Tag: ENVIRONMENT

Teachings from a Christmas Tree

Teachings from a Christmas Tree

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The first thing I remember is swirling stars and crisp autumn nights. In human years I know not how long ago I was planted on the mountainside. I remember waking up in the chilly air and realizing the magnificent forest of my brothers and sisters around me covering the hills.

I felt my friends being planted alongside me. We communicated through our roots and branches as they swayed in the fresh breezes. It felt good to sink my roots into Earth. Such warmth and joy I felt as Earth’s energy coursed through my being. I tingled with excitement.

My first night, my roots already working deeper into the soil, I could stretch taller. Oh, I wanted so desperately to touch the stars, to feel their sparkle on my green fingers.

The first snow felt so wonderful. Cold it was but it blanketed me and somehow it felt right, as if this was where I belonged. And so I flourished and sang my life song with the wind and rain, stars and snow. And I heard the music of the heavens. So sweet was it in answer to the deep, resounding heart beat of Earth. The music of the spheres filled my days and nights, but especially at night could I hear it…when everything else got quiet.

So was my life until one day I saw humans, some very small, running up the path to the big trees in the neighboring field. The small ones ran and played among branches and some came over to me and started making human sounds…”Baby trees….aren’t they cute….want a bigger tree.”

I didn’t know what they meant but suddenly a loud sound erupted and I heard a big tree moan as it fell. “What happened?” I asked my friends but they didn’t know. Softly, as we listened closely, a message was passed to us from bigger trees. They said they would share the secret of our power. That captured my curiosity so I listened and this is what I heard:

“You are born for a very special purpose. You were planted on this beautiful mountainside and you grow and take in Earth’s love and care, starlight’s magic, rain’s cleansing power, wind’s song, and the passion and fire of the sun. These elements build in you and grow as you grow. Then, when the time is right, you are taken and put in a home and decorated with lights like stars and shiny things that are most wondrous. And as you stand tall in your best splendor, you slowly die. But as you do you give off your life force and all the energy of stars, sun, Earth, rain and wind that you took in is released into the human home, and maybe into the human hearts. You are a blessing and remind the people who take you, of the light and love available to them.”

It sounded wonderful yet questions bubbled up through my sap. Would it hurt? Wouldn’t I miss the mountains and birds and sun and snow?

But there was only silence.

And so I let it go and simply observed it all. Seasons of warm and cold came and went and I witnessed it all.

As I grew, every year people would come and look at me and touch me but passed me by. I wondered if I would ever fulfill my destiny.

And then one beautiful, sunny, crisp day, two people walked among our section of the mountain. One touched me and I shivered. “Take me, take me! I am ready!” They walked on. But after a while she came back and touched my strong trunk and placed her warm hand around it and I felt the most amazing sensation flow into me. I heard her words, “Thankful…grateful…welcome…I love you.”

And then I heard the saw motor and for a moment it hurt and I shivered from pain. But as I began to fall, I let go and thought, “Oh–now is my time, my purpose will be fulfilled.” And such joy I had never known.

I was wrapped tight and laid on top of a fast-moving thing and before long I was standing in water, drinking deeply for I was very thirsty. I was placed in a huge room with big windows where I can look out over the mountains.

I have sparkling white stars resting on my branches and beautiful shiny things adorning me. There are all manner of special things hanging from my branches and they feel full of memories from long ago and I hear their stories.I have heard beautiful music and singing and although it’s different than the music of the spheres, it is quite lovely. And now, it is dark outside and the woman sits below me writing down my story so others can know what I know, what I’ve learned from being a tree–a tree destined to be a magnificent Christmas tree. And so my purpose is fulfilled. And I am happy.

To learn more about my work please visit Turtle Island Adventures. Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays! May we continue to learn from all that nature teaches us.

Grateful for the Small Things

Grateful for the Small Things

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Okay, so this juvenile bear isn’t exactly small, as the title suggests. Neither are the two others that are part of this family. The mother is huge and healthy and I am overjoyed that I spent time watching this precious family romp on my decks Thanksgiving night and a couple nights after that instead of being in some store getting pepper-sprayed while reaching for a $2 waffle iron.

In preparation for my upcoming move to Coastal Alabama I’ve been sorting through clothes and ‘stuff’ that I have accumulated in the past 5 1/2 years here in Asheville. While I’m grateful to have warm clothes to wear and a nice home in which to live and toys to play with, I find that the most important things can’t be bought…like spending time with my bear friends.

