Episode 1: When No Thing Works: Systems Collapse & How to Meet This Moment

When everything feels like it's falling apart, how do we make sense of this moment? In this first-ever episode, host Norma Wong introduces the purpose of The Horizon Story podcast and how she makes sense of the world around her in a time of collapse. She is joined by Executive Producer Na'alehu Anthony, and they discuss accelerating change, how to handle anxiety, and what it means to meet this moment maka'ala, eyes wide open.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Did you sleep well last night?

SPEAKER_02 0:03

Well, given the time change and the travel and all of that, pretty well. Pretty well. How about you?

SPEAKER_01 0:09

Well, not bad, given the anxiety with respect to what it is that we're doing today, right? I mean, this isn't our usual thing, right? Definitely not. Definitely not.

SPEAKER_02 0:18

Definitely not.

SPEAKER_01 0:19

But what is usual is we could sit and we could essentially chew the fat forever, right? Yes, we could. Or at least. Well, you could chew the lean. I would chew the fat. Oh no, no, no, no. No, no, no, no. We would both chew the fat, and uh you could go to the mariner's game, and I could applaud you for what it is that you're doing. One day. One day.

SPEAKER_02 0:42

One day you will you will come with me.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

Okay, one day. One day. One day. But uh if we weren't already in relationship with each other, if we didn't already have Pilina, you know, that interwoven relationship that a person might have with another, it wouldn't be possible to just sit and talk story, uh talk story about anything, uh, let alone this thing called origins. And origins do matter. They matter. So before we begin, I do want to make sure that I do this. I want to acknowledge all the people who are making this possible, including the people that uh I had a bit of a say a critical struggle with, right, in order to have this conversation. What the critical struggle is, is uh leaning into the notion of having this kind of conversation in plain sight with people it is that I have never met. And I want to acknowledge that that is something I'm not taking for granted at all. Now, it could very well be that when all said and done, it's just you and me on the set, and there's actually nobody watching, and we won't know that for a while. But in the meantime, uh assuming that there are, I do want to acknowledge uh the viewers and the listeners who are taking this moment uh to be in this kind of reflection with us. And I would be remiss if I didn't start by thanking uh ancestors and teachers. Teachers who are uh still with us and teachers who have since passed. So, man, thank you for being here. Really?

SPEAKER_02 3:05

Happy to be here. Thank you for having me. Um I was thinking about why in the world would I do such a thing? Why in the world would you do such a thing? As this. And um because it would be more natural, I think, for for you and I to be on a podcast, very short and quiet podcast called A Conversation Among Introverts. Oh, okay. But that that will be for another day.

SPEAKER_01 3:35

It would also be very short. It'd be very quiet. Very short, very quiet. And we would hope for new no viewers.

SPEAKER_02 3:41

Exactly, and we probably would have none. But um the the truth is, is I was um, you know, this morning when I woke up uh being on a different time zone, uh the sun was barely rising, and so I I took myself out for a walk and made my way down to the water's edge. And uh I stood there remembering the stories that I've heard you and Na Lehu tell about your ancestors and how they believed that across the vast sea, somewhere, that there surely must be more land and more people, and that they would eventually set about going to find that, even not knowing for sure that it was there. And um the to me, this podcast and having this conversation is a little bit like that. We don't know exactly what will come of it, but we know that we have to we have to go. And so um at the top of episode one, when you said let's get to work, I thought that's the call, let's get to work, let's do it. And you know, I'm a team player, and this is my team, and so let's do it.

SPEAKER_01 5:21

Well, you're a pretty good coach, too. That only a team player. I've noticed that over the over time. And uh, even though I won't go to a baseball game with you, I never say never. Well, okay, up until this moment, I haven't gone to a baseball game with you. Uh, that uh I do take notice with respect to the deep observation that someone would have if they were to sit through something as long as America's pastime, right? Right, that whole notion of just watching everything open up and play out uh and either come together or not, right? And you have to wait for it to come together. And and I've noticed how it is that you are with people trying to see whether or not they will open up and come together, whether they'll even play, right, whether they'll even come to something. And I think that that's why we had the instinct. Uh non-stoops needs to be on this first part, this first part of the podcast as we're opening up. Right.

