Ancient Intelligence
I’ve been thinking a lot about chronic illness this week.
Words tend to fall short when I try to write about it. Or they get stuck. Or they flow into the systems of my body, trying to track it all so I can tell you what it’s like. Trying to translate torrents and pains and fatigue so rich and thick they could be scooped up and eaten like custard.
But there’s another issue.
There’s a difference between thinking about chronic illness in general versus thinking about it while existing from within a flare. When the latter happens, as is the case currently, the experience is inextricably linked to awareness of the larger earth systems I exist within and how they pulse and throb and ache and scream alongside my own body, which is but a microcosm of the whole. It’s an intimacy that feels private and quiet. And sacred.
After a few days navigating a flare alongside notion that my work load cannot be anything other than what I scheduled it to be, it becomes more difficult to hold my center. As a person prone to being highly sensitive to the energies of the collective, I rely on specific practices and rituals to keep from being flooded by the heavier human emotions so thick in the field at this time. I am particularly sensitive to the chaotic shock and grief that permeate the field alongside natural disasters.
In some ways, chronic illness seems like one of the most sensible outcomes of the revolutions and violence of modernity. And within that sensible outcome, a glimpse of the ways whole systems work. Every thread of my being linked to all that exists out there. I am but one expression of an infinite flow of energy, spinning itself into forms, shapes and colors. And as those forms consolidate themselves down to this earth plane, this super dense ball in space, it becomes more difficult to escape the truth that when the home for my body is unwell, the home of my body cannot be well.
But...that’s the thing, I guess. I see plenty of people escaping that truth. I do it at times, as well. I can’t exist inside a constant felt knowing of what is happening. It would swallow me up. And so I embrace the humanity of the thing which, I guess, includes throwing my hands up in the air sometimes and enjoying the battery that powers the air mattress that cuddles my body when I sleep in the woods. The delivery of a candle making kit. A visitation from friends who spewed out fossil fuels so we could hug each other after years apart.
I anoint my wrists with essence of rose. An instant connection to Venus and purpose and remembrance of that time she appeared by my side and we stared at the ocean together while she cried in acknowledgement that it would, in fact, be getting worse.
The temperature soared as high as 100 degrees in the Northwest Territories on Saturday, the hottest temperature ever measured north of 65 degrees latitude in the Western Hemisphere. Last week, the earth experienced the hottest four days in at least 100,000 years, each day breaking the record set by the previous. A client emailed today to cancel. Their town is underwater. Last month I made a facebook post with tips for dealing with extended periods of wildfire smoke as the east coast had their first significant run in with what we’ve been dealing with on the west coast for years.
How is it possible that bodies and souls are NOT sick? How is it possible that we still aren’t acknowledging the toll all of this takes - whether we pay attention or not? How is it possible for adaptability to be such an incredible blessing and yet such a curse? We keep marginalizing those who carry these beacons of a collapsing system as if it will stop the contagiousness of what is being communicated.
I’ve been listening to so many podcasts with brilliant thinkers and feelers talking about the connections between autoimmune disorders, ecosystems, climate collapse, trauma, oppression, healing... and as I do, I am so comforted. I understand that what goes on in my system has its own story, but that it is also a mirror of a larger story. This understanding reminds me of the connection of all things and the strength inherent therein. It reminds me that we exist as dynamic clusters of energy forged through millions of years of evolution. Ancient intelligence that is crying out (note: my computer autocorrected that to “dying out” and that was interesting). It is communicating. It just happens to be communicating at such a volume and velocity that it becomes virtually impossible figure out exactly what it is saying.
I do my best to comfort and soothe and, more than anything, listen. I try to learn the ways my body speaks to me and the ways the earth does as well. And bigger still, the entire universe. I do my best to act tenderly towards my body as a vessel that has carried me through ups and downs. I try to allow these flares, these periods of floodings and inflammatory fires and pain to move through. As they do I try to let them inform my always deepening regard for the natural systems I am embedded within.
I struggle with a need to not become the thing - to not Be Chronically Ill - to not identify with the label so much that it becomes immutable and fixed. Even as I recognize it is more of a dance than anything, and that there are parts of the experience of my illnesses I would probably benefit from accepting.
Even as I recognize that our earth systems have passed a certain point of no return.
Amanda is a queer astrologer who is very into relational, evolutionary and psychological astrologies. Her purpose is to help folks navigate shifting paradigms. You can support her work — and get rad incentives like monthly AstroCircles, New Moon ritual guidance and one on one sessions if you want them — on Patreon. Please share this article if its contents were meaningful to you.
