EarthLove

Sharing Songs of Earth and Sky

Autumn Begins with Balance

By Leave a Comment

Today is the autumnal equinox.  Autumn has officially arrived.

An equinox is the moment in which Earth’s equator lines up perfectly with the center of our Sun’s disk. This occurs only twice each year, in March and September.

At the time of an equinox, our Sun rises directly in the east and sets directly in the west. Day and night are precisely equal at the equator — and very close to equal everywhere else on the globe.

Metaphysical thoughts on the equinox from MysticMamma:

Symbolically, it can be viewed as the point when day meets night, where opposites meet on equal ground, where we can integrate the duality within the oneness of existence.
The ancients, who knew themselves to be at one with the Earth, honored these planetary shifts as important reflections of life. As above so below, As within, so without.
This eternal medicine reminds us of the equanimity necessary to reconcile opposites…

 

∞

Thoughts on equanimity and balance from BuddhaNet:

Equanimity is a perfect, unshakable balance of mind, rooted in insight. Looking at the world around us, and looking into our own heart, we see clearly how difficult it is to attain and maintain balance of mind.

Looking into life we notice how it continually moves between contrasts: rise and fall, success and failure, loss and gain, honour and blame. We feel how our heart responds to all this happiness and sorrow, delight and despair, disappointment and satisfaction, hope and fear. These waves of emotion carry us up and fling us down; and no sooner do we find rest, than we are in the power of a new wave again. How can we expect to get a footing on the crest of the waves? How shall we erect the building of our lives in the midst of this ever restless ocean of existence, if not on the Island of Equanimity.

A world where that little share of happiness allotted to beings is mostly secured after many disappointments, failures and defeats; a world where only the courage to start anew, again and again, promises success; a world where scanty joy grows amidst sickness, separation and death; a world where beings who were a short while ago connected with us by sympathetic joy, are at the next moment in want of our compassion – such a world needs equanimity…

∞

Spend a few moments meditating with Mama Earth today. May she help you find your sense of balance and equanimity in the midst of all the waves of change and chaos.

Forest Dreaming

By Leave a Comment

“I felt like lying down by the side of the trail and remembering it all. The woods do that to you, they always look familiar, long lost, like the face of a long-dead relative, like an old dream, like a piece of forgotten song drifting across the water, most of all like golden eternities of past childhood or past manhood and all the living and the dying and the heartbreak that went on a million years ago and the clouds as they pass overhead seem to testify (by their own lonesome familiarity) to this feeling.”

~Jack Kerouac
‘The Dharma Bums’

Solar Eclipse and New Moon

By Leave a Comment

Ring of Fire - Annular Solar Eclipse
Ring of Fire – Annular Solar Eclipse

An annular solar eclipse happens Sunday Feb. 26 as the moon begins anew in watery Pisces. Radical change and chaos is happening all around us — and no place is that more apparent than in the political arena.  Fire is stirring up our inner emotional waters much like molten lava roiling up the sea. Now is the time to slow down and breathe!

Change is coming. Pisces, the powerful dreamer, can help us now. Dream often and dream big. Dream of how you want the world to be. Hold your dream for a beautiful new world close and love it into being.

 

More astrological insights into this time.

Water is Life ❤️

By Leave a Comment

    Maced Woman at Standing Rock                                             Photo by Kelly Daniels, modified by Kat Williams

Sacred Earth Institute stands with Standing Rock. 

“On one side is the unquestioned assumption that land is merely a warehouse of lifeless materials that have been given to (some of) us by God or conquest, to use without constraint. On this view, human happiness is best served by whatever economy most efficiently transforms water, soils, minerals, wild lives, and human yearning into corporate wealth. And so it is possible to love the bottom line on a quarterly report so fiercely that you will call out the National Guard to protect it.

On the other side of the concrete barriers is a story that is so ancient it seems revolutionary.  On this view, the land is a great and nourishing gift to all beings. The fertile soil, the fresh water, the clear air, the creatures, swift or rooted: they require gratitude and veneration. These gifts are not commodities, like scrap iron and sneakers. The land is sacred, a living breathing entity, for whom we must care, as she cares for us. And so it is possible to love land and water so fiercely you will live in a tent in a North Dakota winter to protect them…” 

~Robin Wall Kimmerer & Kathleen Dean Moore

☾☽

 It is time for each of us to treat Mama Earth
with love, honor and respect.

