Against the Hegemony of Sadness:

as the Horizon is walkin’, the Roots are dancin’…

By Augusto Alcalde (Roshi) saludrebelde@yahoo.com.ar

http://autumnbridgedojo.blogspot.com

How are the compañeras/os of whose Heart is of the Earth walking the horizon
in the Argentina and Indo-Afro-Latino Land of today?

Who are we? What are we? The ones that were silenced, the ones who were faceless, nameless, with a
dark cloud as a horizon, the ones that do not produce, do not count. All the “we” that already walk
the pathless road of revolutions shining of beauty. Knowing it or not knowing it.

The ones that go into the mountains, real or metaphorical ones (is there a difference?) to find
ourselves, and I say “ourselves”… to see and walk the heart that could ease the pain of the Earth,
stones, weeds and dreams. The ones who in those mountains do talk
and listen to our dead that do live on as a path.

We are the ones with our face reborn, our name renamed.

The ones who walk the storms and sunsets in creativity and joy
to harvest Peace Justice Freedom and Love.

The ones that walk sing and dance against the Hegemony of Sadness that wants to steal
the past and the future, clouding the blooming present.

That is, we are you, just ordinary people, this is to say rebel stubborn indigestible and undefeatable
people. The “we” that shines and acts and builds much beyond our awareness of our common rebel
body allowing the “Land with No Evil” of our ancestors to bloom and flourish
at every step, at each step, as the step herself.

So I am talking to you, talking to me, talking to us. And as well listening to that whisper that has the
power and pregnancy of that very Land and Heart.

We can call that “Rebel Health”

we are you, just ordinary people, this is to say rebel stubborn indigestible and undefeatable people.

One step: Horizontality as a practical position in the dance for a new world

We have been activists for social change before the common experience as a formless and mostly
“anonymous” Movement of Movements; dance of dances. This is to say, when we get here we bring with us,
each of us, many other experiences, memories and ideas with us. We find then that the first thing that we have
to do is to learn how to listen to each other: listen to the struggle that we want to develop and unfold, to the
problems that we have and to the dignity that we want to affirm, express and recover. This is what we were
learning and at the same time we were looking for creative and effective ways to move along this pregnant and
unknown road that is the social unfolding of this present..

From the beginning we saw the necessity to build something new, uncertain, from our own reality, something
that we all could be a part of and would express our heart and Memory. So from this naturally does autonomy,
horizontality, and a new, direct, inclusive democracy, and an integral, whole struggle emerge.
We did not actively try it: the only thing that we did was to listen and assume this reality that we were
confronting and was confronting us and let her inspire our steps.

We were also touching something similar when we shared that Memory, Identity and Hope that do live in many
and diverse practices and we were trying to see how to recover, renew develop and unfold them.

Horizontality then becomes something that abides in the daily practice of the Movement-Dance as well as
between all of us, and in each one’s heart. From long ago we were giving it a form and organizing it not as final
form or organization, but as an evolving, unfolding one. This is something that we have embodied and engaged
in very naturally.
Being true to these principles, we do not have leaders, what all of us already learnt was that leaders are not
necessary for us, because if we don’t do things together it will not work.
“Together” “Us” “one Heart-one Struggle” are the key words, and there is no need for leaders there.

Horizontality thus implies a different way or relating to oneself, a new way of discovering how it is possible to
change reality. This has to do with the willingness and the heart to constantly learn and to accept that what one
considers certain, when working in a collective, as a collective, gets modified.
This is not only related to self-organization and self-administration, but also and especially with self-defining
ourselves: being clear about that there does not exist something that judges or establishes who we are, clear
about that we will go on discovering who we are and how we will transform reality at a given moment and
situation.
The “I” and the “WE” as a function and a process, not as a defined “thing”.

Horizontality then for us is the practice of a project, a project of projects. It is not about a concept that is
understood on its own, but rather a way of relating and establishing relationships that is based on a concrete,
sincere and joyful practice. It has to do with relations with the different sides, to the sides, and not up or down.
To propose to build from the bottom to arrive to the top implies a contradiction with respect to horizontality. We
build thus to the sides, inhabiting the cracks of the system. This is why we do not talk any more about the
concept of building “from below”.

