intervene, we have responsibility towards the situation to an extent.  When something begs to us to get involved, we cannot simply say “it isn’t our business” and step back.  At the same time, discretion is important.  Just because we have the ability doesn’t mean we must get

involved in everything that crosses our path.

We have the responsibility to those around us to not close our eyes to suffering and pain.  Even when something is “not our business”, it is the connection to those around us that makes us human.  It is easy to close our eyes to the suffering around us.  Far harder to get involved, and far harder again to get involved constructively instead of just reacting to soothe our own discomfort.

“Mind your own business” is a dismissal.  It’s a statement to back off and leave things to those that are concerned.  But I ask: what matters are best left alone, and what concerns us all?  This is not to say we should just get involved without thought.  Some things aren’t our business.

But some things are.

Questions:
What matters are worth getting involved in even when involvement isn’t wanted?  Why?
When is it worth it to take “mind your own business at face value” and leave?
What are the costs to minding your own business?  What are the benefits?

Marriage is a complicated subject, and one often thrown into the religious realm. So what is the official FlameKeeping answer towards marriage?

Well, marriage is certainly a good thing. A marriage ritual has not yet been written, but I’m sure it will be at some point. The Universe celebrates when people find happiness with each other. The Universe does not care if they are of opposite sex or same sex, though, or any of the other concerns we trap ourselves with.

Marriage is a choice, not a trap. It is a celebration of togetherness and a statement of what should already exist in the people’s hearts. It is a combination of the bright flames, leaving each dark flame to burn separately. It isn’t a choice to be made lightly, nor is it a choice to be forced into. It is a choice of love. When the love and willingness to work through isn’t there, then the marriage will fall.

Marriage is not just about passion. It’s easy to see the fairy tale ending and believe that what you have will be forever. But after the wedding comes heartbreak, children, job losses, and all the other stresses that can strain people. If the people involved do not have affection for each other beyond the passion, they will never hold.

Marriage is not a trap. If the relationship has fallen, it is honorable to dissolve it instead of clinging to something that no longer works. While a marriage should not be abandoned precipitously, it should not be held when one or both of the partners is punished by it. There is no honor in staying miserable.

Questions:
When should one marry? Why? Why not?
When should marriage be dissolved? Why?
What is the purpose of being married?

We are tool using people. It is what we are, what we do. You cannot remove us from our tools and still have humanity.

But what does it mean to use tools? It sets us apart from some of the other animals, but we are not the only tool users in the animal kingdom. And it means we innovate. Not only do we use tools, but we are constantly coming up with new ones. And it means that we are constantly redefining those tools and their relation to ourselves, too.

We wield tools. But sometimes, it feels like the tools wield us. We feel hostage to our communication devices, trapped by our computers and unable to escape the instant information available. We time our lives around our televisions and our laptops. And we refuse to disconnect from our tools because we define ourselves by them.

There is nothing wrong with tools. But we need to remember that they are the tools, and we are the people. We need to treat them with respect, but we need to make certain that they serve us, and we do not serve them.

We are not our tools. And while we cannot live without tools, and would make new ones the minute we could were we dropped naked on an island somewhere, we have to make sure the tools we have serve us and not the other way around. When we find our lives in service to our tools, we have lost perspective.

Questions:
What tools can’t you live without? Why?
What do tools mean to you?
How do you live your life in service to your tools? How can you stop doing so?

As we know from previous essays, recognizing that everyone is part of the Divine is a major tenet of FlameKeeping. Acknowledging the divine in others is only the first step though. As part of the divine ourselves, we need to strive to do what we can to improve the Divine around us. This task becomes difficult when we keep ourselves hidden beneath our shells.

Sure, even while keeping ourselves isolated we can still use our outward flames to improve the lives of our family and friends, but it isn’t always enough. We become more fulfilled inwardly when we are able to make a beneficial difference outwardly. This doesn’t mean that we need to go out and start a soup kitchen, or create a new charitable organization; (although those would certainly be good things) even the little things can make a difference. A kind word to a store clerk, volunteering for an organization, even helping someone with a stroller get through a door is a way to improve the divine in both others and ourselves.

