Michael grew up the younger of two brothers in a small town in Vermont, where his parents ran a wooden jigsaw puzzle business. After studying fine arts at Wesleyan University, he made fine furniture, then worked as a bookbinder and graphic designer. At some point, he got an MfA in creative writing at Sarah Lawrence College. Today&nbsp;he lives in Boise, Idaho, and runs a nonprofit that brings arts programming to residents&nbsp;of Idaho prisons.

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Michael H. Richardson

<h4>MICHAEL H. RICHARDSON explores the idea of caring—both caring “about” and caring “for” people and things. He challenges us to look to the heart for the solutions to both our own personal issues and also the big questions facing humanity today.</h4>The word “care” is fascinatingly faceted. We can care about someone or something, and we can care for others and ourselves. One involves an internal world related to feeling, while the other is external and happens according to how we act. The internal system of care seems to be about letting something in us resonate freely. It’s a vulnerability. We might feel compelled to care about others because we intuit a vulnerability in them. But the outward act of caring-for requires work and, at times, risk. The body is a bridge between these two aspects of caring. This human caring body is like a key piece of infrastructure in our society that is under strain and needs repair.For a few years, in the early 2000s, I embarked on an effort to address climate change where I lived in Idaho. I started a small organization to educate the public about carbon, fire, electric vehicles, and such, and to pass legislation for incremental progress. We had wins, and a bit of progress was made, but certain assumptions I had made became like a shoal on which the project foundered, so I had to rethink the entire situation. I had assumed that people would or could care.We held an event at which five local scientists, all familiar with climate issues, addressed an audience of business leaders and legislators. Each of the experts (two fire scientists, two hydrologists, and a river and fish expert) had conveyed grave concerns to me about the future when we met privately, and cared deeply about the planet. The idea was that these scientists might have an impact on local policies and approaches, so I asked them to each prepare a 10-minute talk for lay people, to convey the urgency they had shared with me. The audience was made up of fifty policy makers, clergy, business leaders, and other thought leaders in Idaho. It wasn’t open to the public, and there were no media personnel present, so everyone could speak with complete candor.As the talks unfolded, I was flabbergasted. Four of the five presenters said little about climate change, and failed to share their concerns. One of them mainly promoted his laboratory. Amazingly, in a setting where their opinions might make a difference, they lost their sense of imperative. Just one of the five voiced her honest opinion about snowfall in the mountains, hence the viability of our ski industry, with some emotion in her voice. I felt like a cartoon animal who had stepped off a cliff edge, hovering in mid-air. These folks cared about the climate, but when it came to “caring for” in this setting, they confronted a block in themselves.&nbsp;<figure class="image"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/heart_can_do_amazing2_852c785308.webp" alt="heart-can-do-amazing2.webp" srcset="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/thumbnail_heart_can_do_amazing2_852c785308.webp 145w,https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/large_heart_can_do_amazing2_852c785308.webp 472w,https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/heart_can_do_amazing2_852c785308.webp 472w," sizes="100vw"></figure>&nbsp;In private, we can easily share the way we care “about,” but in public (and in Idaho if you’re a scientist discussing climate change),&nbsp;which is where we often care “for,” there is an entirely different dynamic. Caring “for” in the open depends on a kind of integration of inner and outer worlds and a freedom from fear. After this event, it struck me that problems like climate change need to be addressed at an entirely different level than we might presume.It can seem that the massive problems we face—climate, racism, human rights, disease, economic equality, etc.