One Heart: Autonomy as the Power to do and think and act in liberty and freedom

Autonomy and Freedom then is the project & the dance that we decided to unfold.
It is the Heart that we choose to touch; it is the free territory that we dream to inhabit. The “Land With No Evil” of
our ancestors.
We are clear about our problems and difficulties, the causes of our dramas, and we are also clear about being
fully able to create and walk the solutions, responses and respons-abilities by reflecting, learning, struggling
and doing together as compañeros, Sisters and Brothers in the One Heart Dreaming.
And we know who we are: we are persons, individually as well as collectively, fully able to transform reality by
creative and liberating work, sharing and caring, without the false necessity and drive for exploitation,
oppression or individualism.
Thus the space that we build and unfold in our common walking is rooted and based on the actualization of a
new way of relationship and of relating, radically opposed to the capitalist and “neo-“liberal system, because it is
completely clear that we do not want or support it or any kind of oppression or exploitation.

Thus from and inside daily confrontation and response with reality and the Power, and acting from this ways
and principles, a new sociability, a new “subjectivity” is born, a new way of thinking, a new heart: free, with no-
name and collective, from which we self-define ourselves, self-organize and self-express.

The new ground, new heart that we are living and palpitating is what motivates us then.

And this way of relating and working is primordial also in the inside of the Nameless Movement, where every
day we have a puzzle to solve, and where, since it is something new, we have to think and create a great
variety of rainbows.
It is a difficult ground, because it is a constant incognita. There can be no program. We wholeheartedly
choose to walk on uncharted Land.

And we are not interested in giving much thinking to this apparent “lack” of definition because what we do is to
affirm a horizon that is not a goal, but a road and a heart and an inquiring that we are traveling, walking and
dancing on, building, creating and unfolding, and at the same time, re-discovering ourselves in the questions
that emerge at each step.

The meaning of the Freedom that we are thus discovering and unfolding in the collective as well as in the
depths of each one’s heart it is completely different and not related to the one of the neo-liberal capitalism. That
one is a so-called freedom that only masks oppression, unhappiness and death.

We thus do liberate ourselves from domination, submission, exploitation as people, and we want to contain and
affirm this Vital Unconditioned Freedom in the common good, for all beings and species, rejecting and dropping
individualism, egoism and personal interests that are sometimes placed above collective interests.

In the middle of an oppressive poverty, of an entire and unjust institutional structure that always tries to pollute,
co-opt or destroy the spaces of Liberty, Rebel Health and Sanity, what we may have achieved is just the
unfolding of a space of liberty and freedom: liberty of thought, of practice and of making mistakes, of correcting
errors and relapses and of starting over again anew to put together in common the intimate common dreams,
those that just because of living in a repressive system and society, were almost frustrated and buried. But true
dreams never die, they just take a break in their dancing.

A project of projects, a road of roads, a multiplicity of steps….

In this sense, our projects are fully rooted and directed to this space of freedom, liberty, sharing and mutual
care. Our project thus points to generate a space and a heart which affirms, strengthens and unfolds the
commitment to live in a world like this one in a critical and constructively creative way and struggle.
Engaging and involving ourselves in the creation of a new world, starting in the ground of relationships, and not
waiting for the mythical time of the Big Revolution for inhabiting this free territory, but doing it right now and
here.
Whenever our feet are placed then, the true Motherland unfolds the common heart of Freedom, Justice and
Dignity for all beings on the Blue Planet.

And this is not just about creating and walking, it is also about unfolding and flowering from the small and
simultaneously exercising a collective work, of learning, of finding a space where to integrate the personal
knowledge into a collective knowing and wisdom.

Thus we feel that there cannot be horizontality without autonomy, and nothing genuine can exist without
Freedom, and nothing worth of the Dream can dance without Love.

And yes, this is a complex as well as fertile relationship. Many times decisions can be made in a horizontal
space that nonetheless is against the criteria of the organization. And there are times that the horizontal
mechanism produces something negative. Thus we can say that horizontality in herself, isolated, does not
make much sense, but only when it is related with true autonomy and the Dream, that is to say, with the
freedom to express, share and build something new in the Heart of Dignity. This is why we talk about an
integral, whole struggle. as the coming forth of an integral, whole new person and relationships.

