Making Room for Nature's Wisdom

     I recently picked up an audiobook of Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants, by Robin Wall Kimmerer.  What a beautifully told story by this scientist and storyteller from the Potawatomi Nation about the wisdom of plant life, and what we as industry oriented, consuming humans in the 21st century can learn about our  relationship with Nature. It essentially comes down to our human ability to re-establish connection to Nature and  to acknowledge our interdependence. This will require a humble respect towards the wisdom that Nature holds.  For if we continue on this current path of "progress" led by the human need to control and acquire, we will watch the ground literally crumble beneath our feet.

     Listening to the audiotape is a remembering and a welcoming to my soul.  This is why I practice yoga to bring myself back into right relationship of my body, mind, soul, and all that is.  Yoga is my path to wholeness and wellbeing which are my rights since birth as a citizen of this planet. To recognize my true essence is to recognize myself beyond my body and into the sky, water, and earth. The sky breathes me to allow life.  The water hydrates me to allow flow. The earth feeds me to allow me to know nurturance/love.

     This wisdom was/is known by the indigenous peoples of the world. The term "indigenous" may be the same as waking from the delusion of separateness. In yoga the term avidya, meaning ignorance, indicates that we remain behind a veil obstructing our knowing the truth of who we are. We are beings very intimately interwoven in this web of life. What happens to one, happens to the whole.  No separation.

     Particularly, in the hustle and bustle of every day life of developed countries we are further removed and veiled from the gifts of Nature but instead turn to the gifts of Amazon (not the river). Some of us have never planted a garden to move at Nature's pace of growing from seed(my peas are now breaking ground). Some have never had dirt under their nails smiling at the opportunity to intermingle with the earth.  Some of us have not witnessed the reciprocity of receiving squash from the garden and offering back compost to the garden. Much is to be gained to be in closer relationship to the land that feeds us and gives us shelter.  Now would be a good time to contemplate all the gifts that you received from mother Nature in the past twenty-four hours (from toilet paper, clothing, to a beautiful sunset). Then ask yourself how have you shown appreciation for all her gifts?