A few years ago I installed a small water garden to provide water for wildlife. One afternoon as the bears were playing around my home, a young one came up to the glass door where I was sitting with my camera and placed her wet paw on the glass where my face was peering out. I pressed my face closer to the glass and she licked the glass. I could almost feel the tickle of her warm, pink tongue on my nose as I giggled. What could be more joy than this? A $2 waffle iron? Hardly.

Last week I helped celebrate Micki Cabaniss Eutsler’s birthday. Micki is a neighbor here on the mountain and she was my first publisher. I met her shortly after moving to the mountain and our connection led to her company, Grateful Steps, publishing their 7th book, my first. I was able to tell Micki, at her party, how much I appreciate her mentoring me in the publishing realm and helping me believe in my abilities as a writer.

As I feel my time in these lovely Blue Ridge Mountains come to a close, I am mindful of the many people, places and animal friends that have enriched my life and blessed me with experiences that are forever woven into the fabric of my life, my soul. The visits from the turkeys, raccoons, flying squirrels, ‘possums, bears, hawks and song birds are gifts that cannot be bought. I consider these wild creatures my family and their well-being and health brings such happiness to me, such celebration!

We live in a time of change. A time when darkness is exposed more and more. Rather than dwell on the horror of it all, let us joyfully celebrate the light that comes and do whatever we can to see that it increases. For baby bears, friends, trees, the snow falling across the valley as I type this….I am grateful.

To learn more about my books and my work please visit Turtle Island Adventures. (No…the snow is light today…the image of Riceville Valley was taken last year…I see this every day as I walk…snow or green, it’s amazing!).

Gratitude for a Sense of Place

Gratitude for a Sense of Place

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It took me a while to make the decision to leave the Blue Ridge Mountains but when I did my compass pointed south, or specifically– southwest. The live oak trees draped with Spanish moss whisper my name as the wind rattles their waxy, hard leaves against each other. The smell of coastal Alabama soil, that sandy loam, lies waiting for me to come home, to walk barefoot and connected with its magnificence.

In the past 18 months I made over ten trips to my home to document the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and with each trip, it was more difficult to leave. I felt my work was just scratching the surface, that there is so much more I could do, that I wanted the Gulf of Mexico to raise up through me to protect Herself. All of these reasons resound in my mind but more important than anything is an intense desire, a burning within my soul, to be home. I can’t really explain it, although my mind has tried to make sense of it. It feels like my bones responding to a homing signal. Maybe I’m experiencing the same pull that monarch butterflies feel or migratory birds. It’s like an internal signal has been activated and I’m ready to go.

Meanwhile, amid this magnetic pull back to the Alabama Gulf Coast, I have my home for sale and am dealing with flaky buyers who change their minds like they were changing their dinner order. Dealing with the ups and downs of selling my beautiful home is wearing on me. But my vision is still crystal clear; I won’t allow insensitive buyers to detract me from my intention.

I love the land here in the Blue Ridge Mountains. The nearby Smoky Mountains are a true spiritual home for me and have been since I was a child. Living here has been healing and restorative and has boosted my creativity and connected me with incredible people. All to prepare me to return back to my home and apply everything I’ve learned here to help an area that was heavily damaged with the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill. And no matter what the slick BP advertisements and tourist boards say, there is still substantial problems in areas along the coast and a looming unknown regarding wildlife and Gulf health. I want to be there to do whatever I can to help this place recover.

And still….still…beyond the reasons I think I’m headed home, I really don’t know what I will be doing help the communities or wildlife. And that doesn’t matter really because I’m taking the first step and that is to be willing to sell my mountain home and move back to the place where I was born in total trust that I will be shown what to do when I am there. I am willing to take this leap.

When I was walking this morning in the frosty, mountain air I realized that the biggest surprise of everything going on in my life now is this intense love I have for the Gulf of Mexico, the shores, bays, rivers and people. My bones resonate with the tides there and for this deep sense of place, I am truly grateful. I never realized how powerful the love of a place could be and how being totally committed to helping protect it can change the course of a life.

Excerpt from my book Sharks On My Fin Tips: A Wild Woman’s Adventures with Nature–“Like many coastal species that begin life in the brown waters of Weeks Bay, I began my life on the shores of this tiny estuary. I grew up amid herons, egrets, baby crabs, shrimp and mullet with the dark-brown mud squishing between my young toes. The smell of salt marsh filled my being and was imprinted on my soul only hours after I breathed my first breath….And like the creatures birthed in the bay, I too moved away from its tranquil shores yet I will always feel the pulsation of saltwater in my blood like a magnet, drawing me home.”

