I went to a Druid Grove meeting. It was part lecture, part ceremony. Mostly it was information about begin a druid as a philosophy and a life style. As pointed out by the presenter, some people treat Druidry as a religion, but she doesn't. In my mind, exactly what makes a religion a religion is a bit fuzzy. Time to Google.
Ok, I’m back. According to Merriam-Webster, religion is:
: the belief in a god or in a group of gods.
: an organized system of beliefs, ceremonies, and rules used to worship a god or a group of gods.
: an interest, a belief, or an activity that is very important to a person or group.
Hmm, these definitions kind of imply that almost anything you consider important could be considered a religion. On the other hand, the first two definitions require gods, and the lecturer completely skipped over the mention of any specific deities. Which would make sense when you understand that she considered it more of a philosophy. The main tenant of Druidry seems to be balance, balance in all things.
You can Google Druidry and learn get as much detail as you want, so I’m not going to give a full definition here, I’m just going to talk about the parts that interested me and gave me insights.
The funny thing about balance is that it’s not static. If you stand something up on end, sooner or later it will fall down, due to some external influence. There’s the concept that I was introduced through robotics called Dynamic Balance, which is how people, or instance, remain upright while walking and running. This is opposed to Static Balance, which describes how things remain upright while standing still. Early robots all used static balance algorithms when they moved, and needed to remain completely centered at all times. The severely limited their speed and stability; they were pretty easy to knock over. The newest models now use dynamic balance, which allows them to be “out of balance” in one sense, while remaining upright.
For instance, when you are running, especially when you are accelerating, you are out of balance; your center of gravity is not directly above your feet. You stay upright and move forward by continually catching yourself on one foot, then the other, as you continue to fall forward. You stay upright through a balance between how fast you are falling forward and how fast you are pushing back with your feet. Lean further forward, and you speed up (or fall down), lean backwards and you slow down or stop. Dynamic balance means you are continuously adapting and compensating for the changes the world throws at you. I say all this because the speaker spoke a lot about balance, but seemed to imply that there was a single, static, point of balance, and the job of the druid was to find and maintain that state.
The more I thought about it, the more I realized that in this context, there is no such thing as one balance point. Everything is in motion, all the time, and don't retain our balance as much as we create new balance every day. What may be a great solution and bring balance today, could be a disaster tomorrow, when circumstances change. And things always change. When we expect change and anticipate upsets, we are able to navigate through life with a certain amount of grace. Ever tried to stand on a surfboard or a skate board, while it’s not moving? It’s Hard! A bicycle is so easy to balance when you're moving, really difficult to balance when your standing still. It’s the same way with life; if you try and fix your life into a single routine and resist change, you will find yourself working really hard, constantly facing upsets as things happen and the world shifts and changes around you. On the other hand, if you are open and can accept change, then bumps and perturbations are easy to recover from. Not to mention that life is a whole lot easier.
I’m as guilty as anyone of finding a situation I like, and, once there, wanting to keep everything exactly the same. Or having an ideal of how things should be, aiming for it, and getting upset when anything in my life threatened that course. When you’re young, change is cool, when you get more set in your ways, change becomes annoying. When Steve Jobs died, I had a sinking feeling that Apple, the Apple I knew and hitched a lot of my identity to, was gone. Of course, Apple is still here, but he Apple that I believed in is not. In reality, it’s probably been gone for years; That scrappy, counter-culture startup with unique products that gave the computer world the finger, had been fading for a long time, but I could pretend it was still there as long as Steve was running things. Now Apple is different, for better or worse, it’s different. Get over it.
That’s dynamic balance. The fact that work, school, church or pretty much any group you belong to, is going to change. You know you’ve been with any group for a while when you catch yourself thinking about “the good old days.” People come in, people go, kids grow up, your interests change, and you find yourself having to make the choice: Do I resist change, ignore new opportunities and allow my world to contract, or do I embrace change and try new things?
When you try and keep everything the same, same job, same friend, same hobbies, same music, same movies, same interests, you risk focusing on the details and minutia of life, and being constantly upset by all the wrinkles that life throws at you. It’s like being on a ship in the middle of the ocean and being totally focused on running the ship, so much so that you pay no real attention on where the ship is going. And then you’re surprised when you look up one day and discover that you’re in a place you never expected, and probably never wanted. That’s a life of static balance.
On the other hand, if you're on that same ship, but you have a clear idea of where you're going, then the details of running the ship are only as important as they need to be, in order to get you there. You give them just as much attention as they require, and no more. If things change, you adapt, because you know your purpose is what's important. When your purpose is clear, you can always find your way back, no matter how many storms, crosscurrents, or other obstacles appear in your path.
Some of you may have noticed that this analogy works on two levels. First, it's a journey to a particular goal. But, if you zoom back a bit, you see that the journey is your life, and the ship is your day-to-day reality. The size of the ship, it's complexity and all the "stuff" on board represent your physical and emotional baggage. And there is no goal, but instead, a purpose, a guiding principle or principles, that inform your choice of direction and give you a context to interpret all the things you see and do along the way.
To be a modern-day, philosophic Druid, is to seek dynamic balance in all things. A balance that allows you continuously adapt to the obstacles life throws at you, and the missteps you make along the way. Even if you fall, you can roll with it and get back up. If the obstacles seem too great, you can find a detour or alternate route. Your guiding principles allow you to adapt to changing conditions while informing you of which changes and actions are compatible with your values, and they can only do that if you release your attachment to the details of daily life.
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