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The mountains, I become part of it
The herbs, the fir tree, I become part of it.
The morning mists, the clouds, the gathering waters,
I become part of it.
The wilderness, the dew drops, the pollen
I become part of it.
~Navaho Chant
Athabasca Falls, Banff National Park, Canada
In Western culture we have a tendency to talk about nature rather than speak to nature…
~ Didier Lacraze
Spirit Island, Lake Maligne, Jasper National Park – photo by Devadana Sanctuary
I have come to terms with the future.
From this day onward I will walk easy on the earth.
Plant trees.
Kill no living things.
Live in harmony with all creatures.
I will restore the earth where I am.
Use no more of its resources than I need.
And, listen to what it is telling me.
~ M. J. Slim Hooey
Along the Ice Fields Parkway, Banff National Park, Alberta – photo by Devadana Sanctuary
The oaks and the pines, and their brethren of the wood, have seen so many suns rise and set, so many seasons come and go, and so many generations pass into silence, that we may well wonder what “the story of the trees” would be to us if they had tongues to tell it, or we ears fine enough to understand.
~Author Unknown, quoted in Quotations for Special Occasions by Maud van Buren, 1938
Lake Louise, Alberta, Canada – Photo by Devadana Sanctuary
Life in all its variety and beauty calls us for a response – a new integrated understanding of who we are as humans. This is not only about stewardship of the Earth but also about embracing our embeddedness in nature in radical, fresh, and enlivening ways. Humans, Earth, and the rest of life are bound in single story and destiny. It is no longer a question of “saving the environment” as if it were something out there apart from us. We humans are the environment, and it is us…
~ Mary Evelyn Tucker
Forest Goddess, by Lars van de Goor Photography Art, used with permission
We often forget that we are nature. Nature is not something separate from us. So when we say that we have lost our connection to nature, weve lost our connection to ourselves.
~ Andy Goldsworthy
Salt Creek Beach, photo by TAO Photography, used with permission
When you recognize the sacredness, the beauty, the incredible stillness and dignity in which a flower or a tree exists, you add something to the flower or the tree. Through your recognition, your awareness, nature too comes to know itself.
~ Eckhart Tolle
Photo by Zastrozzi Dh Photography, used with permission
We are here to awaken from the illusion of our separateness.
~ Thich Nhat Hanh
Haystack Rock, Cannon Beach, OR – Mirwais Azami Photography, used with permission
You and I are all as much continuous with the physical universe as a wave is continuous with the ocean.
~ Alan Watts
Kauai, Hawaii – photo by Don Smith Photography, used with permission
As a single footstep will not make a path on the earth, so a single thought will not make a pathway in the mind. To make a deep physical path, we walk again and again. To make a deep mental path, we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our lives.
~ Henry David Thoreau
Yosemite and Full Moon – photo by Gary Hart Photography, used with permission
There, on the rock,
where no one will hear,
I will sing the sun up
~ Richard Bear
Fields of Gold – photo by Chris Williams Exploration Photography
When we contemplate the whole globe as one great dewdrop, striped and dotted with continents and islands, flying through space with other stars all singing and shining together as one, the whole universe appears as an infinite storm of beauty.
~ John Muir
Castle Ridge, photo by KR Backwoods Photography, used with permission
Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul alike.
~ John Muir
Bryce Canyon – photo by KR Backwoods Photography, used with permission
Every tree, every plant, has a spirit. People may say that the plant has no mind. I tell them that the plant is alive and conscious. A plant may not talk, but there is a spirit in it that is conscious, that sees everything, which is the soul of the plant, its essence, what makes it alive. The channels through which the water move are the veins of the spirit…
~ Pablo César Amaringo Shuna
Photo by Devadana Sanctuary, used with permission
I am the dust in the sunlight, I am the ball of the sun.
I am the mist of morning, the breath of evening.
I am the spark in the stone, the gleam of gold in the metal;
The rose and the nightingale drunk with its fragrance.
I am the chain of being, the circle of the spheres,
The scale of creation, the rise and the fall.
I am what is and is not . . .
I am the soul in all.
~ Rumi
Yosemite Falls Moonbow – photo by Don Smith Photography, used with permission
