“The more ways we have to connect, the more many of us seem desperate to unplug.”
~ Pico Iyer
Twice in the last week, at the beginning of my annual summer visit with my folks, I was advised, in the gentlest and most encouraging way, to “unplug” from technology and work. Both people used the same word…”unplug.” Both these caring folk know how much I love technology and my work, but they also know how much I need a break to refuel. I also know how much quiet I need to reconnect with myself, my inner world.
For so many of us, stress can be a disconnection from self, where our outer world of connection ironically has pulled us from the one relationship that nurtures and sustains us…our relationship with our self, our soul.
Like taking an exciting journey, technology can take us to faraway places; travel by Internet can be invigorating and inspiring, but it can also leave us (me) with a longing to return home to what is simple. Time to ‘unplug’ from the world and return home to the inner quiet.
So while I am at my parent’s home in the city where I grew up, I am ‘unplugging’ and returning to my inner home to reconnect with flowers, busy sparrows, blue jays, green grass, rain, gentle breezes, and adolescent crows squawking for food when they are of a size that makes you stop and ask aloud, “Really? Aren’t you a little big to be begging from your mommy?” I am returning home where there is all the time in the world to journal with paper and pen, time to read murder mysteries and self-help books on Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself (by Dr. Joe Dispenza), time for meditation tapes…and time to dream big dreams with endless amounts of inner quiet.
The Garden of Unplugged
Where is home for you? And what does this have to do with homeopathy? There is a rubric (a sentence that describes a symptom) that reads, “Home: desires to go home and when there, they want to go out,” which simply means there is a desire to go home and when home, a desire to go out. A desire to travel with the longing to return home; a love of technology with a longing to unplug… Maybe a similar state?
One of the homeopathic remedies that best fits this state is Calcarea phosphorica, a constituent of bone. Have a look at today’s handout on this remedy. Dr. Rajan Sankaran will give you a modern take on understanding what kind of person might need Calc phos.
And from the 14-minute TED talk by Pico Iyer (plugged in to the net long enough to ‘meet’ a new friend!), a wonderful quote about home and unplugging and the Calc phos state:
“…it’s only by stopping movement that you can see where to go. And it’s only by stepping out of your life and the world that you can see what you most deeply care about and find a home. And I’ve noticed so many people now take conscious measures to sit quietly for 30 minutes every morning just collecting themselves in one corner of the room without their devices, or go running every evening, or leave their cell phones behind when they go to have a long conversation with a friend.
Movement is a fantastic privilege and it allows us to do so much that our grandparents could never have dreamed of doing. But movement ultimately only has meaning if you have a home to go back to. And home, in the end, is of course not just the place where you sleep. It’s the place where you stand.”
~ Pico Iyer
