Opening a Dialogue with Nature
posted by Dan | April 28, 2010
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IcerocketA default assumption of western technological societies is that nature is dumb, random, and basically oblivious to us as individuals. Many of us, however, have embraced the notion of synchronicity, and concede that apparently random events occasionally conform to a higher order. This order suggests that intelligence is embedded in the world and can orchestrate events.
Perhaps the most well-know example comes from Carl Jung. "A young woman I was treating had, at a critical moment, a dream in which she was given a golden scarab. While she was telling me this dream I sat with my back to the closed window. Suddenly I heard a noise behind me, like a gentle tapping. I turned round and saw a flying insect knocking against the window-pane from outside. I opened the window and caught the creature in the air as it flew in. It was the nearest analogy to a golden scarab that one finds in our latitudes, a scarabaeid beetle, the common rose-chafer (Cetonia aurata), which contrary to its usual habits had evidently felt an urge to get into a dark room at this particular moment." [The Collected Works of Carl Jung, Volume 8, page 843]
A similar anecdote was told to me by a woman from whom I have received some formal training in energy healing. She was doing grief counseling for a woman who had recently lost her five-year-old nephew. The nephew's family nickname was "Hummiingbird." As they talked, a hummingbird flew up to the window, hovered a moment, and then flew around the corner of the house. They got up and went to the window of the next room to see whether it was still around. In the bush outside the window they counted over fifty hummingbirds. Neither of them had ever seen such a concentration of hummingbirds, which are generally known to be territorial, and they took it as a meaningful sign.
Though there are many scynchronicity stories which do not involve nature, these two do, and they suggest that nature is, at least at times, responsive to a higher order of intelligence. Moreover, nature may, on occasion, be necessary for communication from this higher order of intelligence. Had there been no hummingbirds living in the area, the possibilities for a timely and healing message would have been much reduced. There is only so much you can do with lightening bolts and meteorites.
Nature is fast and nature is fluid. Thus, it presents the most responsive medium for communication, should a more inclusive organizing intelligence seek to communicate. I was pondering this very question, a month ago, when I received my own hummingbird visitation. It was still winter and I had not seen a hummingbird for weeks, nor have I seen one since. But, as I stepped outside that day, one arrived at my feeder. Unlike the uniformly drab species which spend their summers here, this one was brightly colored. He hovered by the feeder a moment, retreated to a distance of ten feet, and then returned to settle and drink, not two feet from my head. This also contrasts with the local population, members of which would not likely tolerate my presence. I took it as a sign that I was on the right track with my prognostications.
The thrust of these ideas grows out of my own experiences with energy healing and with entheogens. I know that, when I turn my attention to them, I can feel subtle energies with my hands. I know that I can, occasionally, see subtle energies. And I hear, at all times, ever-changing sounds which I associate with kundalini activation, and which I assume are another form of subtle energy. That there are levels of organization operating behind the physical is an assumption I am well-primed to embrace. And so I have made some conscious decisions about how I conduct my attention when I am in nature.
First, I attempt to dissolve the conscious distinction between inner and outer. I assume that my consciousness reflects the consciousness in which I am embedded. My consciousness reflects not only the positions of the planets, but the hills, houses, trees, clouds, plants, and animals nearby. When I am able to quiet my monkey mind and relax in to this perception I fancy that I can feel it on my skin when a bird flies by. It feels to be flying through my mind, which is reflecting its conscious environment with a heightened intensity.
I further assume that the conscious environment reflects my own mind--that it is acutely aware of my passage and wishes, as fervently as do I, to engage in a loving, co-creative dance. It wants me to remember what it has never forgotten.
Since my own entheogenic experiences reinforce the notion that nature coordinates to higher levels of intelligence, I am open to shamanic perspectives. Speaking of the Q'ero, of Peru, Stella Osorojos writes, "He said that, in Spanish, ‘nakwi' is usually translated to ‘eye,' but it's really more like a ceque, a ley line, and comes from the Q'ero idea that when your eye sees something a direct connection is opened up to that thing." http://www.realitysandwich.com/spirits_among_us A direct connection to a plant is how shamanic pharmacists explain their knowledge of plant properties. They say they "ask" the plant what it is good for. This implies to me a merging of consciousness in which the plant acquires the power of speech and the shamman acquires the chemical awareness of plants. So how deep do my casual connections with the environment go?
