The analysis and message of Breaking Together has been resonating with some people who work closely with indigenous leaders across Latin America. That is one reason we published it in Spanish as Cayendo Juntos. Due to their work with indigenous elders, my hosts organised a Temazcal, or spiritual sweat lodge, for my birthday. It was led by Don Alvaro, a cofounder of the Elders of Teotihuacan. That’s the area where he and his ancestors have lived, which is famous for its Aztec Pyramids. My experience that day helped me to realise I still have a long way to go in ‘letting go’ of attachment to the impact of my efforts, and the importance of such letting go for my future in this era of collapse.
Don Alvaro’s comments before we entered the sweat lodge may have been influenced by the fact it was October 12th, the day when Columbus first stepped foot in the Americas in 1492. Some call it ‘Invasion Day’. Don Alvaro explained some of the basic ideas of his culture that have been suppressed in the 500 years since then. Such as the obvious fact that we are part of nature and not in charge of it. Plus, the reality that the natural world is itself sacred, rather than just parts of it, or those aspects that we imagine to be separate from nature.
We entered the Temazcal with members of his family and other guests who work on environmental protection. It was a low and round construction, with a concrete base and blankets covering the top. On hands and knees, I crawled into the dark to find a place to sit and wait. Once everyone was inside, lots of red-hot stones were shovelled into a pit in the centre, where they were each marked with a herb. They closed the door, so it became darker and hotter, and poured water on the rocks, like in a sauna. Unlike my local sauna, big pipes of tobacco-rape were being passed around, as my fellow participants beat drums and sang various songs in Spanish.
You might think I’d be fully immersed in the experience. But I’m British. English, even. That is my excuse for it not being so easy to ‘let go’. For the last few years, whenever I find myself in a small unventilated space, I think of airborne viruses. Sweating away in the Temazcal, I remembered the scientific studies that humming produces Nitric Oxide in the mucosal lining of our nostrils, which helps to protect against respiratory infection. If you doubt me, just ask ChatGPT. I did, before looking closer at the studies a few months ago. Armed with that knowledge, I began to hum along to the devotional songs they were singing. I know – not exactly letting go.
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I don’t usually last more than 15 minutes in a sauna, so after half an hour, my personal situation was becoming rather intense. I checked with the person next to me about whether I could leave and come back in. He said I could ask to leave, but the idea is to get so hot that the mind stops working. That’s what I was worried about. But soon after he said that, they opened the door. So I guessed that the sweat lodge was complete. I felt similar to getting off a roller coaster without having thrown up. I was surviving with my Englishness intact. Without letting go. But then, suddenly, more stones were shovelled into the central pit, and it became clear there was a lot of meaningful sweating to come.
As we went back into heated darkness, I realised my humming wasn’t reducing my anxiety that I might pass out or become one of those ‘died suddenly’ stories. Soon after, I began involuntary moaning like when in terrible pain. Another part of my brain started to worry what others might think of my moaning. But that part of my brain also noticed how the increasingly ecstatic singing to Mother Earth meant I probably couldn’t be heard. So I could moan and groan as much as I wanted without embarrassment! It also gave me something to do about my anguish while reassuring me I hadn’t passed out yet. It was a perfect solution for an Englishman. With that technique, and regular cold water being thrown on me, I was finally able to ‘let go’ in the dark, steamy, noisy Temazcal.
I started to feel what was beneath my psychological habits of protection. And I discovered a deep exhaustion. After a week of events discussing the heavy subject of my book, I was feeling raw. I was daunted by the schedule of events coming up over the next few weeks. Believe it or not, I don’t talk about societal collapse every day. I wouldn’t be able to cope with the emotional labour that is so often involved with people who haven’t considered this very deeply. And my own emotions about this remain significant: there is still grief, anger, fear and frustration. When I experience those emotions for a while, they can seep into a stagnant sense of defeat and alienation. It’s a kind of disconnection born of the pain of connection. It is a tiring way to feel.
The singing stopped and Don Alvaro spoke.
