Land is a fountain of energy flowing through a circuit of water, soils, plants, and animals. The health of the land depends on sunlight flowing through the green leaves of forest, field and meadow. In other words, it is sunlight through green leaves that builds and sustains the health of the land. Healthy land has the capacity for internal self-renewal, but all lands can be abused and degraded.

If we abuse the land upon which we walk and live it is because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we begin to see land as a community to which we belong, we may also begin to use it with respect. There is no other way for the land to survive the impact of industrialized man. Our relationship to the land will be proper when it protects the integrity, stability, and the perpetual productivity of the land and its biotic community. That land is a community is the basic concept of ecology, but that land is to be cared for, loved and respected is an extension of ethics. A land ethic simply enlarges the boundaries of our awareness and our respect to include soils, water, plants, and animals, or collectively: the Land.

When we begin to understand that land is a community, that we are part of that community, we can begin to understand that the health of the land, forests, soils and streams directly influences the health and prosperity of our people. Conservation of rivers, fisheries, forests, soils, and natural beauty begins with us as families and individuals. If we, as members of the biotic community, are consuming more than our fair share of the earth’s energy and resource budget, we destabilize climate and we undermine the health of our life support system.

We will be successful in our efforts to conserve and protect forests, soils, and streams – vital components of our life support system — when we reduce our consumption of water, trees, and energy.

Being part of an integrated, whole and healthy biological community provides strength and meaning to life. Sensitively to the life forces and spiritual flows of the community provides direction. Development of wisdom is an evolutionary process of the mind and spirit in a love relationship with the earth. The beginnings of wisdom come in this organic relationship. This is why organic gardening, back-country camping, fishing are important activities for many of us. Watching and listening – becoming part of  a flowing stream, touching the earth, or dreaming with trees and clouds offers peace, a close communion with God’s creation, and divine synchronicity.

“To understand the relationships and currents tying together the whole creation we must use the whole horizon of consciousness. We need an education of the heart and spirit. The days of our lives must become precious. Enjoy the perfection of what we are doing. Enjoy accomplishing it exquisitely.”

“If the day and night are such that we greet them with joy, and life emits a fragrance like flowers and sweet scented herbs, is more elastic, more starry, more immortal – this is our success. All nature is our congratulation, and we have cause momentarily to bless ourselves.
Nature is instinctively joyful. The joy of intense beauty is liberating.”

“Generations of our fore parents have dimly felt that somehow within nature lays a template for guidance — that genuine revelation lies within the livingness of grass, of cloud, of light — a revelation sharpening our knowledge of the roots of connectedness and kindness  –  the beginnings of humility.”

Aldo Leopold, Paul Kreger, Henry David Thoreau, Cedric Wright

Synchronizing With Natural Energy Flows

Pay attention to the little things.  Recognize and respect life in all of its various diverse expressions, great and small.

Treat all beings, living and nonliving, as friends deserving recognition and respect.

Be kind.

Understand that in wildness is the healing of the world.

Love, care for and respect the ancient harmonies and sacred cycles of the earth.

Revelation is in the word, in the flow of the river, in the songs of the winds, in the seasons of the earth, in green leaves processing sunlight, and in communion with creation and the people we love.

Walk a sacred path. Ask for guidance to see what needs to be seen, to understand what needs to be known, to pray the prayers that need to be prayed, and to speak the words that need to be spoken.

Walk in communion.    Joy, ecstasy and synergy flow within communion.

Soil is the foundation of civilization. Whatever we do to the land we do to each other..

A good man leaves few footprints in passing. A better man leaves none.

Use energy carefully, use it wisely. Apply only the energy necessary to bring about constructive change. Never apply more than is needed.

Vengeance is a wasteful degradation of strength.

Love and compassion are more powerful than hatred.

Never leave wounded enemies behind. Care for them, heal them, have them as friends. Have more friends and fewer enemies.

Empower people to good.

Walk in love and beauty, work within, but do not try to possess. Possessiveness destroys beauty; possessiveness destroys love; possessiveness destroys the earth.

Communion, deep, soft and loving communication is vital in the evolving of any relationship.

 

Gratitude to Mother Earth, sailing through night and day – and to her soil: rich, rare, and sweet

in our minds so be it.

Gratitude to Plants, the sun-facing light-changing leaf and fine root-hairs; standing still through wind and rain; their dance is in the flowing spiral grain

in our minds so be it.

Gratitude to Air, bearing the soaring Swift and the silent Owl at dawn. Breath of our song clear spirit breeze

in our minds so be it.

 Gratitude to Wild Beings, our brothers, teaching secrets, freedoms and ways; who share with us their milk; self-complete, brave, and aware

in our minds so be it.

Gratitude to Water: clouds, lakes, rivers, glaciers; holding or releasing; streaming through all our bodies salty seas

in our minds so be it.

 Gratitude to the Sun: blinding pulsing light through trunks of trees, through mists, warming caves where bears and snakes sleep–he who wakes us–

in our minds so be it.

 Gratitude to the Great Sky who holds billions of stars–and goes yet beyond that– beyond all powers, and thoughts and yet is within us–

so be it.

             Gary Snyder – Prayer for the Great Family

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Raindrops of water and light pour down,
and rivers are streams of light.
A great love it is that pervades the world.
Give us grace enough to lift our eyes
that this beauty shall not flow by unheeded.

          Kabir