June 24, 2025

When all the world comes crowding in

the firehose of bad news spewing into every waking moment

The underground torrent of generational trauma

threatening to burst its reservoirs

already flooding your subconscious

Consider

how a tree holds space

its limbs dancing to the wind's onslaught

creating pockets of calm within its leaves and boughs

Or the sea grasses

moving, swaying, sashaying with the tide

the waves crash yet the grasses shelter

small, unmoored creatures

in folds of shimmering weightlessness

Or the moon, a pool of stillness

catching the eye of many an earthling

scuttling about a teeming surface

holding each one in a gentle lunar embrace

So you, too, can learn

to dance, bend, pause, shift your weight

to reflect the light you've been given

to try a new posture

to protect what is tender and unfolding

You can learn

to be still

Keep your margins open

your mind clear

your evenings free

of dings and rings and blinking screens

A different time exists beyond

the ever-urgent feed

the endless scroll of doom

Time you protect

space you hold

when you say

No.

Not now.

We create our own sanctuaries

cities, neighborhoods, churches, temples, mosques

hearths and kitchen tables

where the violence rampant in high places

has no foothold

Now

is time

for something holy

something spacious

a deeper magic

Whatever is happening in the digital ether

has no weight compared to now

This moment

This breath

These relationships

This eternal present

(Republished with permission)

Liuan Huska is a freelance journalist and writer at the intersection of ecology, embodiment, and faith. She is the author of Hurting Yet Whole: Reconciling Body and Spirit in Chronic Pain and Illness. She and her husband co-wrote My South American Classroom, a children's picture book about their family gap year, coming Fall 2025. She is a regular columnist with Sojourners Magazine and writes the Substack newsletter Becoming Whole.