Day 43 Squanderlust; or, Bigger Isn’t Always Better

Here’s as good an international analysis as any I’ve read:

“As the calamity unfolds, President Trump and state governors are arguing not only over what to do, but also over who has the authority to do it. Mr. Trump has fomented protests against the safety measures urged by scientific advisers, misrepresented facts about the virus and the government response nearly daily, and this week used the virus to cut off the issuing of green cards to people seeking to immigrate to the United States.”

In the words of Dominique Moïsi, a senior adviser at the Institut Montaigne, a Paris think tank, “America has not done badly—it has done exceptionally badly.”

Contrast this with the level-headed leadership of Angela Merkel speaking to the German Parliament, “Let us not squander what we have achieved.”

The exceptionally bad contradictions coming from The White House have given me whiplash. Seriously.

No wonder I liked what Angela Merkel said. It prompted me to think about the United States and how, because we are so leaderless, we are lost, a-wander through the world. I know that all who wander are not lost, per the illustrious J. R. R. Tolkien, but Americans who are looking to our leaders for leadership are lost indeed.

So of course, as my brain so often does, I skipped blithely from wanderlust to the sorta-rhyme squanderlust, inspired by the words of Mx. Merkel.

The OED gives varied synonyms for squander; they are dissolve, waste, disperse, scatter, disintegrate.

Every time I think there’s been a small step toward truth, honor, beauty, nobility—any of the most valuable things in life (which, as I’m sure you know, aren’t things)—by one leader, other leaders speak or act literally to disintegrate or squander the gain.

She went on, “Nobody wants to hear this, but the truth is that we are not living in the final phase of this pandemic, but at the beginning,” she said. “We are going to have to live with it for a long time. This pandemic is an imposition on our democracy, because it restricts our existential rights and needs.”

Here is a leader, perhaps not entirely fearless, but strong enough in her core self to be able to speak the unvarnished and terrifying truth. I’d add Andrew Cuomo to that list. Dr. Anthony Fauci, as well. Gavin Newsom. Sadly, this is the long version of the list.

Orhan Pamuk, 2006 Nobel Prize Laureate in Literature gives me some hope. He’s writing a novel about the third wave of the bubonic plague in the early 20th century. His diagnosis of the reactions of humanity is eerie.

He says, “The initial response to the outbreak of a pandemic has always been denial. National and local governments have always been late to respond and have distorted facts and manipulated figures to deny the existence of the outbreak.”

Oh, okay, people are being people. Maybe there’s some comfort in that.

Here’s more: “Much of the literature of plague and contagious diseases presents the carelessness, incompetence and selfishness of those in power as the sole instigator of the fury of the masses.”

Yeah, I know, selfishness is. Sigh. It’s also not going anywhere in the near or distant future.

The best plague writers, though, offer “a glimpse at something other than politics lying beneath the wave of popular fury, something intrinsic to the human condition. Behind the endless remonstrances and boundless rage there also lies an anger against fate, against a divine will that witnesses and perhaps even condones all this death and human suffering, and a rage against the institutions of organized religion that seem unsure how to deal with any of it.”

Okay, existential rage, check. Take a number. We’ve all got it on some level.

“Humanity’s other universal and seemingly unprompted response to pandemics has always been to create rumors and spread false information. During past pandemics, rumors were mainly fueled by misinformation and the impossibility of seeing the fuller picture.”

Ohhh, this is what usually happens but, hark, a sunbeam! Is it because of “the impossibility of seeing the fuller picture”? Well, that’s certainly been true of The Trump Pandemic.

“The terror we are feeling, however, excludes imagination and individuality, and it reveals how unexpectedly similar our fragile lives and shared humanity really are. Fear, like the thought of dying, makes us feel alone, but the recognition that we are all experiencing a similar anguish draws us out of our loneliness.”

We are all the same in the deepest sense.

“In time I feel less ashamed of my fear, and increasingly come to see it as a perfectly sensible response. I am reminded of that adage about pandemics and plagues, that those who are afraid live longer. Eventually I realize that fear elicits two distinct responses in me, and perhaps in all of us. Sometimes it causes me to withdraw into myself, toward solitude and silence. But other times it teaches me to be humble and to practice solidarity.”

Here is a very good description of where we all are right now, leaderless or not: withdrawn into ourselves, toward solitude and silence—this is where all true change begins, Beloved, within the individual upon whom it dawns at last that it is possible to change our experience.

Fear is a great teacher. Of course it teaches all of us “to be humble and to practice solidarity.” By grace, the recognition of our sameness is the inevitable birth of compassion.

Mr. Pamuk concludes, “For a better world to emerge after this pandemic, we must embrace and nourish the feelings of humility and solidarity engendered by the current moment.”

Ah, but how to keep the humility? Watch the floundering of our leaders, even the truth-tellers, and ask yourself if the news is delivered in humility, with honor, with honesty.

And how to keep the solidarity? Stay connected to your own heart. Make the time to listen to its inherent wisdom every day. Seek to understand what your part in the solidarity is—just your part.

I know this White House has no part in anything even resembling humility or solidarity. See aforementioned whiplash. But, Beloved, not a one of us is a victim to their Machiavellian political machinations unless we allow ourselves to be. [Suggestion: turn off the television.]

Quite a statement, I know. But here’s how I know. One of the things that seems to unite many of these disparate coronavirus briefings is that small gains are dismissed, minimized, diminished as unimportant, not worthy, useless.

I beg to differ.

With most things in life that are important, the big, broad, ta-da! gesture is often just that—a gesture, a nod, a brief candle of oh, yeah, that, and the small, delicate, quiet daily actions that accumulate into the magic of change do not intrinsically draw attention to themselves. Witness cell division, for one.

For real change, for permanent change, for change that is life-giving, bigger isn’t better. Faster isn’t better. What’s better is small private actions that added together make for some of the most exquisite things this world has to offer.

Don’t despair over this plague, Beloved. It will pass. True, with devastating loss, but it will pass. And in the meantime, do the small things. Remember to celebrate the small gains. That’s how compounded interest works.

Dr. Susan Corso is a metaphysician and medical intuitive with a private counseling practice for more than 35 years. She has written too many books to list here. Her website is www.susancorso.com

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