SolSeed book preface
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This book as a whole is written collaboratively by Ben, Brandon, and Shelley. This preface, however, is written by Brandon speaking for himself as founder of the SolSeed Movement.
Happy in the sun
Several years ago I happened upon a picture whose caption struck a chord in me that resonates to this day. Our family was in the market to join a community supported agriculture (CSA) program. As we browsed the websites for the various CSAs in our area we happened across a picture of some sugar pea sprouts along with the caption "happy in the sun!"
"Happy in the sun!" There was nothing complicated about the image or the caption. The sprouts were simply being sprouts. And yet, there is something profound about the phrase "happy in the sun!" and the way it was juxtaposed with those sprouts. Those sprouts were living up to their potential. They were in some sense "fully alive", the very picture of thriving and flourishing.
If someone were to caption a picture of you with "happy in the sun," what would that picture contain? What is it that you do that drops you into a state of flow? What engrosses you to the point that time stops passing and there is only you immersed in the task in the present moment? What is your happy in the sun? How do you even go about answering these questions? How do you live the answers once you have them?
More or less alive
There was a time in my life when the most common thing you'd hear from me was a sigh. Sitting on a couch in our living room every minute or two I'd sigh. Life was futile, tasteless and bland.
During this time of sighs I was a graduate student in Computer Science at the University of Rochester. I was working on interesting problems and getting paid to learn. Two years earlier I had married a woman that I adored and who loved me too. On the surface it seemed like I should be relishing my life. Yet there I sat. Sighing on my couch.
This "sighing" period of my life lasted for months. When I look back at this time, I'm struck by how little gumption I had. It took all of my reserves to meet the minimums. I was doing what was required, and no more. Any moment when I wasn't acting on some direct obligation was spent in a vegetative funk, punctuated only by the occasional sigh.
Things suddenly got better when I began treatment for depression. The contrast was dramatic. I was full of ideas and brimming over with energy to try new things. In my new state of anti-depressant induced mania, everything I ate was incredibly tasty. Every new idea I had seemed as if it would change the world. Each day was full of zest and I charged around inhaling life.
The contrast between these two adjacent periods of my life has made a lasting impression on how I see the world. I went from a barely alive vegetative fugue to a frenetic mania that oozed life. I went from sucking the life out of those who had the misfortune to be in the same room with me, to pumping up those I encountered and filling them with a sense of new possibilities for their lives.
These back to back periods of stark contrast opened my eyes to how I, the same person, could be more or less alive at different points in time. Since then I've noticed that this same thing often happens to me on a day to day basis. Some days I am powerful, self-expressed, and the world brims with opportunity. Other days I am weak, stifled, and trapped in a dead-end life.
This phenomenon of more or less life is not limited to individuals. I noticed the same dynamic at an internet startup that I worked at for a number of years. Now it was not just an individual who was more or less alive depending upon the day, but a company composed of many individuals.
Have you experienced the same phenomenon in your own life? Do you remember a time when you were working with a group and the experience was fun and playful --- full of life. Ideas came easy and everyone seemed full of energy to carry them out. Compare that with a meeting during which someone kills the energy in the group with a mean-spirited comment.
We're used to thinking of life as a binary property. Plants and animals are alive until they die. But maybe it makes more sense to think of life as a continuous property. An individual organism, a group of organisms, and indeed the body of all life can be more or less alive from moment to moment.
This book describes the SolSeed movement, a journey in progress to become fully alive as individuals, communities, and indeed as the "body of all life." I hope you find something in it that helps you on your journey!
Bring Life!
Brandon CS Sanders, February 2012
