The Ceremony of Unconditional Collaboration.
by Jacki visiblydistorted
"Greed has been interested and invested in limiting access to the relationships required for quality of life. In order to be in relationship to the community of life that Beings are naturally born into, there have been established some restrictions." It was a very one-sided conversation. It was more of an announcement.
Greed was an inventor and a problem solver. Greed invented a way called Ownership. In order to meet Greed's needs, Greed had decided to access the way of Ownership to create a career or social caste which became called Submission.
Greed said, "This is the way you can access the relationships to what you seek again: Do a quest for me, exactly as I say. Then come back and I will hold the results of your journey in addition to all that I am already holding on to. If I am pleased by your offerings, I will give you something in return; a coupon for a discount to a limited amount of what you need that I am holding. I will give you access to some of that when you give me back the coupon and just a little more."
Greed added, "Another tradition in this way is that if you are going to share what I have given you, you can use my coupons to do so. Only my coupons will be valid. If you give a little less of what you have to someone else for smaller discounts, and send them on a quest for something I do not yet hold, then they will learn my way and I will become closer to happiness."
Greed wanted all the Beings who were disconnected from the community of life to know Ownership and to pass it along to others so that those Beings would also help Greed.
While the Beings who listened to Greed thougth that Greed was very ill and needed to heal, they also wanted to use Greed's potential for happiness as medicine and to try to better understand the illness that caused Ownership to be Greed's invention. So, off they went on the quests.
Some were quests for Animal Beings, others were quests for Mineral Beings, and then Spirit Beings, and then Elemental Beings, and then eventually all of the Kingdoms of the world were sought after by the Beings that knew Greed first.
Greed, who was always thinking about how to find more and more Beings to teach, started to see that many of the Beings were worrying about the way others who had not started to walk Greed's way, but were confused and hurt by the ones who had left the community of life for that journey, and in the process began to mirror Greed's walk in their small ways, but without asking first. They were learning the Taker culture even without the way of Ownership. Greed had an answer for this, too. Greed began to promise safety for those who walked in the new way. There would always be something for the future if Greed was allowed to hold on to these Beings just a little longer. Greed was sure that the Beings would understand that learning this way meant that protecting this way would result in less of the Beings who were not yet included having quarrels with one another.
Greed made smaller and smaller denominations of the coupons, while deciding who else to bring in by giving more quests. Complex recipes were the next set of quests, and Greed announced that these would teach skill and cunning, and the Beings who walked this way would then be able to decide who they would bring in to different specific careers within the way of Ownership. Some of them learned to protect Greed. Some of them learned to gather up more life from the families that remained. Some of them learned that they could offer protection to those families by holding on to their relations in Greed's name, for a little extra in the exchange, and then Greed would not have all the Beings directly, and the communities of life would feel more comfortable knowing that they were just a step closer to thriving again.
The Beings learned skill in taking life from the lands, and from the waters, and from the relationships to all else. Greed made yet more rules and restrictions, because the Beings were able to keep some of the life for themselves if they learned a lot of skill. Greed was still hungry for more. So then Greed was deciding who could teach, and who could learn, and of course, none of this could happen without passing along to Greed all that was learned, all of how it had been applied, and a little extra. So that is how Greed came to own not only the Beings, but their knowledge and skills too. Greed was not yet satisfied.
Beings came back after their many quests, giving to Greed much more each time, and getting less back for their troubles. It got to be so much of the world working to heal Greed that there were not enough of Greed's clever coupons left to meet anybody's needs anymore. Greed was not stupid. Greed knew this was part of the way of Ownership. Greed wanted deeper and deeper Submission from the spirits of all the Beings.
So Greed decided to create another level of the conversation, where the access to life was granted by just the idea of a coupon instead of a piece of paper. That way Greed got all the coupons back and only gave out the promise of access to something, and even then, only if the rules were followed that Greed was given a new kind of extra, a little more that was time-sensitive, growing and growing if the Beings on the quests were too slow to return with any of the Beings that Greed had asked for.
Greed was still not satisfied. Greed invented reasons why it was not acceptable to walk the way of Ownership with certain taboo Beings. All the Beings still doing the healing work were not sure about this plan, because it just meant that all of Greed's Beings were so disconnected from the community of life that Greed was keeping away, that they were starting to sleep deeply. The Beings recognized that Greed was losing touch with those other Beings held in safety, and not enjoying the accumulation at all. More healing was certain to be necessary.
The Beings were getting more and more quests from each other than ever before, and building families of skill and knowledge in order to make new, dangerous Beings to keep Greed's way safe. Greed still believed that Ownership was medicine. Greed had so many spirits bending for Greed's healing, that only very few Beings were left to watch and keep the stories of what life had been like before Greed was influential, and the community of life before Greed was even born.
