A few thoughts on a quiet Sunday Evening.
On “Flow”
I don’t know that I’ve detailed this principle anywhere in any great detail, but the principle of “Flow” has been crystalizing in my mind as I have studied and learned about water, and how it works in the world around us and within a contained system. The idea that flowing water is constantly changing seems to me to be a parallel for life, and the constant state of change that is on-going. We never stop flowing, and attempts to stop flow are futile. This applies to many areas of life, family life, food production, industry in general, money, spirituality, and in more ways that I have yet to discover.
For example: today, I read in a Florence Nightingale text about a recommendation to send out a couple of trained female nurses to a hospital in India. My thoughts were that this would be a futile request, not because it wasn’t needed, but rather because a system of inflow of nurses was needed, not just a couple of nurses. Without the flow, then should anything happen to one of the two nurses, the system collapses.
In family life, there is a constant need for dialogue and revision of family structures and efforts to make rules and put system in place to improve. That a one-time meeting would be enough is vain hope: stagnate water. There must be flow for there to be life.
This also applies to gardens, nature, and this is where the principle is perhaps most evident.
Abolitionists, Humanitarians
Is this a political system, is it a way of life? I find myself most resonating with the Abolitionists as a political movement, and perhaps a more modern day equivalent are humanitarians. (This was suggested to me in prayer this morning.) This explains a lot about who I am and why certain activities and stories resonate deeply with me.
This is why I am being brought to consider Florence Nightingale. She is both the descendant of abolitionists. I would also consider her to be a true, if not one of the truest humanitarians. This is why I’ve been brought to consider her writings. This is significant, still highly relevant work.
I’m longing, pining to find association with like-minded individuals, even politically so. I think this would resonate deeply with Rachel as well. I don’t know what these sorts of modern political organizations look like, but I feel like this is also why I’ve been brought to consider political science, and American History, and so forth.
This seems to also be the purpose or a key purpose of the Renovators story. As I go growing this idea of the work of humanitarians, I will need a vehicle to teach humanitarianism to a large enclave of future humanitarians. And what better way to plant seeds, than with a story?