“Joy does not simply happen to us.
We have to choose joy and keep choosing it every day…”
—Henry J M Nouwen
If you imbibe something poisonous in the forest, its antidote usually grows nearby. This natural healing principle, known and practiced by indigenous cultures for millennia, also applies to the seven activist addictions. If the environment, system, or culture, is toxic and poisonous, look for the remedy right next door.
The wild remedies for the seven activist addictions grow in the vibrational soil of joy, which is the antidote to resistance. Wild remedies do for the soul what herbal remedies do for the body—regenerate, nourish, and heal us.
The wild remedies for the seven activist addictions can also be thought of as rivers that flow through our energetic bodies, with currents so strong that the addictions naturally erode over time. This confluence of rivers has two main currents: upward (Feminine Principle) and downward (Masculine Principle).
The upward current is the current of liberation, which arises from the Earth. The downward current is the current of manifestation, which descends from the Cosmos.
There is also an outward current of giving and an inward current of receiving.
Each river and current is a powerful energetic medicine. When all four rivers are flowing through us, and the obstacles, pollution, and debris of the seven activist addictions are removed, we naturally flow towards joy—that numinous birthplace and creative matrix, the soul’s true home.
I first learned about these energetic rivers through Anodea Judith’s epic book, Eastern Body, Western Mind: Psychology and the Chakra System as a Path to Self.[1] Judith was one of the leading pioneers who brought the Hindu chakra and Buddhist cosmology to the Western World. Her work forms the basis of the Seven Chakras theory as I understand it.
I see the seven activist addictions as blocks in the rivers of our lifeforce, which cause stagnation in our energetic centers or chakras. Wild remedies can alchemize and dissolve those blocks. Each activist addiction has a wild remedy. Stay tuned for more.
[1] Anodea Judith. Eastern Body, Western Mind: Psychology and the Chakra System As a Path to the Self (New York: Clarkson Potter/Ten Speed, 2004). On page 10 there is a complex Table of Correspondences which inspired my connection of the seven activist addictions and their wild remedies to the sovereign rights of each chakra.