Sanctifying Nature

"Vision of A New Culture"
Healing the Planet

Sanctifying Nature Session
Eco-spirituality in practice

"This is really wellbeing" exclaimed Marjan after one of the exercises. "REAL WELLBEING". And indeed it is a nice way to say what the exercises do to you. "They bring me to my deepest Self" Ingrid says. "This spot is so dear to me, it has a very special energy", is the way Mieke expresses it. "That contact with nature cannot be described" and "I'd rather like to go on for ever with it". That's the way Edith and Brigitte say it. "I take it to home and work" Sjoerd emphasizes. All recognize themselves in the same thing, everybody says it in her or his own way.

We have shared this together last summer in the Vondelpark in Amsterdam. It hardly can be expressed in words though. What I see as a teacher is the symphony of life: deep inward concentration, great clarity, the gracious movements, the gentle contact, pure joy, the unmoving silent awareness, the subtle beauty, the erupting bliss, the spontaneous naturalness, "to be just there", all the qualities of Real life were emerging there and became visible.

I had started the mornings because I "had to do something". "Being your Self connected" was very much my personal need. The exercises were especially designed to give people everything they already possess: to simultaneously being rooted in "Heaven" and earth, the clarity of mind, inner peace, an open heart, an intense free flowing energy and direct contact with the surrounding nature. Although I knew about the inner qualities of the exercises I had never thought that people would resonate in such a special way.

It appears that value has its origin in its surplus value, a quality of Being, which IS from the very beginning of the exercise. Everything is already there. You enjoy the moment - you are it - and there is nowhere to go anymore. There is no search, but the finding of fulfillment, which was there always. The essence of community, even between people who "didn't know each other previously" can be tasted all the time. In the exercises we are so naturally part of Life, we are "beyond communication". Moreover, the character of the exercises is such, that from the very first moment everything is moving spontaneously.

Hence, it isn't necessary to imitate the teacher hoping that "once it will be coming from within". With us your aim is realized immediately and in the selfsame Moment. It is all about "feeling awareness", to be in contact while simultaneously being aware. We do it by continuously letting go in the earth and to feel it. The paradox is this: because of the unity with the earth "Heaven" - your consciousness - is spontaneously expanding itself. Very soon "it clicks" with your environment, in a way that not you, but IT is moving you. From the same inner quality everybody then finds his or her own way.

To me all participants without any exception have become very dear friends. In a short period of time I felt myself growing into the group, something which is quite new to me. To me the mornings are THE praise of existence, the way in which I experience my joy, my gratitude, the openness, the continuous renewal and awe. My body is part of the "body of God", nature around me. I am standing, walking, moving in the Space That I Am Myself. Transcending myself nature has become part of Me. Being Nothing I am everything.

There are sometimes these thoughts which remind me of our common background. Experiencing that the Essence of the tree, the grass and the water is my Essence, that we are One in Essence, I think of those missionaries of the early Middle Ages, who traveled around in order to destroy everything that was holy to the people: cosmic nature. How they out of blind hatred have cut trees and forests, killed the animals, drained the wells, while burning and destroying the holy places. It is the main cause of our current alienation from ourselves and our environment.

Maybe it's funny, but when having those thoughts I feel responsible for the degradation of nature. Even more so, because this process was started and implemented in the name of the sacred, of "God". They were religious, "spiritual" people who did this to the earth and her inhabitants. And they still do it. Still fanatic Christian sects are destroying everything that is "not in Christ". Previously it were the pagans, now it is the indigenous people, who are exposed to the combined violence of "missionary, merchant and soldier".

The extra dimension the exercises is giving me is, that by being part of the Whole - by Being - I feel nature being sanctified (again). Of course she already is, but it is the feeling that what IS becomes activated, a visible, tangible and concrete reality. This awareness is stirring an impetuous joy within me. In such moments - just like Brigitte felt - I would like to go on walking, with my hands in namasté, to celebrate life and to return to nature and the people THAT which was taken from them.

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