To Stop the Sword

True Social Practice, True Life practice and expression is a full body one, it is our community in ourselves and
with all beings in all time and space.
Many things are happening in the world since last breath.

Wu Shu, rendered as "Martial Arts" has the implication (in the ideograph "WU") to "stop the sword". The sword
that kills, the sword that gives life.

Let’s not be afraid of "No Gate", lets not be afraid of “don't know”. There is a seed there, an unconditioned seed,
thus pregnant of possibilities. That very not knowing, if it is not mere ignorance but the presence of the mystery
of the living moment is the key.

Only the “mist-ery”, with "mist".

The source of all wonder and creation, says the Old Guy Lao.

That is the vital question. Much more in this moment of the world and humanity and the many beings: to
understand the causes of suffering and how to stop it.
This by no means I think is an individual task. It is something that we can do, we can be free completely from
suffering, but lets be clear about it, this can never happen if all our fellow beings don’t come with us, or we go
with them, to that point. Community practice, community body, community understanding is the need and the
practice.

That will be also impermanent, which is to say has to be renewed in joy moment by moment, this task should be
renewed moment by moment with our whole heart and engaging our whole body, heart and attention as well as
our steps.
After all, if there are no steps there is no horizon, and if thus, where can the Sun of Limitless Life and Freedom
rise and shine?

Let’s emphasise in our social change practice a different kind of practice that has tremendous value. It is a
home, street and everyday based practice. So our building of the new world-new heart happens at this very
moment and place and also when we go out into our everyday life situations. Is there another place?
Another element that I think is important for conceiving this practice of change is how, where and when to
draw the line in practice between full commitment and self-indulgence. There is a subtle line there – each one
of us knows in his or her heart where the line is. So please let’s draw that line, and let’s follow our heart and
our body in drawing that line and not our idea or concepts about how the social practice of change should be. It
is a very subtle line. Each one of us knows where it is and it has to be drawn at each moment, and we need
utter sincerity and straightforwardness with ourselves for this.

Secret Practice, Secret Activism.

Another element I find fundamental is what I call secret practice, secret action. Secret practice, unnoticed
practice, a practice that happens in a very subtle way without necessarily shining with fire crackers or Big
Revolutions.
There is one something about this secret practice that I like to emphasise – that practice that happens and is
even secret to ourselves – we don’t notice that practice is happening. We do not notice those revolutions
shining and blooming.

That is the subtlest way of that secret practice of social change, and of changing ourselves simultaneously.
And it comes forth only when that notion of social action as something special, separated from the rest of our
ordinary life, dissolves completely.

I think on “nothing special” and I think that is another element of social action for real change.
This is just another moment of practice and next breath, next heartbeat we will have just another “One Moment
Revolution”, forever, beyond time and beyond realization.
There is nothing special, here, It is just happening. That quality of “nothing special,” just life itself as practice
and realisation, is at the heart of social action and practice, I do believe and walk.

This may mean that we do not have our old views. And to “hit the mark completely means that you have no
new nest in which to settle”.
What we may be pointing at here when we say “old views” and “no new nest in which to settle” is to see them
as a seed and a cradle.
Sometimes we come to Social action with a certain idea about how things should be, how it should be and what
we are supposed to gain from that practice. But we can say here, we need not to have our old views.

Without denying History and Memory, two necessary roots for understanding and unfolding the present. all
those old views, including the one we had a moment ago, should shed off. With a foot in the past, another in the
future, and our Heart in the present, we do not act from our old views, so that heart and that mind can be
renewed moment by moment.
And this in itself can be shining revolutions and beauty for all beings.

And if we do hit the mark it is better not to have a new nest in which to settle either. What is the point here? It is
a kind of Social action for change that is the heart path of inquiring itself.
Not inquiring toward understanding, and not inquiring for some special understanding, but just inquiring as our
path, forever, being renewed moment by moment.