While all these things might sound simple, they are unfortunately not done as often as they should be. If we don’t actually get out of our shells and use our outward flames, we not only rob the Divine of our potential, but rob our own inner divine of the benefits it deserves.

Questions:

Are you more isolated than you could be?
If you feel that you are more isolated than you could be, why?
What can you do outside of your shell to improve the divine around you?

It’s hard to look at other people and see them as Divine as well as themselves. Sometimes this is hardest with those we live with and see regularly. And yet, it is also the most important to remember that yes, our family is Divine.

What does it mean to see your family as Divine? It is to recognize that while we all fail, we are still special and sacred. We can’t take our family members for granted and simply assume they will do what we want. To do so is to trample on their own sacred nature.

Why is it so hard to view family as Divine? We see them every day. We know their flaws and their good points at least as well as we do our own. Sometimes it becomes easy to see these people more as an extension of ourselves and not individuals. We forget that they have their own needs, their own choices. We forget that we can’t force people into our mold for them.

If we forget to see those we are closest to as Divine, though, we trample all over their rights and needs. We forget to see them as the individuals we came to love in the first place, and see them only as extensions of ourselves. We need to see them as people, not as pieces of us, or we risk losing everything that makes them special in the first place.

Questions:
Who do you have a hard time seeing as Divine? Why?
How does it feel to see someone you love as Divine?
How do you celebrate the Divine in your family?

There is a constant emphasis in our society on leading. We encourage people to lead, celebrate people that are in the public eye, and speak poorly of those that take on supporting roles.

While there is a need for people to lead, there is also a need to know where you are going if you are standing in front. An encouragement to leadership without question of what one is leading is damaging both to the person leading and all those that end up following. It’s very easy to crave power. It’s much harder to focus only on the goal and see power only as the path, not the goal itself. Like money, power is good at confusing priorities.

What is being a good leader? It means knowing both where you are going and why you are going there. It’s not enough to want the power: there needs to be a concrete goal for that power to be used for. Power in and of itself is a false goal. When we neglect to use it correctly, it is still a use. Even if we try to deny the power we have, we are still using it by refusing it. It cannot be ignored.

What is following? Again, it is a choice that comes with responsibility. When you choose to follow another, you are giving support to the choices that person makes in your name. Choosing to follow cannot be a choice to push off your morality onto the other person, however. You choose to follow, but you make that choice every time you are asked to do something. It is not a choice made once and never again. It is a constant choice with every request, voiced or not.

Not everyone can lead. We are all limited in our scope of ability and attention, and some things need to be given to another to do. But that does not mean we should forget to pay attention to what is being done in our name. Nor should we ignore what we do in others’ names. Action breeds responsibility. Neglect that, and you have ignored your Flame completely.

Questions:
What do you not lead on? Why?
What kind of follower are you? Do you ask questions, or simply do as you are told? Does it vary depending on who’s asking?
What are you leading in that you would give over your leadership to another if you found someone worthy? What do you look for in a leader?

It’s hard to start things. We see things that are wrong, and then we look around for someone else to start moving. We want to join, but we don’t want to lead. Or we want to lead, but we don’t care about the topic.

Sometimes things need to be done. And sometimes we need to be the lone voice in the wilderness, saying what needs to be said. It’s not going to make us popular. It’s not going to be comfortable. But what needs doing isn’t always popular or comfortable. It’s comfortable to leave things as they are. For many people, it’s better to stick with what you know than risk something new, because it can be worse. And it’s hard to realize that it doesn’t matter. Sometimes change is necessary. Sometimes the system is broken. And sometimes we need to speak.

We can’t wait for someone else to do things. We can’t wait for the system to be fixed for us. We are the eyes and hands of the Divine. If something needs doing, we need to do it ourselves. And it might not be comfortable. But if not us, then who?

Questions:
What do you wish someone else would do? Why?
If you were to take up any cause, what would it be?
Can you be a lone voice in the wilderness? Why or why not?