Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.
~ Arundhati Roy
Lower Yellostone Waterfall, WY – photo from bigstockphoto.com, used with permission
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There is a tree. Somewhere
A tree that I know
A tree that knows me
Ready to receive all my joys and my sorrows
My laughter and my tears
There is a tree. Somewhere,
That has weathered all my storms
And held me through the dark night of the soul
When the howling winds shredded to pieces
Everything I thought was me.
On the soft carpet of its golden needles
I found true release
And in its rugged embrace
I fell into presence
There is a tree. Somewhere.
A tree that you know.
A tree that loves you
A tree
That is you.
~ Nicole Schwab
Angel Oak, SC – photo from bigstockphoto.com, used with permission
The sacred is all around us, woven with stories and starlight, in the rich texture of the soil, and in certain dreams that come on certain nights. And yet it is also hidden, fading from sight, forgotten, lost in the dramas of daylight, in the harsh light of a civilization with its ever-present smartphones and computers. This is the strangest story of our present time: that something so essential, the oxygen of the soul, is left unnoticed, even in its absence. Our culture searches for answers to so many questions – the particles of existence, the genes that make up our body – and yet leaves unasked what is most vital. What has happened to the sacred that alone can give meaning to life – the simple truth that was known to all cultures before us? Like the forests we have clear-cut centuries ago and no longer even remember, we do not know what we have lost. And we as a culture are not even asking the question, not even considering what this might mean.
~ Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, from “The Loss of the Sacred and A Prayer for the Earth”
Aurora Borealis, Alaska – photo from bigstockphoto.com, used with permission
Hold your hands out over the earth as over a flame. To all who love her, who open to her the doors of their veins, she gives of her strength, sustaining them with her own measureless tremor of dark life. Touch the earth, love the earth, honor the earth, her plains, her valleys, her hills, and her seas; rest your spirit in her solitary places. For the gifts of life are the earth’s and they are given to all, and they are the songs of birds at daybreak, Orion and the Bear, and dawn seen over ocean from the beach.
~ Henry Beston
Russel Falls, Tasmania, Australia – photo from bigstockphoto.com, used with permission
It really boils down to this: that all life is interrelated. We are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
Swans at Scottish Lake – photo from bigstockphoto.com, used with permission
The breezes at dawn have secrets to tell you
Don’t go back to sleep!
You must ask for what you really want.
Don’t go back to sleep!
People are going back and forth
across the doorsill where the two worlds touch,
The door is round and open
Don’t go back to sleep!
~ Rumi
Sunrise, Caribbean Sea – photo from bigstockphoto.com, used with permission
…along with the other animals, the stones, the trees, and the clouds, we ourselves are characters within a huge story that is visibly unfolding all around us, participants within the vast imagination, or Dreaming, of the world.
~ David Abram, The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-Than-Human World
Bighorn Sheep – Glacier National Park, photo from bigstockphoto.com, used with permission
The Earth can teach us how to live in harmony and oneness as part of the great web of life. Once again we can learn how to walk in a sacred manner, experience her wonder and mystery, care for her soul as well as her soil.
~ Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee
Deep Tropical Jungle, Southeast Asia – photo from bigstockphoto.com, used with permission
The future will be in the hands of those of you who belong to the 21st century. You have the opportunity and responsibility to build a better humanity. This means developing warm-heartedness in this very life, here and now. So, do whatever work you do, but ask yourselves now and then, “How can I contribute to human beings being happier and more peaceful?”
~ H.H. the Dalai Lama
Cliffs of Moher, Ireland – photo by Patryk Kosmider, bigstockphoto.com, used with permission
Children, language, lands: almost everything was stripped away, stolen when you werent looking because you were trying to stay alive. In the face of such loss, one thing our people could not surrender was the meaning of land. In the settler mind, land was property, real estate, capital, or natural resources. But to our people, it was everything: identity, the connection to our ancestors, the home of our nonhuman kinfolk, our pharmacy, our library, the source of all that sustained us. Our lands were where our responsibility to the world was enacted, sacred ground. It belonged to itself; it was a gift, not a commodity, so it could never be bought or sold. These are the meanings people took with them when they were forced from their ancient homelands to new places.
~ Robin Wall Kimmerer
Cathedral Rock, Sedona, AZ – photo from bigstockphoto.com, used with permission
Watching the simple wonder of a dawn can be a prayer in itself. Or when we hear the chorus of birds in the morning we may sense that deeper joy of life and awake to its divine nature. While at night the stars can remind us of what is infinite and eternal within us and within the world. Whatever way we are drawn to wonder or pray, what matters is always the attitude we bring to this intimate exchange: whether our prayers are heartfelt rather than just a mental repetition. It is always through the heart that our prayers are heard, even if we first make the connection in our feet or hands. Do we really feel the suffering of the earth, sense its need? Do we feel this connection with creation, how we are a part of this beautiful and suffering being? Then our prayers are alive, a living stream that flows from our heart. Then every step, every touch, will be a prayer for the earth, a remembrance of what is sacred. We are a part of the earth calling to its Creator, crying in its time of need.
~ Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, “Praying for the Earth”
St. Mary Lake Sunset, Glacier Natl Park – photo from bigstockphoto.com, used with permission
In the past, shamans, priests, and priestesses were the keepers of the sacred knowledge of life They helped people remember that all trees are divine and that all animals speak to those who listen.
~ Ted Andrews, “Animal Speak”
Scarlet Ibis, Trinidad and Tobago – photo from bigstockphoto.com, used with permission
We must change our lives, so that it will be possible to live by the…assumption that what is good for the world will be good for us. And that requires that we make the effort to know the world and to learn what is good for it. We must learn to cooperate in its processes, and to yield to its limits. But even more important, we must learn to acknowledge that the creation is full of mystery; we will never entirely understand it. We must abandon arrogance and stand in awe. We must recover the sense of the majesty of creation, and the ability to be worshipful in its presence. For I do not doubt that it is only on the condition of humility and reverence before the world that our species will be able to remain in it.
~ Wendell Berry
Sunset on Fitz Roy, Patagonia – photo from bigstockphoto.com, used with permission