It is a Walking. We do not have a new nest, we do not act and practice and then arrive at a safe place and stay
there forever.
Call it revolution or New World or whatever you want. It is a Walking.

News for us all – there is no such a thing as that place. Creation, change, transformation, is just walking. It is
inquiring. Formless walking and inquiring.

We have the breathing, we have the ground of this living moment, and we have the inquiring heart and step.

Breathing is our companion in whatever approach we choose to come into the world of Action for Social
Change.
Breathing. And breathing implies relationship: we breathe, outside, inside implies that relationship in which the
outside and the inside really don’t have a sharp line that divide them, so that is an inter-relationship, as the
World is, as our life and walking is. And that relationship, inter-relationship, happens moment by moment in a
flow.
This is the chance, the opportunity, the gate.

Then we have this living moment.

To abide in and as it as pure attention, pure open attention to this living moment so that actuality will come forth
and actualise our heart.
This is the source of true Revolutionary actions and hearts.
This living moment: openness to the unknown, openness to the unexpected, the pregnancy of each moment.

Shedding off our old views, we are completely open to that. That comes together with trusting the unknown,
being friends with uncertainty.
Trusting that dark womb, trusting that pregnancy, that mystery that is our life, moment by moment.

Inspiration for our practice comes from this as the heart and step of True Change.
For that to happen with the “don’t know” mind, the mind that is intimate with that mystery, we need to drop
certainties; we need to drop attachment to fixed conceptions or ideas. Then reality, the need of the present
moment, the right way of action (or non-action) and creation does come forth, advances as actuality itself,
confirming Life and action, actualising it, making it and our life completely actual.

Actuality is another key element.

So what can we say about that process, that Rebel Health movement that we can call “revolutioning”,
expressing and acting “revolutions”?

Written and done in plural and without capital letters) the process and act of transforming the word “revolution”
into a verb?

Sudden realisation, gradual personalisation. That embraces the two aspects of action.
We realise that we “revolutionize” and then we have to give body to that actuality, we have to walk that shining
fact.
Walk the shining fact.

Of course that gradual personalisation happens step by step. But then we can say, we may walk for Social
Change forward, but lets be aware that each step is equal in substance.
A free and unconditioned Heart, a free and unconditioned Love is that “substance”
Then the revolutions shining of life and beauty do down and unfold in the midst of the walking, never solved but
enriching and inspiring every one of our steps.

It’s thus a matter of giving body to it, as in realising the body that is already there, the true body, being one with
that body. The body of this very living moment, the body of our nature, the body of our unique life.

We are, just as we are, that very heart of change. Our life as it is is that very heart.

Lets appreciate ourselves, lets appreciate our life, lets appreciate our dance & struggle.

We are that very walking, that inquiring that has the potent capacity of re-creating life at each living moment.
There the New World does find us, embodies us, as the mystery, as the unknown, as the gate of ease and joy.

So we hope that people in affinity with this vision will also move out of their habitual and conditioned
experiences, from the vertical and oppressive-oppressing structure in which we are generally immersed in, and
bring forth a different type of relationship and work, dropping fear and certainties and the false refuge of a so-
called security that is only the one of a coffin.

This is to say: we have to stop being spectators and become actors in this dream that is unfolding in all rebel
hearts and territories, in many and important cases with the strong wisdom and inspiration of our sisters and
brothers of the Original Peoples of the Land to whom we owe our full and complete solidarity in the struggle in
the deep recognition that without their strong resistance and Dignity over the centuries, the Land would not
have the color of the Earth, but the color of the money and Greed, that is to say, the color of Death.

In our Rebel Health ground we quote the Zapatista Sisters and Brothers when they say:
“The New person (woman and man) is really the very same old person, but one that becomes good by
touching the things with Dignity, this is to say, with respect”.

You are We, just ordinary people, this is to say rebel stubborn and undefeatable people

For Us, for all non-human animals and beings, for the children and the seeds,
this is our challenge and joy, as well as our dance and struggle.

Cheers!!!

Augusto Al Q’adi Alcalde

Rebel Health and the Net of Rebel Solidarities

www.solidaridadesrebeldes.kolgados.com.ar