—are chiefly technical, political, and ecological. Apparently, if we can install enough solar and wind, get enough people vaccinated, restore enough rainforest, or educate people, it will solve things. If we can put the right people in office, it will lead to progress in other respects. Technologies and policies based on science feel approachable and rational.But material forms of progress are deceptive. While non-polluting technologies are critical, good policies are essential, and having thoughtful people in office is awesome, human problems have never persisted for lack of knowledge or technology. For decades we have known that gasses like CO2 and methane would damage the planet, but certain forces in society have scuttled collective action. For decades, we have had the resources and ability to feed every human, and to provide every child on the planet with a decent education. Yet, today we have over a billion children living in dire poverty.What we’re facing is not a technical crisis. To the degree that we have seen progress, it is because people have found a way to care. It has always been the openness of the human heart that limited and defined how policies and technologies were adopted.&nbsp; When it comes to the survival of our species, I’ve come to believe that our most critical long-term project and strategy must be the opening and healing of the human heart.What we call the “heart” can’t be addressed with policies and technologies. The heart is strengthened and clarified in relationships, and our relationship with nature—with other living things in ways that are nearly impossible to express.&nbsp;And there is another component to the heart that is less obvious: solitude and quiet. Wherever you go in our society today, there is music playing. As if no one can stand to be alone. Fewer and fewer places exist in darkness. We offer children no rite-of-passage involving solitude, as a chance to confront the natural universe free of pressures and norms. It’s only in solitude that we have the chance to locate the heart. Solitude leads to the integrity that lets us say things and do things that might be unpopular. But it is built on a foundation of love and support, too. Someone anchored in both love and solitude has the ability to care outwardly, to be vulnerable in the open.<hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">The heart is strengthened and clarified in relationships, and our relationship with nature—with other living things in ways that are nearly &nbsp;impossible to express.&nbsp;</h4><hr><figure class="image"><img src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/heart_can_do_amazing3_57e999a6e9.webp" alt="heart-can-do-amazing3.webp" srcset="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/thumbnail_heart_can_do_amazing3_57e999a6e9.webp 145w,https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/large_heart_can_do_amazing3_57e999a6e9.webp 800w,https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/heart_can_do_amazing3_57e999a6e9.webp 800w," sizes="100vw"></figure>&nbsp;As the heart is illuminated by an independent source, based on no conditions, life becomes profoundly pleasant, simple,&nbsp;and materially light. We require few things, and there is ample luxury in the presence of trees and birds, and other simple things like water and light.The energy of a free, open-hearted person—someone who is deeply acquainted with themselves—can be felt in their presence, but it does not convey itself well over video. What they have is intangible, invisible, and difficult to express. To someone raised in the standing wave of overwhelm that is our current society, the idea of such a state of being—free of desire yet caring deeply—feels either pointless or pie-in-the-sky.Our finest spiritual traditions understand the imperative&nbsp;to heal and purify heart, but religions have become operations involving what is written and tangible. And science operates only according to what can be proven. How comfortable are we speaking not from texts, and not from the results of repeated experiments, but from insight and wisdom we’ve gleaned in self-discovery, drawing from a resource that is inherent in nature, in simply being?It’s a fragile project. Perhaps it’s helpful to imagine an arc that lasts a thousand years. Certainly, healing ecosystems like the oceans and the Amazon will require that kind of timeframe. It is slow-going to change the world through direct acts of love. Progress plays out quietly and away from electronic media, and plays out in acts where no attention or reward is sought. When we talk about persevering in a challenging world, there is the physical necessity of survival, but true perseverance involves a heart that remains clear and compassionate toward all beings despite threat, injury, exhaustion, humiliation, disaster, failure, and violence, such that we have a way to resist violence in ourselves.The impacts of heart-centered thoughts, words, and actions—acts of caring rooted in caring—ripple far and quickly. Just as ecosystems recover quickly when given key support (I picture the re-introduction of beavers into river ecologies, restoring so many other creatures and systems), the effects of the heart have the potential to achieve amazing things with delightful swiftness.<hr><h4 style="text-align:center;">Illustrations by ANANYA PATEL</h4><hr>