I have heard it said that a flower does not know that it is beautiful until someone sees and appreciates that beauty. Is this an analog to the apparent fact that an electron doesn't know whether it is a wave or a particle until it is observed? Trying this assumption on, I look at birds intently. I pay a lot of attention to them and I appreciate their beauty. I make the assumption that they feel my admiration and gratitude. The feedback is that I feel their joy. Anthropomorphizing? Boy, howdy! But I think I have a pretty good idea what my dog is feeling when she is chasing a squirrel. She is loving life. That enthusiasm is contagious. Why should it be any different for barnswallows, areobatically swooping for insects in a field? They love to fly like a dog loves to run.
As I visit the same spots every day I encounter the same individuals and, by paying close attention to them, the relationships build. They come closer and spend more time looking at me. Maybe they are basking in my admiration.
In this state of mind everything that happens is meaningful. I take everything personally, from the path of a goose in flight, to the ciphers traced out by ants. Three days ago I stepped outside to see about a dozen barn swallows feeding in my neighbor's field. I assumed that among them were the four that have their nests in my barn. One by one, within the space of fifteen seconds, four broke off their feeding, circled around behind me, flew directly over me, and swooped, at the last moment, to within a foot of my head. Did I take it personally? You bet.
Another assumption I am toying with is that the dialogue is constant. It is one without words, composed of subtle and complex feelings. Consciousness in proximity to a cedar is fundamentally different than consciousness in proximity to a horse. One becomes aware of how nature is embedded in our own consciousness. The logic that we should enhance and increase the natural diversity of our surroundings becomes something that I feel as a product of my experience. Our own psychic healing is ultimately, intimately dependent upon healing our local environments.
Many of us have read fantastic accounts of shamanic rituals with medicinal plants. We know of the worldview which considers nature to be animated with agency, intent, and consciousness. Yet, however much we may respect and accommodate in this worldview, it is difficult to translate that potential awareness in to our own surroundings. The loud, crass franchise culture around us does not speak of such things. And to do so, ourselves, would earn us the label of "delusional."
It can be done, and it has a cost. I have become less tolerant of the gap between what we are now and what we might, through nature, become. I suppose that as you increase your capacity to perceive beauty and relationship you also increase your capacity to perceive their absence. It doesn't bum me out. But it does evoke a kind of existential impatience.
I don't want to encourage guerrilla gardening and get myself on a no-fly list, but I urge everyone (who has not already) to try this set of assumptions on for size. Walk around in it. Take it to the park. Take it to the birds.
Dan
Comments
snake tale
— Apr 29, 2010
alchemynow - Linda
posted at:
http://stopthestorm.wordpress.com/2010/04/29/hitching-a-ride-with-kind-s...
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+HITCHING A RIDE WITH KIND STRANGERS
I heard a true tale as I sat eating the last of my Thursday lunch in town today with my friend, Sharon. It rivals my grieving chicken story. And again, it makes me wonder about how much wonder most of us miss in the world.
I was still picking through the last of my bargain basement pile of Burger King fries. My friend had finished her chicken sandwich and was replacing her cell phone back into her purse after taking it out to check on the time. Suddenly she straightened up a bit taller in the booth with one of those ‘oh, and’ looks on her face as she said, “My granddaughter called me this morning. She was cracking up. You won’t believe what she told me.”
OK, I’ll bite. Sharon’s granddaughter, Shelly, arrived at work in a nearby town this morning a little earlier than her boss did. She was busy sorting through real estate folders at the start of her day when her boss burst through the door.
“Come out here and look! You have GOT to see this! There’s a gigantic snake out here in the parking lot!”
The real estate office sits behind the town’s Denny’s restaurant and shares its parking lot. Once Shelly stepped out through the office door, she was greeted with a pandemonium movie scene. Groups of excited people clustered together pointing and squealing near their parked cars. More people streaming out of the Denny’s. In the center of the parking lot arena wandered a massive snake, in and out, under and around the cars, obviously searching for the best way out and not finding it.
It twisted and turned its direction, heading first one way and then another as the growing crowd skittered and chattered.
“What should we do?” Shelly heard people calling to one another. “Don’t hurt it,” someone finally shouted loudly. “It’s not a rattlesnake. It’s a bull snake. It can’t hurt anyone. Just leave the poor thing alone. It’s confused and scared. It will leave by itself.”
Katrina was as fascinated watching the people as she was following the trajectories of this snake, out of place on this hot pavement, obviously having no more idea what it was doing there than the people did.
