From Panic to Prayer Mode

So many people are carrying around sorrow and pain and difficulty. They all have their joys and concerns. Family members or friends who are sick or cross over. Injustice and unfairness that makes us emotional. I have become aware that the best thing we can be doing these days is to pray. Some people I have met have a negative reaction to the word prayer, like it is just about asking some God or maybe Goddess for help. I have asked a number of wise people what they see as prayer and they all pretty much said the same thing I have been thinking. It is listening. It is a dialog with the universe. It is being deep with the mysterious. It is connecting with the life force energy that is out there, that makes a seed sprout into a beautiful flower. It is receptive silence. I personally talk silently talk to myself and the divine spirit within.

Recently I could easily go into panic mode. We at the Free Farm would love to have a place to move to when we leave our space at the end of the year. So far we have had no luck, even finding a temporary space to move our large greenhouse. I understand that since it is so big, but still it would be nice to continue growing seedlings to plant and give away. But instead of going into panic mode I have switched to prayer mode. I take a deep breath and trust in the mysterious to act appropriately. We are also in plan mode and making lists of groups who may want something from our farm that we are letting go of. Our priority of who to give things to would be to find people who share our philosophy of service to those in need. That is opposed to people who just want something for there private needs or desires or who are running a business (even if it is a good business). Plan B would be to give things away to anyone who wants what we have left.

While the Free Farm is is in the process of transformation, the Free Farm Stand has really blossomed. Because of the grant from the Bothin Foundation, we have a large refrigerator where we can store a lot of produce. So Alemany Farm has been harvesting their surplus produce twice a week for the Free Farm Stand and we can now store it to give away on Sunday. The results this summer is that we have had a lot of really fresh local produce that is out of this world. It is so special and I wonder how may people that shop realize the quality of produce they are getting. This week there was so much produce from both the two local farms (ours and Alemany) plus a ton of left over greens from the farmer’s market.