These Beings held space, knowing that even though Greed was thinking that all the Beings who were toiling away and near to dying and deprived and isolated and hurt by the way of Ownership were going to find happiness for Greed through that work, and even though Greed was convinced that Ownership was medicine, that it was all just an elaborate dream and that Greed would eventually be unable to add anything else to the immense community of life under Greed's rule, because any Being that was left outside of that conversation, would be an almost forgotten story.
But what no Being had realized yet was that the medicine Greed needed was for the Beings to rediscover their deeper roots to the community of life, and stop trying to appease Greed. Greed needed to feel like Greed had won, but the Beings knew this to be a false need and that it was part of a complex illness that also included Fear.
Greed was fearful because of past trauma. There were times on Greed's early journey, an older story than any of the Beings had so far brought with them to Greed. The keepers of those old stories were holding them in secret, to make sure that Greed did not destroy the community of life entirely, when the Fear culture growing in Greed got stronger and more dominant even than the Hunger. Greed, they knew, would soon protect the way of Ownership by accessing those dangerous Beings and using force.
In the older story, as it was remembered then, there had been a time where all the Beings in Greed's life had been journeying from a place of abundance and out into the unknown. They had heard that there were other Beings somewhere. Greed was born during this time of uncertainty, on Curiosity's journey. Curiosity moved the Beings to a place and time they had not been to on other journeys. Curiosity wanted to build relationships to a greater community of life, including distant life forms, and so some of the journeys began to be external instead of always internal, for a while. But Greed's deep seated trauma stemmed from this uncertain time. The caring Beings who supported Curiosity had to decide how to share the limited access to life, in that place between, in a fair way, knowing that the Beings there could only bring on the journey what they could carry.
Nobody had thought to teach Greed the story of wildcrafting during those travels, and Greed was never spoiled, not even once. Greed resented having to always share, especially since the Beings in that place between had all had the choice to walk that path with each other, complimenting each other's skills and knowledge to make the journey easier on everyone, but Greed had just arrived without a purpose and was left wondering why the gifts of Greed's spirit were not being honoured in some way. Greed did not like having to walk a path on a journey that was for other Beings, and not having any choice in the matter.
Greed thought that there must be a better way, but that there was just not enough connection between all of life and Greed. Greed was truly an individual on the shared journey. So, feeling limited by this and afraid that it was the only option available to Greed, Greed began sneaking.
The old story about the abundant land and the journey of Curiosity reminded the Beings that Greed had trauma to overcome. Greed had been very sensitive at that young age. They also held an old teaching about wildness, wilderness, and wildcrafting that should have been given to Greed during or just after the conversation Greed had with the Creator, on the way to that life walk. Greed had been strongly self-protecting because then all the barriers to having more than enough could be ignored and forgotten and destroyed, like so many beings that Greed's Ownership and Fear were taking for granted.
But the storytellers could not just say to Greed that "This is not working for us and here is why not." Greed had to learn about this story in a different way, for it to be medicine. Greed was invited by these storytellers to gift something to the community of life.
In the confusion of the Fear and Ownership that had reduced the community of life so much, that had limited all the Beings to working for basic survival, and that had created so much conflict, competition and hierarchy through that, Greed said, "I have given you so much already. I have given you access to tasks that educate you, I have given you opportunity to make good karma by helping me, and I have given you ideas and my coupon promises, with which you can have any kind of conversation, conversations that you were not having before. I have given to you rules and structure and safety, and obligations that make you feel your value. What more do you want from me?"
The Beings were not sure how to tell the proper story because Greed had forgotten how to understand the older languages of the Beings from the abundant lands and waters. The Beings decided, for this circle, to stop exchanging coupons and promises, which is how the questing came to a halt. They were attending to telling the story properly.
So the remaining story keepers and those Beings who had said "No." to Greed, got together. Greed of course, coming from a place of Curiosity and spaciousness, wanted access.
"No." the beings said to Greed. That word was a way of sending Greed back into that past trauma of having limitations without understanding them.
"I am using even the manners which I have shown to you and required of you. Please, please?" Greed asked,
"No." the Beings replied, "Stop interrupting."
Greed was afraid that the question of what the other Beings wanted as a gift would end up being too much for Greed to give away. One more time, Greed tried to persuade them.
"Look, I might just hurt anyone who gets in my way, and make them regret it." said Greed's trauma. Greed's threats were part of desperation. Greed had built an empire and it was crumbling.