SPEAKER_02 6:41

If we could stop talking about me and talk talk about you, um, I if I could uh offer an observation, uh speaking of those that I've had of you, is that um you have said more and more frequently uh recently that this is no time for the small game. That's right. No time for the small game. No, no time for that. And so um my observation is that uh you have moved into the big game. You've written the two books, you're traveling globally to um a worldwide audience, you're trying new things, you're making the leaps, uh, and now here we have this podcast. Do you want to say a little bit more about why a podcast, why now, and um what should what are you hoping for the listeners to um to engage with?

SPEAKER_01 7:44

You know, my ancestors, in terms of ancestors um both on the Hakka side, on the native Hawaiian side, and my ancestors who are Zen teachers. So if I look at those three sets of teachers, what I know about them is that uh the conversations that they would have with people would be consequential, but would be with right with the people who are right in front of them. Okay. I happen to have benefited from that. Right in front of them, sitting down in a room or outside uh on the grass or uh in the dojo or in the kitchen, around the table or not, you know, wherever it is that we are, you would be uh in relationship to all of the things literally, meaning you're hearing it and you're hearing it exactly from that person who heard it from another person in a very similar setting. And that is how it's been from time immemorial. And so there for me, there was even like this great reluctance about writing the book, uh, let alone the second book. Um but here's where all of that ended up in that decision, which is also about how this decision got made about the podcast. And that is if we are indeed in this accelerated collapse, in which all of the wisdom that is by the way, not mine, right, but that which I am just bringing forward from observations of ancestors and teachers that I have had, and uh practicing it in the contemporary moment. Okay, that that's all that I'm doing. So all of that, can it actually get transmitted to people quickly enough if people have to be directly in front of you? And my teacher actually worried about that before he passed, and now it's been some time since he passed. So he worried about it then. He passed the worry on to me, and I know that uh that conversation that we had before he passed, he had no idea that there would be this thing called, you know, podcasts and social media and all of that type of stuff, that there would be such acceleration. Yeah, but at that moment he knew and he passed on the concern. And so then you have to live and work with uh the understanding of what do you do about that? Right, what do you do about that? Do you say, well, this is how we've always done it, and that's how it's going to be, and only the people in front of you are gonna be the ones that you transmit this to. Or do you take a chance? All right, do you take a chance? Now, in my family, we have some gamblers, and I'm not one of those. So I didn't pick up the gambling gene, but I think I picked up the part of the gambling gene that has to do with when the time comes, you have to take the risk and you have to go. And I I believe that that is what this is all about, right? Can't play small. Right. And you know, you and I have had that conversation with people, right? You just can't play small. You have to take a risk that the people who are listening are the people who are uh intended to be listening. And there'll be some folks, you know, who are going to try to move it into the places uh that will make sense and will not make sense. But I also have to uh have this faith, and I'm not a person of a lot of faith, I have to have the faith that anyone who is not bored by what it is that we're talking about today, Nan, are the right people to listen to it. And everyone else would be bored. And that would be the great filter, right? The great sieve, the great colander that sorts out everything that it is.

SPEAKER_02 12:36

Yeah. You know, um when you were talking about the the gambling gene, of course, that kind of called into the science part of me. Uh-huh. And um it makes me think that everyone who is listening um may not have a dominant gene pre genetic predisposition to the conversation, but surely there is a recessive gene waiting to come to life. Oh. And um and so that's what we're doing.

SPEAKER_01 13:11

Oh, that's a very interesting way to think about it. Well, if that's the case, then evolution is on its way. Yes, it is. Let's take a quick break and we'll be back uh still talking uh with Nan about origins and beginnings and that part of origin and beginning that is source. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00 13:39

What to do when nothing works. With Wise and Witty Pros, Zen Master and Indigenous strategist Norma Wong reflects on this question and more in her acclaimed first book, When No Thing Works. Norma weaves poetry, storytelling, and meditation, inviting us to imagine a horizon of possibility beyond crisis. Hard copy and audiobook available now. Shopbookshop.com and support your local bookstore.