Suddenly two elderly women rushed out of the restaurant. One of them moved toward their pickup truck and stood there while the other woman, brazen and very self directed, marched across the wide parking lot directly toward the snake who stopped dead in its snake tracks at the sound of her firm and commanding voice.
“What in the WORLD are you doing out here!” The woman spoke to the snake as if it were a wayward child. “I though I told you to stay in that truck until we came back out! Now, you get yourself BACK in there right this minute! Do you hear me? I’m talking to you. Get yourself back in that truck -- NOW! Do as I say!”
Shelly could hardly finish telling her grandmother this story she was laughing so hard. “You won’t believe what happened next, grandma! That snake straightened out its body and headed right to that truck. It poked its head up the side of the rear tire, arched itself over the top of it, and – really, grandma, I am telling you the truth – got right back into that pickup like it was told to!”
Once the snake had followed its orders, and with the tailgate slammed shut, the women turned to the awed crowd and told them the rest of the story.
“We both decided we deserved a Denny’s breakfast this morning,” reported the snake charmer. “We were on our way into town when I had to slow down for a snake crossing the road. Only when we got closer, we could see that there were two snakes, great big ones. But one snake was smashed dead. The other one, this one, lay close beside it and wouldn’t move an inch even after I saw it was a Bull snake and I walked right up to it and tried to chase it away.”
“What to do with a stubborn snake? Nothing, I tell you. Not a thing. So I decided to ignore it and let it have its way as I bent over to pick up that dead one. It took me a couple of minutes to carry it down the shoulder and into the Mesquite bushes off the side of the road. It was heavy! I laid it down to rest there in the shade.”
“By the time I got back to the road, the other snake was gone. I thought it had wandered away, but when I got back into the truck my sister told me she caught sight of it in the rear view mirror climbing into the back of our truck. We always leave the tailgate open for better gas mileage, you know how that goes. I didn’t shut the tailgate after the snake got in. I figured it would just stay in there until we were done with breakfast like I told it to, and then we’d just drop it off where we found it on our way back home.”
The listening audience of bystanders, bound to remember and tell this story for many days to come, decided as a group that these two snakes were obviously mates, married for life, and had been for a long time. They decided this surviving snake was beside itself at the tragic death of its mate, and being left suddenly and completely alone, hitched a ride with these two kind strangers.
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Cool Story!
— May 02, 2010
So cool! I am in awe of the mindset that would assume that communication is going to take place. Knowledge is so much harder to abandon than to acquire.
I have been finding a lot that is of interest on Stop the Storm. Thanks for the link.
Grieving Chicken Story
— Apr 29, 2010
alchemynow - Linda
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posted at:
http://stopthestorm.wordpress.com/my-adulthood-stories/in-honor-of-the-g...
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*In Honor of the Grieving Chicken (2003)
I am a simple person and I live a simple life. Many days come and go without any particular event happening that would later make that day stand out more than any other. Yet every once in awhile something special happens, and when it does I know I will remember it for the rest of my life.
About seven years ago, while my son was still in high school, we lived on a seven and a half acre piece of property in the best house of my life. I was buying the property, but in the end I could not afford the $1200 a month it cost me in taxes, insurance and house payment and after my son left home I lost it.
But while I was there, I loved it. I loved walking every inch of that piece of land, watching the plant life come and go with the seasons. Watching the hammer head clouds build over the mountains as the summer rains came and changed the dry brown dirt to thriving green. And best of all, I was able to keep chickens.
I had never had a chicken before. I bought 40 of them online and they were shipped through the postal service the day they were hatched in little boxes with holes in the sides. It took them three days to get to me, and I doubt they ever stopped cheeping. Poor little things. What a way to start off their lives.
I kept them in the spare bathroom away from the cats until they were old enough to live out from under their lights. Then I moved them out to the chicken vault I had built them. Lots of time, money and love went into making them a house with a cement floor, and a run made of double chicken wire up the sides with cinder blocks laid at the edges to keep the coyotes, cats and dogs out at night. It had a chicken wire roof to keep out the hawks and owls.
After some time they were big enough I could let them out of their enclosure during the day. They returned every night at sunset like clockwork to roost. I had two dogs at the time that I had rescued from the local pound. One of them I never caught again once I got her home and let her off her leash. The first few days I let the chickens out during the day she showed no interest in them whatsoever. Clever, sly dog. By the fourth day I heard a clucking fiasco outside and ran out to find that this dog had killed one of the hens and had deeply bitten through the back meat another.
