I was stuck in my head, trying to explain the uncomfortable state I found myself in. Looping, reaching. A coyote graced me with it’s medicine in the form of a confrontation with Enzo. He brought me out of myself and reminded me in his humbling trickster way, “Hey sweetie, there’s a lot going on out here. Lots of lifeforms are existing now in this moment just outside your door. You, human, are part of this ecosystem. Widen the sphere.”
I woke up this morning thinking about cities. In that groggy, soft, subliminal state, I felt into the foreignness. Flesh and blood, primal animals in a steel, concrete, technological maze, we buzz around inside of a computerized world. The gigantic areas of degradation to the natural habitat emitting more pollution and emissions than fathomable. And this is progress? The pushing. Our landscape, our bodies, all that we are. Production. Achievement. Caffeine. Pharmaceuticals. Plastic. Chemical “food”.
Breath into your belly, child. Know that you are alive. Eden, Eden, hold me close to you. Help me not to get spun. Open our eyes so that we may see your magnificence in the tiny sprout that comes from the seed, in the gigantic sun illuminating warmth over the vastness of this planet, in the heartbeat inside our chests. In the eyes of a dog live the whole of cosmos, the great mystery. I choose to look because there is no other way for I am no longer sleeping. It can be hard sometimes, to really look, because of the immensity of you.
The old ways should not be lost for the natural world has much to teach us. We once lived by her teachings, but they were stifled and labeled as primitive. Deep inside of all of us, deep down in the belly, this wisdom lives. Technological advancements do have their benefit, but over engrossment leads to imbalance. Equilibrium finds restoration in tuning in to the innate primal intelligence that is present in all of life. This is a two way street.
So I grow my food. I touch the Mother. I open to the wisdom of the Ancient Ones. I learn the names of the plants. I see them when I walk. I sit by the river. I bury my face in Enzo’s fur and breath in deep.