SPEAKER_02 14:15

As Norma mentioned, we're going to be talking about origins. And uh we could call this segment here The Life and Times of Norma Wong. Uh, so before we get into uh whatever origin story you want to tell today, would you say a little bit about why it's important to talk about origin, to know one's own origin story? How will you know how it is that you got to where you are?

SPEAKER_01 14:46

I mean, it's it's that's a pretty simple thing, right? And it it doesn't mean that everything in the past is a determinant for who it is that you are, what it is that you do today, right? It's it's none of it is faded to be so. But there'd be so many things that can help fill in the explanation about you know how it is that you come to be the person who it is that you are right now. Uh it's also important to have the sense of origin that's not like solely tied to your one single life, okay, which is a thing that I'm also cognizant of when I talk with people uh who have had their past ruptured in some way, right? Disconnected. So they might not even know like the exact place that they were born at, or they wouldn't know uh where exactly their parents um came from, or even who their actual parents are, right? So there's all of that that could be like a mystery, but to have it an inquiry of curiosity, not about your specific ancestral line, but the things that occurred in the past, and in the peoples who would have likely been there in that past, and where those people came from, what their migratory path might have been, the places that they lived, uh, what were the conditions that they lived under, all of that. Um, and what was the earth doing at that time? Was it in the same tumultuous state as this is right now? So, you know, when we ask the question, uh it's the weather is not normal. Well, when was normal? When would we peg that? Could be somebody's origin story. They could say, I remember that uh, you know, in the the last time that uh weather was normal was in the spring of you know uh 1943 or whatever it might be, right? And say, well, you're you were born after that. And you say, that's right, I was born after that. But that's what the story came down to me, that the spring of 1943 was when everything shifted. So it's it's like filling in the gaps of the potential lines of story that would end up with your current story. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 17:38

What do you want the listeners to know about your origin story?

SPEAKER_01 17:44

Oh, man, let's see. Uh well, we're we're going for G-rated, right? Yes, correct?

SPEAKER_02 17:49

Just for today.

SPEAKER_01 17:50

Just for today, okay. And I know this is not radio, so technically uh we could have, we could say certain words, but we'll try not to do that because we're gonna keep it G-rated.

SPEAKER_02 18:00

If you cue me, I can, you know, like beep or something.

SPEAKER_01 18:04

Okay. Okay, okay. You could be the sound effect. Yeah. All right, okay, we could do that. Um, let's see, where shall we start? Uh so I I think we'll start with um, well, lately. Here's where I've been starting lately. Where I've been starting lately is a few weeks ago, uh, I turned 70. Okay. So great. I think so. So great. I think so.

SPEAKER_02 18:30

You look good for 70, by the way.

