sacred Archives - EarthSpirit

Published May 15, 2013 by EarthSpirit Community on EarthSpirit Voices
Written by Alison Mee

Alison Mee, has been part of the EarthSpirit community since 1999. She lives near Harpers Ferry in West Virginia.

Alison's land A year ago, as events in our lives unfolded, both logic and intuition told my husband and I that we needed to pick up and move our family from our home of 18 years, to somewhere new. We felt about as sure as we could be, that the move was right for us, that we were moving toward greater joy. But that didn’t make it easy for me to leave the land.

I had allowed myself to fall in love with the land on which I lived. I had connected to it as deeply as I knew how. One summer, I decided that every single solitary day, I would eat something from my land. I started with the chives and the fresh onion grass of spring. Then, with my relatively meager gardening skills, I grew some vegetables, and brought snap peas with me when I traveled, keeping them carefully and eating one every day. By autumn’s figs, I was feeling the land as part of myself.

I went through retreats, of staying on that land for a week or so at a time, spending time outdoors, but not going beyond that piece of land. I composted the story of my life, into the soil: apple wood from the home where I grew up, branches from the woods behind my grandmother’s house, flowers from funerals and weddings. The first time we placed each of my children’s feet on the earth, it was there. I brought bits of the land — soil, moss, pine needles — with me when away from home.

How could I leave? I could leave, I found, with love, appreciation, and intention.

As soon as we knew we were going to be selling the property, we had a family ritual with the land. We thanked it for it’s support of our family, and rejoiced in all the great years we’ve had there. Then, I opened up the thicket, the space that I had set aside some years ago to be mostly free from human intervention. I wouldn’t be protecting it in the same way anymore. Our relationship would be changing.

Then I sought to use my connection to the spirit of the land where I had been living, including the local river, to reach out to the land I was moving to, to help me find my correct path. Somewhere, I knew, was a place that could give me what I was needing, and likewise, could need me. I wanted to let the land reach out to me, as I searched for it.

When we were looking for our new home, I paid as much attention to the land as I did to the houses. We explored all over the county, and I smelled the dirt. At first I was shy and kept trying to do it when the realtor wasn’t looking, but eventually I got used to his attentiveness and he got used to the fact that I spent more time on the land than in the house. I stopped worrying about his opinion of me. Finding the right land was more important to me than not weirding out the realtor.

If I weren’t going by smell, I’ve since learned that I could have gone by field guide maps. It turns out that what smelled so good to me was biodiversity. Where we live now has a huge variety of plants and animals.

Now that I’m here, I’m falling in love again. Instead of plowing in with what I think should be here, I’m waiting and letting the woods show me their paths. I’m watching to see what’s going on. Who has been living here before me? What needs to be done? What’s been waiting for me? What would rather be left alone?

I bring water from my old home, to my new home. And earth. And sap from the white pine which used to be my meditation spot. If I were moving very far, I might worry about bringing non-indigenous plants, insects or microorganisms. But it would still be acceptable, generally, to bring vegetables grown in one home, and then compost them into the land in the new home. And in this way I’m bringing the story of my life forward, weaving together the connections.

Now it is spring, and I am seeing the emergence of new flowers, hearing new birds, connecting deeper with the spirit of this land.

And tasting the sweetest onion grass in the world. I’m home again.

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Published May 18, 2012 by EarthSpirit Community on EarthSpirit Voices
Written by Katie Birdi

Offerings The world is (among other things) a cycle of give and take. We breathe out, the plants breathe in. The plants breathe out, we breathe in. Offering doesn’t have to be about sacrifice. It can be joyful gratitude for the bounty we are surrounded by, a connection with our prayers, a gift of service, and the passion we are compelled to express.

My offerings come in cycles, as a part of my daily practice. I offer something daily, weekly, monthly… and they connect me to different rhythms in my life. Daily, I offer my breath to the plants, keenly aware that their existence, and my own, is locked in an elegant (covalent) bond. Weekly, I offer a bowl of rice to the spirits of the land I live on in respect and gratitude for the Unseen Ones that populate this place with me. Monthly, I donate newborn and preemie hats (knitted with love) to the local hospital. Every other month, I also head downstairs to donate a pint of my blood, a very physical offering, and one of my favorites. I give thanks that I am healthy and strong, watching my blood flow out of my body, and wish with each drop that whoever receives my blood also be healthy and strong. I do my best to stay open and aware, and I give other offerings as they seem appropriate. I do my best to do it with a clean, clear heart, and with respect and honor to the world which is my home and family. One of my favorites is to leave nuts in the holes of trees. I will do this to give thanks, sometimes in supplication, and sometimes just because it feels right to do.

Offerings come in many forms. Gifts of service are particularly humbling to me. I have friends who host gatherings, musical performances, and I have one friend who consistently does the dishes after a group meal. What an amazing, oft overlooked offering! I am touched each time a person holds the door for me, offers water to a dog that needs it, chooses to ride a bike instead of drive a car, or offers to help someone change a flat tire. Recognizing these offerings makes each moment of my life sweeter.

My son turned two in February of this year, and we enjoy frequent walks in the woods. I am so glad to have the opportunity to show him all the wonders that the world so passionately expresses. I was dismayed at first, that my son was most fascinated by the trash he would find in the forest. Running past a snail, a fallen tree, a pine cone and a forest of fiddleheads, he triumphantly points his finger at a smashed plastic cup and its blue straw, sticking up pathetically from the wreckage. “Bwoo! Bwoo!” he says, looking for affirmation that he has correctly identified the color of this amazing thing he’s found in the forest. “Yes, blue” I say, proud that my son is developing in language, awareness, and ability. I’m also dismayed that the forest I’ve brought my son to, hoping to teach him about the sacredness of the Earth, is filled with trash.

It occurs to me that the trash I’m surrounded by is an offering. The people who have left these offerings have shown, with their actions, how much they value the Body of the Earth. What are you offering? Is it the best of who you are and what you have to give? If offerings are a prayer, what are you praying with? What sorts of unspoken things are you saying to the world and your community with your habits? If the only offerings we make are the convenient offerings of coffee cups, wasted food, and misprinted copies, we invite similar energy into our lives. Take a moment. Take a breath. Take only what you need, and give of yourself in return.

I do my best to help my son learn the vital lesson of the Thank You letter. Gratitude is something I wish to nurture in his nature. I do my best to teach him that an Intentional Offering isn’t always a thing. Sometimes it’s money, food or goods, but sometimes it’s an offering of time, skill, or consideration. Sometimes it means inconveniencing ourselves for the good of the World. Carry a reusable water bottle. Enjoy your reusable mug. What do you “throw away” on a daily basis? Where does it really go?

When we go shopping, my son has his own, toddler-sized reusable shopping bag, and his own toddler-sized water bottle. Children learn by imitating adult behavior, and as Mama carries a reusable bottle & shopping bags (offerings of consideration), he needs one of his own. One of his first chores was to help Mama sort the recycling. We talk about reducing, reusing, and recycling every day. The concepts are clearer to him now than the words are when he says them, and I am a Proud Mama…and now our walks in the woods include a bag for the trash we find, which we sort for recycling later.

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