SHOWING Up
in community for ourselves, each other
and our world
we offer in-person and online spaces for connecting with others and mindfully engaging with some of the most difficult issues facing our world.
showing up is a project that facilitates social engagement and compassionate change in meaningful and mindful ways.
It invites us to:
- show up 'as we are' in an inclusive community of mindfulness and meditation practitioners
- attend to self-care as part of an overarching intention to practice caring for all aspects of life, while gently and firmly challenging ourselves to move out of our comfort zones
- learn from elders and teachers of mindfulness and social engagement
- bear witness to pressing social issues through direct engagement with community leaders and those who have first-hand experience
- and respond to act and serve in ways which have meaning for us as individuals.
We're committed to standing in solidarity with those affected by systemic discrimination and structural inequality, learning about the part we each play in these structures and expanding our capacity to change this over the course of our lifetime.
Mindfulness practice, which has as a core component 'not turning away' from experience, shouldn't be used to bypass the reality of individual and collective suffering. Rather it's a practice which helps us to become aware of the conditioning and biases which create artificial separation between us and other people and other species, and the harmful effects of these biases. As the Vietnamese meditation teacher and poet Thich Nhat Hanh has said, 'we are here to awaken from our illusion of separateness.'
Mindfulness creates the inner space and resilience necessary to bear witness to things as they are. What happens next and what compassionate response we choose may be different for each of us. We're sustained in this practice by community. The simple presence, support and accountability-holding of others enable us to keep engaging and learning for the long haul. What matters is that we keep showing up - as we are and with what we have to offer.
Here is a link to resources for educating ourselves about racial discrimination in particular, along with suggestions for groups whose work we can support through donations and petitions.
Join us as we walk the path of engaging mindfully with the joy and suffering of the world at a time of painful yet increasing clarity and opportunities to serve. We practice, learn and respond together and one step at a time.
".. if we do act, in however small a way,
we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future.
The future is an infinite succession of presents,
and to live now as we think human beings should live,
in defiance of all that is bad around us,
is itself a marvellous victory.''
- Howard Zinn