Sustainable Living

So I'm sitting here thinking about how to live sustainably.

Not in the usual sort of "How do I want to set up my garden, my food purchases, my use of fossil fuels" though I'm thinking about that too.

I'm thinking about actually living.

Feri work talks about calling one's power back from the places it's gotten tangled up, not submitting one's life force to the outside, and Feri work is one of the few places I've seen where that is valued. And it's a hard skill, and it's not one that there's much allowance for -- people are supposed to invest more of themselves than they can afford in things other than themselves.

I'm having to put down a project that matters to me, that needs to get done, that one of my communities needs to have, because if I worry about getting it done now it sucks up huge amounts of energy, more than I have free to give it. It will get done, someday, at some point, but I will do it on my terms. I can't be at the whim of the community -- back to the Dancing Monkeys, in a way.

And somewhere along the line there's this guilty sense that I should be sacrificing something other than this project. I can do with a little less rest, a little less food, a little less time for myself, right? I can spend less time with my family, expend less effort on my own personal emotional state?

What do I need?

Thinking about that gets the old loops going, "You're so selfish", "You're so ungrateful". Taking the time for the stuff that matters to me, feeds me, sustains me, that's something I have to fight myself to be able to do. How dare I not hold a nine to five, how dare I not work the overtime, how dare I not sacrifice myself to a political cause, a religious lack. How dare I not take all my free time and spend it working in a shelter or picking up trash by the side of the road, because someone needs to do it, after all?

How dare I take care of myself when the world needs saving?

I can work late again tonight, no problem, the company needs me. (My family misses me, but ....)