I had quite a time of it as I had to chase the girls back into the coop in the middle of the day. I could think of nothing to do for the wounded one but smooth her golden feathers over her gaping wound and put her in the coop with the others.
Because I could not catch the dog, I called the pound and asked them to come down, please, and take her back. They didn't want to but eventually did come get her. They had to use a live trap for the job.
I had heard stories about how chickens attack and peck to death a wounded bird, so I expected this to happen. It didn't. Not once did any of the girls show any aggression toward the wounded one. Her back healed eventually and she lived for another year. Then came the day that I will never forget.
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Every morning I opened the door to the run and all 39 chickens dashed out excitedly as fast as they could go, squawking and flapping, feet in a blur of motion, terrific noise and commotion -- for about 40 feet. Then they would all suddenly stop and get along with their peaceful day's activities of wandering, pecking, scratching, eating and talking quietly among themselves.
On this particular day I went through the same routine, as did the girls. Or so I thought. I was almost back to the kitchen door when I noticed a peculiar sound, a wooing, a melodic cooing like no sound I'd ever heard before. I turned to look toward the coop, and there was one gold chicken who had remained inside. She had not left in the mad fluttering dash out the door. She was standing there looking down toward the ground, making no other movement than to sing this gentle, low eerie song.
I returned to the coop and was going to enter to check on her and see what she was doing. But when I got to the doorway I stopped, frozen in awe. Lying dead on the ground was the bird who had been wounded, and standing close beside her, with her head lowered over her, singing, was her golden sister.
Awe can take our breath, our words and our thoughts away. I knew instantly that I had stumbled onto what would be one of the most sacred, precious and beautiful moments of my life. But that state lasted only a moment, and then I was on about my day. In true ceremonial fashion I went into the coop, picked up the expired chicken by her feet, and marched her over to my south fence line and heaved her over for the coyotes to enjoy.
When I turned back towards the house, however, I had yet another surprise. The singing chicken had called all the other birds back into the coop. I stood and watched them as they marched in and huddled for a few moments at the spot where the dead one had lain. Then they all simply turned around and marched out again and continued on with their day, doing things we normally expect of chickens.
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I felt so fortunate that day to have been home and able to witness that event. I could never have imagined that chickens have a capacity to grieve one another's passing, an ability that must be stored somewhere in their DNA code and in their little tiny brains, to be remembered at times such as this one.
Whatever gap in my thinking I had created between myself as a 'higher' being and the lowly chicken species evaporated that day. I now have a sense of mystery surrounding animals that I never had before. Who knows what animals do when humans aren't looking? Who knows their secrets? It almost seemed like something that would happen in a child's story, like the dolls that came alive at night in my mother's childhood Raggedy Ann and Raggedy Andy book.
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I later witnessed another amazing chicken behavior, but at least this one seemed logically believable. I came home one day and did not see the girls anywhere in the yard. Once I parked the car and got out I began to search for them. I found them all behind the chicken coop together in a circle facing something in the middle. When I got closer and peeked over their chicken shoulders, I could see that they had trapped a rattlesnake in the center.
I watched. After a few moments the girls began to inch closer and closer to the snake, never taking their eyes off of it. At a certain point the snake lashed out at them and returned to its still position so swiftly I could hardly tell it had moved at all, but I distinctly saw that it made its attack with both its head and its tail. The startled chickens immediately jumped back and froze. As I continued watching, the pattern was repeated several times. I realized that the snake had been trapped there for quite some time, and had actually moved around in coiled circles so that it had created a hole as it augured itself further and further into the dirt.
I immediately realized another use for chickens, but still felt sorry for the snake. Not liking the snakes that had shown up in the house, and being afraid of them, did not stop me from rescuing this one. I went for my shovel, scattered the chickens away, scooped the snake out of the hole and onto the end of the shovel, and walked it, too, to the south fence line and heaved it over. It never moved all the time I carried it, but it sure took off in a big hurry once it hit the dirt where it landed.
I asked someone about this afterward, and they acknowledged that a rattlesnake is not built with stamina. It needs to rely on its venomous strike, but when surrounded by 40 attackers there is no way it could win. Chickens will simply wear a rattlesnake out this way and then devour it like a giant centipede -- which I knew was their favorite snack. Many times I had seen one chicken find a fat centipede, grab it and run away as fast as she possibly could, with the entire flock in pursuit. It only took seconds before the ugly critter was gone, a piece of it in every chicken's mouth.
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