“Preguntas” he asked? If I’m exhausted, imagine how a 78-year-old elder from a tradition oppressed for over 500 years might feel? So I asked him if and how he doesn’t feel angry or unforgiving about the past and ongoing violence towards both his culture and wider nature. He replied that with self-love and self-respect, for all that one is and knows, you can focus on being who you are and bringing your own beauty to the world. He said that means the difficult emotions can pass, rather than dominate.
I needed to hear that. Because I thought I had freed myself from fanciful stories about better futures. I thought I had freed myself from stories about my efforts adding up to impact at scale. I thought I’d been freed to focus on what’s true, good and beautiful, sometimes striving for positive change at scale, but not being attached to that outcome. So, I had thought my motivation was based on something deeper than stories about me and my fellow travellers mattering to the history of humanity, the planet or cosmos. But despite that, I’d still been disheartened and dismayed by my perception of regression in societal discourse and the structural determinants of that. That’s with US BigTech distorting civil society, globally, due to their oligopoly controlling 85% of social media interaction. More personally, I had become disheartened and dismayed by my friends being manipulated. Also, by them not wanting to know more painful truths. I had become disheartened and dismayed by professionals in my sector behaving similarly, despite their training, time and mandate. My emotional reactions meant I had not surrendered to the possibility of that situation getting worse, without that then distorting my own confidence and intention to bring my own truth and beauty into the world.
What Don Alvaro said was helpful in reminding me I can keep living the way I believe in, partly as a positive response to what I don’t like happening around me, even if my efforts don’t necessarily contribute to a significant resistance or a lasting regeneration. For instance, what we are doing with Bekandze Farm in Indonesia feels true, good and beautiful right now. We are showing that food can be grown without relying on fossil fuels and without poisoning the land, the water, and local life- just like it used to be. We are finding that many Balinese people, young and old, want to relearn the old ways and blend them with what has been found to work elsewhere. So our organic farm school is great without being world-changing. It is great without being imagined as part of a regenerative wave that will transform humanity and the planet. I know we could get washed away next week. Or we could run out of money next year. Or we could get shut down due to a bureaucratic hitch. But it would still have been great for a time.
Though it may not sell my efforts to influencers on social media, grant makers, or tourists passing through, I prefer to leave out the stories of collective salvation when talking about our efforts with the farm school. I now consider such stories of salvation serve the economically privileged, as they distract from the full pain and injustice of the unfolding tragedy that was required by that privilege. Instead, many aspects of our lives are going to get worse for the rest of our lives. Some people knew they were getting worse for over 500 years. But they kept going.
As I crawled out of the Temazcal into the Mexican sunlight, I felt it is time I accept fully the implications of what I’d concluded in Chapter 7 of my book. Which is not only that the ‘cultural cement’ of modern societies is collapsing along with everything else, but that my efforts might achieve little of significance to reduce it. My hard slog of researching, writing, and promoting the book might not add up to much.
The sweat lodge helped me to recognise how ‘collapse acceptance’ is an ongoing process for me. As I reflected on Don Alvaro’s words and my own difficulty in surrendering to the process, I clarified two aspirations for how I would prefer to relate to people who think in different paradigms to myself in future. First, I aspire to be discerning, calm and forgiving when hearing any salvation stories like quantum agency, fractal change, second coming, alien revelations, or global awakening. Fairytales of salvation have always been told to us by people wanting to feel important or forget death for a while. Nothing will change there. I just won’t reinforce such fairytales when explaining my own motivations and actions in the fields of either deep adaptation or regeneration.
Second, I aspire to become immune to any sense of defeat if people appear to become more deranged as societies become more difficult to live within. The fear and suppression of difficult emotions is entirely normal. The vulnerability to believe in stories that avoid those emotions is also normal. I will continue to invite myself and others towards more ‘critical wisdom’, as I try to do with my book, live online courses, and blogs. However, that may have little effect and so returning to compassion, curiosity and respect can remain an intention. That’s the least I can do after recognising how people like me seemed insane to people from a culture that was being destroyed for over 500 years. Their descendants still opened their sweat lodge, and their hearts, to me, and to others ready to heal. Over the centuries, they weren’t sweating on us all waking up. So neither will I. So neither should we?
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