SPEAKER_01 18:32

Well, thank you. Thank you so much. Um, you know, the uh well, I I endeavored to wash my face this morning, so that helps, right? That helps get a little sleep. Um, but how I'm gonna look basically at a particular age is actually gonna be less about me and about my genes, right? Not the ones you wear, but the ones that you're made of, right? And uh I would say what I can say about my genes is that that I have a number of ancestors who lived a long time. And therefore, uh in terms of how it is that I can face this particular moment, is that I was set up in the right direction for that. Okay, so not not having much to do with much else than that. Okay. And it would begin with the fact that I have never lived anywhere else. Okay, this is my home. I have never called any other place my home. The short time that I might have lived away, it would be very short, uh, would have been for a period maybe as long as six months when I was going to school on the East Coast. But I certainly uh didn't call that place home with no disrespect for anybody for whom that is their home. That is not my home, right? Uh but that this place would be my home would have a long origin associated with it, and that would have begun at a time that would have meant a time of migration. Okay, both on my native Hawaiian side and on my Hakka Chinese side. Hakka Chinese who would have come here in the 1870s to this place called Hawaii. And uh, in that first few uh ships that came over, that they were all men according to the contracts of the time, came to work in the plantations. And the intention was that they would return, and so they would not bring family with them, they would not bring women with them, they would just come to work in the fields. But many stayed, like my ancestors did, they stayed. And so if you do the math, and I I know you're big into that, right? Math, right? So if you do the math, I perked up. You perked up, yes, I noticed that. If you do the math, then if you say your ancestors came at that time, then they you could not only be Hakka Chinese or Bunti Chinese or Cantonese Chinese. You would have to be a mixture of some other. And the other that blended so well for the Hakka Chinese were the Native Hawaiians. And for the Native Hawaiians, the other that blended so well were the Chinese. Why do you think that was? You know, I think that it was because they had common loves, common desires. They loved uh family and land. They all sought to have like a place where they could grow a few vegetables, you know, uh take care of a few chickens, uh, that they respected the ocean. Uh many of them were, you know, uh either good fishermen or like my uh my grandfather and a father and his father before him were experts in terms of making nets. So both the crab nets as well as the throw nets, you know, these huge nets that they would essentially carry over the shoulder and they would wait patiently at the shoreline. And then they cast the net in a huge arc that would land like a large umbrella onto the ocean. And the notion is you would throw it in front of the fish in the direction they were moving to, not where the fish are, or you would miss them. Right? And so that that sense of observation, I would say, is not mine. It is genetic. It would be genetic in this sense. It's not that some people are born to be good fishermen or to be good farmers. It's that once having practiced that for the entirety of their life, it is now in their cellular memory. And in that cellular memory, they would pass that cellular memory on to descendants. So, you know, there's this long strand, right? So they migrated here, but so did the Native Hawaiians, right? When they met up, they were meeting at a place that both had came to one many more years before, right? So Native Hawaiians, about the year 400 essentially, is when they would come. And they would make this place home, right? The place that they migrated to, right? But you know, my life has straddled like these ways in which we would not know that history and then we would come upon that history. And if you're lucky, not only through the political lens, but through a lens that would be more about just the exploration of things. And I was fortunate that the conversations that I had would be uh with people who they would say they're not very well educated. And what they meant is that they hadn't gone to school very long. And what they meant is they could actually talk story. You know, they if if you wanted to know something, you would sit down and they would just tell you a long story. And if you sat long enough, you would learn the same long story. So, you know, my story is like a mixture of things that have occurred before me and about things that happened after I was born and the consequential movement of people in Hawaii over this relatively short period of time, over 70 years, which I know is a matter of perspective. So if you're as a young person and you like haven't reached the age of 20 yet, you'll look and you go, 70 years, that's such a long time. Then of course, I know, looking back, I could say it was both long and short. And that in this moment that we would consequentially come into a new way of thinking about this place call Hawaii, no longer just a possession of the United States, right? Uh, no longer just a uh strategic military outpost, but to look forward to a different kind of destiny of our own making. That would have been the kind of conversation that we've had when I was in my 20s and 30s.

SPEAKER_02 26:46

And we can see how much that's informed by what you've said about how it is that your ancestors came together, what brought them together, the values, the experiences, the wantings that they shared. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:02

So I I'm really aware that, you know, we are that I also apparently inherited, you know, like this whole notion of the long story. Yeah. So um I I need a short break. Okay. Can we go ahead and take one? We'll do that, we'll come back to more of the long story. All right, we'll take a break and come back to long story. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_00 27:30

In her highly anticipated sequel, Who We Are Becoming Matters, Zen Master and Indigenous Strategist Norma Wong asks, will you choose humanity? Poetic and practical, Norma explores who we can become and how we can evolve, not in spite of, but directly in response to crisis and challenge. Hard copy and audiobook available now. Shopbookshop.com and support your local bookstore.

SPEAKER_01 28:05

Hello friends. Uh thank you. Nan and I needed a short break and and we're back again. Uh so Nan, you know, in the during the break, we're talking about like the kinds of things that you still have an interest in as far as how we came to be here.

