Nature: our greatest inspiration.

Reconnecting to Self

Reconnecting with Nature, reconnecting with self.
I have found that I need to be in nature as much as possible. Having King our little dog ensures that we go to the woods for his exercise each day and that works really well for me as the woods have a lovely quality of air and I love the freshness of the atmosphere especially after the rain. We also meet other lovely animal companions and their guardians and squirrels, all sort of birds and of course the beautiful trees including yews, oaks, and chestnuts.
 
As I was meditating yesterday, I perceived that one of the reasons many people these days are unhappy is because they are disconnected from themselves: disconnected from their souls and what they love.
If people managed to reconnect daily with themselves and listened to their hearts they would experience greater self-fulfilment and happiness.
If people then went on to cultivating their connection with the planet and nature and with each other, we would have a much richer experience of life which would also bring greater happiness. It would help us to really understand that we are indeed never truly alone.
 
There are so many stories of spiritual masters meditating in nature, with Buddha under the Bodhi tree and Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane to name a couple. There are also depictions of Kuan Yin the goddess of compassion standing or sitting on a lotus flower and travelling on a turtle. Beautiful areas of nature also form places of pilgrimage, devotion and sacred rituals. Visions of Mother Mary have occurred in many natural places, in caves and near springs. Going on a pilgrimage to a holy or sacred place was common as a means of connecting with one’s Source or Creator however I believe it really is about connecting with self, the Divine Self within, I call it Soul.
 
The indigenous peoples still maintain their connection with Earth, where they are able to, and they have a profound connection, reverence and love for the land, sky and water ways. They do not take more than they need ensuring that there is always enough for their descendants.
 
Perhaps nature is where we most easily meet ourselves through a simple connection with Earth. Maybe just being in a natural setting, as landscaped gardens can also be places of meditation and devotion, can help to elevate our consciousness to that of unity and oneness and ultimately to the love that holds this universe together.
 
 
When I think of trees and plants, I tend to see them as extensions of Earth, extensions of the land taking a form other than rocks and mountains. I started to perceive humans as walking versions or extensions of Earth after that! I think my soul was trying to tell me that we are connected to Earth, we are Earth just that we are walking, talking mobile parts of this planet! This also applies to animals and all lifeforms, be they bacteria or viruses. We are all Earth. Therefor to extend this further, we are all this solar system, galaxy and universe.
 
We cannot escape our connection to one another and our connection to Earth, however I think many of us have ignored this and one of the reasons we have people with so little respect for our finite resources is because of this: Earth is not in many people’s consciousness as a part of themselves, it is other, outside of them.
 
This is the same as thinking we are completely alone and apart from others whereas the truth is we are all One. When one part hurts, all other parts hurt.
 
There was a great experiment done by some scientists where they took a person’s cheek cells and took them a distance away from their source, about a few miles away if I remember correctly. They subjected the cheek cells to some electric shocks and were surprised to discover that the human donor at some level showed signs of reacting to these shocks are the same time!
 
If you think of your body as a planet and play around with the visuals of your hair as trees and plants and the bumps and rounded protrusions are mountains, hills or molehills (hahaha!) then you may begin to perceive yourself as a complex entity not unlike a planet. Out body is made of many parts, with blood vessels and lymph like rivers and the muscles like soil and bones like mountains and hills and gorges. If I cut my finger, all of me goes ouch! It is not just my finger which hurts but all of me! Including my mind! How many of you have had a toothache and it has affected your thoughts and you have felt tired, on edge and grouchy from it?
 
We cannot take our hearts out and expect the rest to function properly. Even doctors nowadays agree that the appendix does have a function and perhaps is best left within the body.
 
It is the same with Earth.
We are all connected and we are connected with this planet.
Disconnection begets pain as we do not appreciate all the wealth and resources available to us, there is just lack because somehow in our psyches we know something is missing and we try to fill it up with all sort of things yet this takes us further and further away from what we yearn for.
 
Creating connections is so easy, have you tried just saying hello to the person you go past every morning on the way to work? This is also creating a connection even if you get a funny look for your efforts.
 
Creating a connection or re-connecting with yourself with Earth is also easy. Just take a walk in the park and listen, sense and look around you. Do not try to rationalise anything that you see or hear, just be in the moment of being in the park, having a walk, smelling the flowers, playing with someone’s dog and admiring the colours around you.
 
Nature is the number one inspiration for artists and creators! How do you think people understood geometry? By looking at flowers and trees! How did creators get the idea for rubber suckers, by looking at the octopus! Velcro is another great example of inspiration from nature. And just look at Vincent can Gogh’s amazing paintings of sunflowers.
 
Nature is full of surprises, is full of medicine with herbs and berries and is medicine in itself with the higher levels of oxygen produced by the plants and trees. This environment is very different from stagnant carbon dioxide in the city due to pollution and our exhalation.
 
So spend as much time in nature as you possibly can.
 
I will be running some simple workshops in parks and special sites to help people to reconnect with themselves and to reconnect with Earth and to just be themselves.
Do join me if you would like to explore yourself in this way and to explore your connection with Earth.