click here for eBook

In his little gem of a book, Stillness Speaks, author Eckhart Tolle writes wonderfully about a reciprocal dimension of this wholeness:

You need nature as your teacher to help you reconnect with Being. But not only do you need nature, it also needs you.

You are not separate from nature. We are all part of the One Life that manifests itself in countless forms throughout the universe, forms that are all completely interconnected. 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. It comes to know its own beauty and sacredness through you!

…Nature can bring you to stillness, That is its gift to you. When you perceive and join with nature in the field of stillness, that field becomes permeated with your awareness. That is your gift to nature.

All arts and crafts can help us tap more spacious, harmonious states of mind and reveal our interbeing with Nature. Our love and creativity can infuse our environs with positive energy.

Here’s a poetic option for you: walk around the place where you live and find a natural feature—mineral, plant, insect, animal or something else in your neck of the woods that you love, perhaps the whole place itself—something that attracts you and inspires and “helps you reconnect with Being,” as Tolle puts it.

Let your attention rest on that natural feature. First take a few minutes to welcome and settle into a simple sense of your own Being. Once you feel a bit of inner quiet and receptivity, go ahead and attune to that natural feature, that particular aspect of Being, Nature and your place on Earth that you love.

photo Leslie Oelsner

You may have very different ways of tuning in to your place on earth than what I am suggesting. Whatever your way, as you attune to the feature you choose, see what comes and let it give “its gift to you.” Receive. Take note of any and all sensory or more subtle internal impressions you receive when attuning. Don’t marginalize what comes to you no matter how vague, surprising or off the wall it may seem.

Whether you receive any impressions or not is less important than that you relax and enjoy the overall felt sense of attuning to this natural feature of your neck of the woods. Your enjoyment and any heightened sensitivity you experience can be understood as part of a sacred exchange with Nature, a kiss on the heart of the Earth.

It’s lovely to do this and to repeat doing so over time. Feel free to journal your experience or to write a poem or a chant to sing to add to your part in this mutual gifting, this sacred exchange.