SPEAKER_02 28:24

Yeah, I mean, I think so much of a uh why we're here does have to do with your own journey through your origin story. And so I know there's a lot you haven't told yet, and I wonder if you want to continue on with some of the maybe speed up a little bit through through time and um particularly around like perspectives that have been important to you, life experiences and so forth.

SPEAKER_01 28:54

Okay, let me do that. I'm I'm also aware that uh, you know, given this notion of uh origin, uh that and story. So if you look at origin and story, it's not important to tell the entire story at you know at one time. And in fact, different parts of it may become available at different times and connect it to things that are happening right now. And that's when the that's when it'll bubble up. So, you know, we'll try not to take it as a linear thing, you know, like as in, okay, all the viewers on the tune. Well, you know, oh well, but I I I believe that actually in both science and math, right, there is a whole part of that in nature uh the spiral, right, is one of the essential forms, right? Which means that there is that notion of things coming back to where they started from, right? I'm just testing that. You're well taken.

SPEAKER_02 29:58

Okay, all right. There is usually a through line that pulls Okay, there's a through line.

SPEAKER_01 30:02

There's a through line.

SPEAKER_02 30:02

Anyway, that's a that's another podcast.

SPEAKER_01 30:04

Okay, all right. So uh so let's take the through line. Okay, the through line. So the through line here would be uh that there would be moments in which uh I would begin to think about things differently, right? One of those moments was in my 20s and 30s when Hawaii was going through an entire renaissance moment, uh revisation of the native language, uh culture, music. Uh, a great blooming was going on uh politically, not only from the native Hawai community, but the community that we would call the people who call this place home. And uh uh entire ways in which we were looking at issues, and I would benefit from that. I would be a minor player in it, but benefited from being in that environment in my 20s and 30s. And I would count as being consequential, is that that would also be the same time that I would begin my practice in Zen Buddhism. And so my spiritual path and my political community path were not on separate courses. They were in uh courses that intermingled uh with each other, right? And I call myself very lucky, fortunate that that's the case, because I know that for many people uh there's like a a um a constrained uh container of one or the other, right? And of course we're having a consequential conversation right now um politically, right, about religion and politics. Uh and here I would I would say that that's not what we're talking about here. Okay, what we're talking about here is um the practice of uh deep inquiry occurring at the same moment where you're being asked politically to be a deeply inquiring person. Okay, and so you're not imposing the values of one or the other. You're in the practice of making sure that if you're going to be making a decision, or you're going to be uh in advising someone who's making a decision, or if you're going to be a policy wonk, which I was pretty big policy wonk, I still have some wonkiness. Yes, you do. I have some wonkiness here, which is what another thing that binds us, right? Perhaps. A little bit of wonkiness, right? That that is the um that you would do so not only with whatever is in front of you, but in inquiring deeper than that, inquiring to uh the source of issues, the roots of things, the causes of things, the impacts of your decisions, that you would know that every decision that gets made would have impacts. Okay. So, you know, if you if I force fast forward uh uh into this, um skipping over large parts of my personal um uh biography, I would say that a really significant moment for me uh would come relatively recently, and that would have been during the pandemic. Okay. Do you remember where you were when you went into quarantine?

SPEAKER_02 34:04

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 34:05

What were you?

SPEAKER_02 34:06

At home.

SPEAKER_01 34:07

Okay. Well, that's good. Yeah because they're supposed to stay home. Yes. Right? Okay. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And um, and were your loved ones with you?

SPEAKER_02 34:18

Uh my son was in college. Fortunately, his senior year. No, actually, he had just he had graduated. He got out just before. Okay. So, but nearby and yeah, partner with me, dog with me.

SPEAKER_01 34:32

Right. Yeah. So your small family basically, you knew where they were.

SPEAKER_02 34:36

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 34:36

And you knew that you're gonna basically go to ground, right? Yes. At that point. Yes. And um you're still working at the coalition, right? At that time? Yes. Okay. And so did your organization uh shut down very quickly?

SPEAKER_02 34:53

We went remote very quickly. Very quickly.