Where do you find a sense of place? What place calls to your bones?

Evolution of Humanity

Evolution of Humanity

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I sat in silence holding love and appreciation for this magnificent planet in my mind and heart. Images came and went–animals, people, bodies of water, forests, sky. There was only peace and interconnection.

Let this day be a marker for us to rise above our selfish concerns and elevate our thoughts to what is good for the whole. No longer worried about ‘making a name for ourselves’ or receiving recognition for who we are or what we do, may we drop all striving for me, me, me and open our hearts for the good of the whole, for the good of this beautiful water planet.

As Osho writes, May the veil of illusion burn away as the sense of groping in darkness dissolves. May we be witness to the process of humanity evolving into the beings we can be. Let all thoughts of separation drop away and may we let go the poison fed to our minds. May our entire lives become flames of awareness.

Change Agents

Change Agents

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On September 23rd I was in a small jet flying to Atlanta from Asheville. We flew over Lake Julian and the coal-fired power plant. Horrendous, black piles of death lay below. Earth raped as a commodity. I was glad to be headed for Rowe, Massachusetts where I would be spending a week with Joanna Macy and many other activists and lovers of our planet.

The first night, 68 of us met with Joanna. We listened as this wise woman shared about the history of humanity’s relationship with Earth. Most humans have used Earth as a supply house and a sewer. Finally, many are beginning to see the Earth as alive, as living. After she shared this and more, each of us stated our name and something of Earth we would protect. After feeling so isolated and alone documenting the Gulf Oil Spill, it was balm to my soul to witness so many people standing up to protect a place, animal, plant…body of water, mountain, meadow.

I left that first night’s gathering feeling the sweetness and power of people uniting for the common good. And with this happy feeling I had to negotiate walking on a small, wooded roadway at night with no light. I had to use my spider-sense, my bear and cougar sense–my wild woman sense that is connected with the wet, deep darkness and rich, loamy Earth. The part of me that sees without eyes and knows from the sound of gravel or grass underfoot where I am. I later wrote, “Amidst the inky blackness, rich and deep, silver drops from dark green leaves splatter and fall to the ground. I walk between two worlds, caught in the middle between lies and truth. May I stand with an open heart and bear witness.”

There was so much I learned and experienced that week at Rowe Camp and Conference Center and there are many nuggets of wisdom that will be with me as my work at the Gulf continues. However, one particular concept stands out. John Seed, an activist who worked to protect trees in the forests of Australia, had the idea that when we stand up to protect something on Earth, it’s really that place or thing protecting itself through us. In example, “I am not Simone protecting the Gulf of Mexico, I am the Gulf of Mexico protecting itself through this piece of humanity.”

And so to all those working on the Gulf, we are united in our efforts by the Gulf of Mexico. And for all environmental efforts, it is the same. Reframing activism, in this way, shifted my thinking and helped me feel the whole of all involved in working to protect and heal our planet.

Whatever you love about Earth and are willing to stand up for, say it out loud in the context written above by John Seed. What do you notice?

Some ideas shared by Joanna: Healing the planet comes from seeing the relationships and interrelationships. Action is something I am! (Not something I do). Don’t wait for the blueprint or plan as an activist. You cannot predict the synergy that occurs when you take steps and risks. Have the courage to move out with ideas. Power is an organic outcome of synergy. Evolutionary forces are wanting to work through us.

After lunch one day I climbed a steep trail and sat on a rock at the top of a mountain and heard this: “When you are called to witness a devastation to Earth, you serve as one of a council who then reports to the whole. Tell the truth of what you see. See with your heart.” And so my work continues whether I’m reading articles on the Gulf Oil Spill and passing them on to others or on the beaches documenting the huge chunks of tar washing up or speaking with school kids.

Many times I have struggled with my reason for doing the work at the Gulf and have asked myself questions like: “Is anybody really paying attention?” “All this time and energy here and is it making a difference?” Joanna reminded us to release the need for our work to make a difference or reach people or be successful. The most important thing to do is to keep doing the work, allowing the creativity to continue to move through us. The key is simply to keep doing it.

“We are so much more than we see right now. The powers that brought us here are so powerful we cannot even imagine.” Joanna reminded us that we have help and we’re not alone. What an important message for all who are working as change agents for Earth.

What are you willing to stand up and protect?

To learn more about my work, please visit my website Turtle Island Adventures.