The heart can do amazing things

<h4>
 MICHAEL RICHARDSON celebrates the
 miraculous nature of our everyday existence and explores the reasons why we
 are not attuned to the miracles all around us in every moment. He encourages
 us to open our eyes to the miracle-nature of all things.
</h4>


 Einstein framed it with his characteristic elegant logic: “There are only
 two ways to live your life: as though nothing is a miracle, or as though
 everything is a miracle.” If indeed Einstein actually said this, his use of
 “as though” was a careful hedge for a scientist – he didn’t come across as
 being too far out. To flesh out the two options:
 


 The universe is unfolding deterministically and mechanically, highly
 limited in its possibilities and meanings. What we see is pretty much what
 there is, everywhere. We’ve discovered nearly all there is to discover.
 There’s no divinity. This is the official belief system of institutional
 science and business.
 


 Despite mechanistic appearances, the fabric of reality is organic,
 inexplicably saturated with love and many other multi-dimensional qualities,
 unlimited in possibility and meaning. There is serendipity and
 synchronicity. Things are mysteriously interconnected, and there’s a sweet,
 divine presence at the heart of it all – something we often detect in our
 own hearts.
 


 The “everything option” is exciting because it means the miracle-ness is
 constant, ubiquitous, always at hand. It’s not about believing that “a
 miracle” might happen once in a while; it’s the whole shooting match! A
 miraculous aspect to all things sits in plain sight and yet it’s strangely
 overlooked – as a matter of faulty perception, or a sort of fatigue, or a
 lack of hope.
 


 Integral in Einstein’s thought is the idea of living your life as if the
 wonder and amazement need to be honored, followed through. Either you see
 that all things are actually miraculous and it affects you deeply – and you
 change – or you don’t. We should be floored and flabbergasted at amazing
 things like our eyes, Jupiter, the beauty of a piece of music.
 


<hr />

<h5 style="text-align: center">
 Either you see that all things are actually miraculous
 and it affects you deeply – and you change – or you don’t.
 We should be floored and flabbergasted at amazing things
 like our eyes, Jupiter, the beauty of a piece of music.
 
</h5>
<hr />


 Yes, but then we should also be agitated, moved, inspired to act or change.
 


 What are we supposed to do with this endless roll of miracles? We’d like to
 believe big, but we don’t want to worry our family with constant exuberance
 and cosmic theories. Then we tend to lose the feeling when we’re wresting
 food out of the garbage disposal or doing taxes. Besides, many educated
 people, including many prominent scientists, seem to agree with option 1.
 Can they really all be wrong? Perhaps the reason we don’t feel it is because
 we don’t feel we can live it.
 


 The religions have their fingerprints all over this mix-up. Christianity,
 Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism and Islam all have presented miracles as
 special, rare moments. Supernatural power – involving human will – is
 supposed to be accessible only to the anointed and enlightened. From Krishna
 lifting mountains, to Jesus raising the dead, to the Prophet Mohammed
 quenching the thirst of armies, tales of healing and death-defying, told
 over and over, seem almost like advertising. Set into the concrete of
 scripture, they seem like photographs from which a very important context
 has been cropped out. Religions often present themselves as exclusive
 gateways to divine power, but then we are all bereft of God until maybe a
 miracle comes. It’s worth noting, too, that teachers like Jesus and Gautama
 were incredibly powerful and extraordinarily gifted, but the vibrational
 character of these teachers could not be written down.
 


 In the religion of modern secularism, the Big Bang and the first cellular
 life shine as great moments of awesome origin and wonder, but most people
 today believe that (after some possible divine huffing and puffing) matter
 and life have merely played out in fascinating, but nevertheless mechanical
 and predictable ways, ways, according to evolution. Just as in the other
 religions, something profoundly sacred and awe-inspiring became flattened as
 it was institutionalized, as theories and equations were put in textbooks,
 this new, even more inscrutable scripture.


 We’ve been led to believe that things like the gorgeous cycle of romantic
 love and sex and reproduction and birth – clearly miraculous and inherently
 sacred – are either sinful or trite, or just mechanisms owing themselves to
 evolutionary processes. If there is potential for a consciousness of the
 sacred, of the precious beauty of each moment, for most people it is drained
 or discharged. Just keep slogging along through this vast desert. Some
 miracle will come! Pray!


<img
 class="w-100"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/everything_option2_img_fd548e530a.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-06T05:45:10.421Z"
 alt="everything-option2"
/>


 But look at your hands praying. Miracles. Your lips and your tongue as you
 speak. Your ears. Miracles. Devote your attention to any three year old
 playing for a few minutes. The universe is banging away as big as ever,
 pumping out endless gigatons of babies, birds, butterflies, flowers and
 sweet nectar, but we blithely opine that the moment is outside of creation,
 just being played like a recording.
 


 If there’s a height from which to experience the unity of things, a place
 where the self coincidentally dissolves, where a light of love enters us,
 most of our tools and partners and methods (Ayahuasca, holotropic breathing,
 heart attacks etc.) act like helicopters, taking us part way up, or even
 very close to the top. But even as we may be elevated, without an
 intelligible perception of the why of this fantastic unity, without a way to
 become anchored there, based in reason, we will tend to gravitate – slide,
 roll, crash, and stumble – back down, back to the humdrum ground state of
 the classic self.
 


 The crazy thing about the miracle-nature of all things is how tragically
 obvious it is; but we are incredulous to the obviousness. It can’t be, we
 say. That would be too easy. We should have to pay for it or read many
 books. It should be exclusive. Maybe it’s not.
 


<hr />

<h4 style="text-align: center">Article by MICHAEL RICHARDSON </h4>
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