A man and woman step out onto the dance floor and start to move. Grace emanates as they swirl, matching each other, twirling away and back together. Joy. We can’t look away. As though demonstrating the dynamic dance of the universe, they move smoothly and in sync. Skaters in pairs, even more so. The movement sings as they swirl in harmony with one another gliding across the ice.
In nature, there is polarity, a dynamic dance between light and dark, day and night, male and female. Arising from the complex, beautiful, enchanting dance of nature, the concept of polarity illuminates this beauty. Yet we often refer in our modern times to being a polarized society. So close and yet so far away. Polarized implies stuck in opposites. No movement, no dynamism, just a stuck place. We all recognize this. We also know in our bones, that there is the potential of dynamic polarity.
In these times, the conflict, hurt, anger, pain, violence, are symptoms of a society stuck in polarization, yet yearning for dynamic polarity. We do well to gaze back and listen to the stories of the people who have lived and still live on this continent. Mother earth was the Great Mother, the mother of all, and Father Sun shining and illuminating earth. One is not better than the other. Together they dance in beauty. Both are essential. The dynamics between them enlivens the universe.
Symptoms of polarization show up broadly in government and organizations and right down to relationships between people. Fractured souls hurt themselves and each other. Loneliness expands and discord dominates. Look how young men (mostly) literally kill people—children, women, each other. Without getting too caught up in the specifics of why, step back and look. In ancient cultures, men trained boys to protect, be hunters, and warriors when necessary. Also, they return from war to be ritually invited back to society. They must release the part of them that trained to kill, and harness that energy to build up society—to literally create, sustain, the physical places as well as systems and governments for the common good.
The symptom of young men killing people at random is an aberration. Meant to protect the very ones they are harming, these men manifest severe polarization stuck in a pattern of destruction.
In response to hearing of these things, my mind stops. My heart aches. What to do or say?
We live is a society badly out of balance, like we are driving on flat tires for 100 miles. Where to start. Mostly I turn to the positive, recognize the need to do what I can in my world. That is good and real. I am grateful for a bed, a home, food, a car, good people. I am touched by connecting with others when the world is in turmoil. Such small comforts and connections in our daily lives are ways that nature offers us simple polarities to counteract the confusion of conflict.
In these and other tumultuous times, there may be small flames of love and leaders who speak above the cacophony of discord. Simple acts of kindness and neighbors helping neighbors engender warmth. The tapestry of community gets woven together piece by piece. We can rise to the occasion, and that cloth of connection is stronger than static, chronic tension.
In late 2025 and into early 2026 a group of Buddhist monks are taking a 2300 mile walk for peace across the US. I love to watch clips of the monks, on their extended walk from Texas to Washington DC between October and February. Over 20 of them, in orange robes, are walking along roads, about 30 miles a day. The power of this act is stunning. Drawn to walk in places that are suffering from many challenges, this is the first time that this lineage of monks has walked in this country. This is their practice, to walk for peace in places of discord. Their simple action, extending over months in many troubled areas of the US, has a potent and multi-dimensional impact.
This is one small yet mighty phenomenon that may be one of the details that turns the ship of culture around. Let us discover and ride along the dynamic dance of polarity and turn away from tendency to static polarization.