SPEAKER_01 34:56

Okay, so it you kept working, but you were you were all remote, basically. Yes. At that point.

SPEAKER_02 35:02

Yes. And being a very community-oriented, communal kind of um having a work style that was like that was challenging.

SPEAKER_01 35:10

Okay, all right. So our lives changed a lot. Completely. Right, completely. Everybody would have a story about that, and everybody would have a story about how you navigate it, um, the especially the first few months in which information was in such a disarray, right? And and that would be the case. And um I began to have a deep appreciation for the fact that it would not actually matter how much I focused or anyone in Hawaii focused on Hawaii. That there would be things that would happen outside of Hawaii that would completely change our lives in the current moment and would completely change our trajectory going forward. Yep. And so that we could not just say this is the place, these are the peoples that we're just going to focus on. And in some ways, uh discount.

unknown 36:23

Right?

SPEAKER_01 36:23

I mean, you might like, oh, okay, yes, we are a state in the United States, and so we're subject to federal laws and things like that. But oh, we'll get an exception. Hawaii, by the way, is you know, is had to get lots of exceptions for federal kinds of things because we are uh we're not typical of the geography or the um uh uh ways of in which we have to carry out things or the issues that our peoples have, right? And so we have to get lots of exceptions. But when you get you can get good at that, and the way you get good at that is you see the world happening separately from your world, and you go, if that is what they say is normal, we are extra special normal, and we're gonna just carve ourselves out. And the pandemic really brought it home to me that you can only do so many carve-outs. And if that's what everybody was going to do, then we would be in the deepest of kimchies.

SPEAKER_03 37:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:40

Okay. Uh which was not a comment. People who don't eat kimchi. Okay, well, it's not a comment on on your uh cultural orientation. Uh huh. Okay, yeah. So people don't eat it. So we would be deep in a vat of fermented smelliness. Okay. Okay, all right. Uh which some people would love and some people would not, but in which we'd have to, we we would not understand how it is we got there. And I could see us slipping into that um during the pandemic. Every person for themselves, every community trying to make it on their own. And I had to suspend my judgment about that because I had to understand, you know, in lots of ways, very successfully, that's what we have done in a way. That's exactly what we have done. And I had to stretch my notion of what my responsibility is, therefore. And that's part of the origin of this rapid shift in thinking about what the consequences for all peoples might be. If we do not wake up from that delusion, right, that all we have to do is take care of ourselves and we'll be fine.

SPEAKER_02 39:17

First episode you talked about collapse, you and not lead um the pandemic was uh a glimpse of collapse. Um, here we are again. Do you would you say a little bit about uh again, about the collapse that we're currently in, how that is different from the pandemic, which I think all listeners could agree on kind of what that was. Um maybe not as clear this time. And um anything you want to connect again through your perspectives, your origin to the current collapse that we're in.

SPEAKER_01 40:00

Okay. So uh I I'm not a historian, but I've read up a little bit about things that have happened in human history. And I know that uh we have we have been in many crises before as humans, right? Um we certainly have been in more epidemics that as a percentage of the population were much more decimating than the pandemic is. I think what the pandemic did is it waked us up from the delusion of our superiority of modern times, that we would be able to hold those kinds of things at bay because of the discoveries that we have made as modern people. And I think that that that is uh that was like a startling thing that just like like really woke us up in a particular way. Okay. Um uh but we've been we've been through wars, we've been through all of those. What is uh uh different about this particular moment, I believe, um, is that we are in like overlapping crises. Okay, okay, so uh of which no single thing is taking precedent, and what we're beginning to see with a lot more um uh detail is how when you move to try to resolve one part of something, the impacts of that will just continue to radiate out, and some will be beneficial to some people, and much of it will not be beneficial to most people, and then it will have a cascading domino effect as as it goes. And and and we're seeing that. We're seeing that so you know we two leaders choose to uh make their move, um basically, uh for uh causes that are about the security of their peoples and other peoples, and they choose to make a particular move, and the move that they make then puts many billions of people at risk. Okay. And when you when you take a look at at that as it as it plays itself out, right, and you say, well, what is the origin of our not understanding that that is something that is likely to happen? What is the origin of that? What is it about the human condition that would make us not understand the impacts that we would have on other peoples as we pursued our own survival, as we pursued our own success? So I think in a in a nutshell, if we could talk about nutshells, uh uh in a pretty big nutshell, uh this is the origin of this inquiry.