Find Robin and Kathleen’s entire article here: The White Horse and the Humvees—Standing Rock Is Offering Us a Choice

☾☽

Water Is Life

Water is Life

We Give Thanks for All the Earth Lovers

By Leave a Comment

Mother Earth Goddess
Mother Earth Goddess

We give thanks for all those who are moved, in their lives, to heal and protect the earth, in small ways and in large. Blessings on the composters, the gardeners, the breeders of worms and mushrooms, the soil-builders, those who cleanse the waters and purify the air, all those who clean up the messes others have made. Blessings on those who defend trees and who plant trees, who guard the forests and who renew the forests. Blessings on those who learn to heal the grasslands and renew the streams, on those who prevent erosion, who restore the salmon and the fisheries, who guard the healing herbs and who know the lore of the wild plants. Blessings on those who heal the cities and bring them alive again with excitement and creativity and love. Gratitude and blessings to all who stand against greed, who risk themselves, to those who have bled and been wounded, and to those who have given their lives in service of the earth.

May all the healers of the earth find their own healing. May they be fueled by passionate love for the earth. May they know their fear but not be stopped by fear. May they feel their anger and yet not be ruled by rage. May they honor their grief but not be paralyzed by sorrow. May they transform fear, rage, and grief into compassion and the inspiration to act in service of what they love. May they find the help, the resources, the courage, the luck, the strength, the love, the health, the joy that they need to do the work. May they be in the right place, at the right time, in the right way. May they bring alive a great awakening, open a listening ear to hear the earth’s voice, transform imbalance to balance, hate and greed to love. Blessed be the healers of the earth.

-Starhawk

Is This The End of Wild?

By Leave a Comment

Trees and Snow

Taming Nature by Nancy Lankston

I like to spend time camping in Rocky Mountain National Park. I love that place. But the last time I camped there, I came away sad. The hiking trails at RMNP are badly damaged from too many hikers. The campground is stripped of every bush and flower; only the hardiest old pine trees still survive. There is very little natural life left anywhere near the campground. I was haunted by the nagging thought that humans destroy Nature wherever we go.

People have been trying to manage and control the beautiful wild places on earth for generations. But we always seem to end up destroying huge pieces of Nature in the process of trying to preserve and micro-manage it. Environmentalists preach about man’s destruction of Nature all the time. It is sad to realize that a tree hugger like myself can add to the destruction without even realizing it.

I believe that we lost an important connection between humans and Mother Nature when we stopped sleeping on the ground and hunting in the forest every day for dinner. We lost something valuable when we got “civilized.”  And now, with every piece of wildness that we pave over or fence in, we lose even more connection. With every choice we make to ride in a car instead of walking, and with every streetlight that we keep burning all night long, we lose our understanding of the value of wild places.

Somehow we forget that every drop of water we drink and every bite of food we consume is a gift from Nature. We forget that Mother Nature provides everything that sustains our lives. We forget… Is this our proverbial fall from paradise, this act of forgetting?

I look around at everything humans have done to our Earth in the name of progress and I wonder. We seem to have a terminal case of amnesia; we forget that humans are intrinsically a part of Nature. Is this a Christian oops, this idea that humans have dominion over this planet? Where did we come up with the notion that we must tame and subdue and manage every other creature on Earth? Whatever happened to the Christian concepts of kindness and sharing? Apparently those ideals don’t apply to plants and animals.

I shouldn’t pick on Christianity. It’s not like Jews, Buddhists, Hindus or Moslems have a history of being any kinder to our Earth. Most religions act like the human body is a necessary evil rather than a divine miracle. Is it any surprise that those same religions view the body of Mama Earth like a necessary evil to be tamed and controlled?

Can we stop trying to tame Mama Earth? Can we just STOP?  Instead of seeing life as a battle of humans against Nature, can we wake up and connect with the wisdom and wonder of Nature? It is the wisdom and wonder of Nature that makes life on Earth possible!  When will we realize that destroying Nature is as dumb as cutting off our own arm? Are we wise enough to finally choose cooperation over domination?

I know in my heart that I am not separate or distinct from Nature.

This single simple idea feels so critical to me.  But what will it take before I start living like I believe that? When will I start working with Nature, actively listening to Nature, looking to Nature for my answers?

I wonder, what else is possible? Can I learn how to partner and work with Mama Earth rather than doing things to her? It is time to try. Because the truth is, I cannot survive without Nature. Nature and I are one.