"No." The Beings still resisted, even when Greed was using dangerous Beings as tools and weapons to create that imaginary win. Greed went pretty deep into that inner healing journey, after the third "No."
The Beings made up a ceremony for Greed, as a way to teach this story. Greed, still deep in the illusion of Power and Control, Loss, Lack, Dominance, resource games, rules and restrictions, and so on, had become quite asleep, descending from rock bottom, and into the depths of the underworld journey. Greed was clinging now only to the influences that have stayed connected during that time of questing and journeying. Greed had nothing else to cling to, to survive, having been given a "No."
The ceremony of saying "No." was part of Greed's lesson in respect. Greed learned to respect consent and dissent. Wildcrafting taught a lesson on taking wisely, and always giving a little back, always asking first, and always leaving more than taking. Greed had to have a vision of the despair, violation, isolation, and grief that many of the Beings had been carrying heavily on a daily basis. Greed had to be shown that even despite these realities, there was nothing to fear because together, all the Beings are very resilient. The community of life goes on, even when many of the Beings are in deep sleep. The vision the Beings gave to Greed's spirit was simple. In the vision, Greed had nothing at all. No connection to anybody, no clothes, not even a body. Greed also had no time, no energy, and no direction. Greed had no identity in this vision. It was deeper than darkness, it was just the total unknown and unknowable experience at first.
So as Greed experienced this vision, in this ceremony, Greed began to understand the Curiosity journey better. Greed saw the journey as the context for all that had become of the world. Each part of that journey revealed itself, until Greed was watching the vision from the eyes of the storytellers. Greed was doing this ceremony with them, participating in visioning. Greed learned how to contribute to the vision. Greed saw that sharing in the exchange meant seeing without taking, sometimes. So Greed observed and through that, transformed.
Greed transformed into a Being of creative potential that offered to the world from within, new possibilities, new conversations, and new translations of understandings. The participation experience demonstrated that through being told "No." and learning to uphold a world where "No", even when uncomfortable and inconvenient, allows all the Beings to sit on equal ground, even with the limits in the world, and that Greed was not superior or inferior when Greed's gifts include honouring the boundaries and rules and protections that other Beings held for each other and for Greed, too.
Greed had to have the experience of doing for Self what others had done for Greed, by losing sense of Self, building Self out of the return to trauma, and then letting go of Grief, who had confused the way toward knowing that abundance does not come from taking and accumulating, it comes from making something new. Abundance, Greed began to see, came from making a connection, a conversation, and a cultivation with Abundance as it resists abuse because of it's unconditional and infinite nature.
Greed learned the freedom of healing from Fear by choosing change. So Greed gave them a gift, after all. Greed knew just what to give. Greed gifted to the community of life a portal, that they could reach into and find blessings as yet undetermined. This bottomless pocket dimension was able to be reached into by all the Beings, without limitation or restriction, and only blessings would be found there. Greed became that portal during this transformation ceremony. And from then onward, Greed led the way between, for anyone who felt Fear or Lack, or Disempowerment. Greed showed them, from that time onward, how to respect the ones who resist. Greed taught the story of accepting a good "No," and taught the story of how to ask first with an invitation for another Being to give, and to take only enough to have some, share some, and plant or invest some back into the community of Life, while leaving most of what the Being offers behind. Greed was able to lead ceremony too, showing any healing Beings that their pain held all the blessings of liberation from those old traumas.
Greed was finally satisfied. All Greed had been looking for all along was to know that for sure there was always more, and that Greed was sometimes going to be gifted more than enough, because Greed had allies to pass along those gifts with. Greed was so happy to be supporting the community of life to flourish and thrive despite a long history of passing on to others more and more debt. So all the Beings celebrated with Greed. They danced and sang about how the illness only escalates enough to show Beings how to embrace their best health. They danced and sang about how it is always possible to walk away from a situation or Being that is not ready to heal, as long as that includes clear vision, and that sometimes this means walking away from Self.
This is history. All the Beings in the community of life can transform the story into a new way of Being. And we are. So from now on, nobody has to do any self-violation. Nobody has to allow others to force or coerce them into behaving in ways that violate others. Nobody has to experience violation in any way at all. There are always other possibilities in that portal to unconditional abundance, and beyond them, infinitely more.
And that is how the languages of Time, Effort, Connection and Direction became cherished ways to exchange creative energy and promote life, embracing their wild nature once more.
For the Feather Carriers, and Life Promoters, everywhere.
♥ Jacki
Special thanks to Louis Even for the inspiration from years past, when I read The Money Myth Exploded, The financial enigma resolved, A debt money system. I feel the need to credit this here because I have done my own version of a solution to the same idea.