SPEAKER_03 43:27

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 43:28

Yeah. Uh friends, we're gonna take uh one last break uh before we end this episode. Uh I would invite you to uh think about the kind of inquiry you might want to make about the origin of how it is that you've arrived at this point where you're asking questions that you've never asked before. They may be different questions than I had, but that is worth thinking about, worth putting down. We'll be right back.

SPEAKER_00 44:09

What to do when nothing works. With Wise and Witty Pros, Zen Master and Indigenous strategist Norma Wong reflects on this question and more in her acclaimed first book, When Nothing Works. Norma weaves poetry, storytelling, and meditation, inviting us to imagine a horizon of possibility beyond crisis. Hard copy and audiobook available now. Shopbookshop.com and support your local bookstore.

SPEAKER_01 44:43

Hello friends, welcome back. You know, Nan and I have been talking about origins, and I hope that you will take a little bit of time to think about your origin as well. And in that, you know, we're really talking about not us as individuals, but us collectively. So my story may be different than your story, but there is a part where we could essentially say that there's the story of our peoples and the story of our place, and the story as it begins to unfold. Why would we even think about that? We think about that because we have a moment to think about that, and then we won't. And what do I mean by that? If everyone, everything is accelerating, if everyone is in the acceleration mode, then we could be quickly looking at a time when we won't be able to like set and reset and place ourselves in the arc of things in which we are tethered to our origins, and to understand that what we're doing right now will be the origin of some future, some future peoples, some future places. And this is an important part of who it is that we are and who we are becoming. Origins matter, but they don't have to be determinative, which is to say they don't have to be like the exact reasons why we are what we are right now, let alone who are we're gonna become. So origins more than determining illuminate. They illuminate, they tell stories about peoples and places and reasons and motivations, and all of that is very important. We'll have parts of this origin story that will uh come into future episodes, but for now uh we'll begin to shift what it is that we'll be in conversation about. And we're gonna shift into what this quickly changing moment means. What is it that we're holding on to and what is being stripped away even as we speak, even as we pause to think about origins or anything else? And so in this next episode, among the things that we will be covering will be uh that the many ways that have gotten us to this point, now now history. It's like to think about returning to that moment is uh folly, and we should set that aside. This would probably be the most controversial thing I've said so far, uh, in um a series that's going to enter into a number of controversial things. Right. Nan's here, she knows part of the story, and so she knows that that will be the case. The notion that as we enter this moment, that it's not going to be possible for us to return to a moment before the chaos, and if we try to do that, that we will limit our possibilities will be the subject matter of this next episode. So, friends, uh thank you for being with us. Uh thank you for listening. Uh take a moment, uh take a breath, take a walk, and we'll see you soon. The Horizon Story Podcast was produced by Sarah Damares de Rivera and Bryson Hole, hosted and written by me, executive producer Na'alehu Anthony, Associate Producer Scott Nine, featuring Nan Stoops, for Collective Acceleration Kelly Miller, for OEV TV, Ken Sato, Wesley Kealoha, Courtney Leong, Jeff Lee, and Ivy Lagadlag. For Pa'akai Communications, Jamila Silver, Diana Hahn, Pearl Tilley, and Christine Matsuda, Hair and Makeup by Chris Jose. Mahalo to the place of my birth, ancestors, teachers, collaborators and friends, Rosie Abrium for the support, and Todd James for the encouragement. The Horizon Story is brought to you by OEVTV, copyright held by Collective Acceleration. Follow us on social at The Horizon Story. Questions to Hello at the HorizonStory.com. Visit us where you find your favorite podcasts or at thehorizonstory.com.