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Joy, Sorrow, and Standing for Life

October 23, 2022 by Fowler

 

“One of the penalties of an ecological education is to live alone in a world of wounds.” –Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 1945.

A few weeks ago, I began hearing chain saws across the creek from my house. Even though this unoccupied land isn’t mine, I’ve been going there regularly for the last 3 years to walk, pray and leave offerings, and have been delighted by many wonderful Nature beings there, both material and spiritual. I remember reflecting just recently that I bet no one else alive right now loves this humble little stretch of pinyons and junipers, cactus, desert grasses and bright spring wildflowers like I do. [Read more…] about Joy, Sorrow, and Standing for Life

Filed Under: Earth-Centered Practices and Ceremonies, Home Featured Right

Magic Beckoning

August 2, 2022 by Fowler

Hello, friends of Gaia! Climate scientist James Lovelock, the central developer of the Gaia hypothesis back in the 1970s, died last week at 103 years old. An obituary in The Guardian states: “He warned, in clearer terms than any of his peers, of the dangers humanity posed to the extraordinary web of relations that make Earth uniquely alive in our universe.” I recently returned from a 2-½ month pilgrimage to Scotland and Ireland, where my appreciation of this magnificent, mysterious “web of relations” deepened considerably.

Now, back at home, I’m beginning to write a book! It will incorporate earlier writings in this blog, along with revelations and instructions I received on my recent journey. The book will recount my own ideas and experiences with what I call Nature Magic.

Here is a draft of the Preface:

In April 2018 I took part in a powerful 5-day retreat in which we explored the deepest parts of ourselves and worked to reclaim our most profound greatness and uniqueness. During our time together, I contacted and released an enormous amount of energy and power that had been suppressed inside me all my life. I returned home with this personal mantra: “I can have whatever I want.” I had never completely believed that before, and, with awe, I felt my deep Self empowered and enlarged. Here is what happened a few days later:

I drive to a place outside Santa Fe to go birdwatching. It’s along the Santa Fe River, downstream from the sewage treatment plant. The river—emblematic of many rivers in the drought-plagued American Southwest—flows for maybe half a mile through the town’s tourist areas, and then, except temporarily during thunderstorms, becomes a dry, sandy ditch for most of its length. Southwest of town, it is temporarily rejuvenated for a few miles by the treated sewage effluent released from the plant, before it again goes dry, all the way down to its junction with the Rio Grande.

As I’m greeting the arriving spring warblers and tanagers, I feel again my love for the birds, and my commitment to these winged ones who have enchanted me all my life. I affirm once more that I don’t work for myself—I work for the birds. I want what they want. And, I ask myself, what do they want? It’s very simple. They want water, trees, cover, food, nesting sites. They want their patch of ground where they can keep living and prospering as they have for millions of years. The birds, like other wild creatures, don’t have it in their nature to “want” anything beyond the necessary conditions for life and its continuance.

And, I suddenly see, that’s exactly what I can’t give them, and neither can anyone else!

Here they are, my precious bird friends, living along a couple of miles of treated sewage water, with the river dry and lifeless above and below this small, faintly reeking green place. While the birds steadily decrease in number, the county still grants building permits for 20 new homes here and 100 new apartments there, when everyone knows that there’s not even enough water for the present population. And there’s seemingly no end to this destructive short-sightedness, here, or anywhere else in the Southwest, or, really, anywhere else in the world.

So—no! I can’t have what I want! None of us who love green Nature can ever have what we want: a fertile, diverse world whose robust living web generously supports all life, human and non-human, where all beings are respected and live freely in their home place, and know that their descendants can too.

I’m stunned. I feel like I’ve run full tilt into a stone wall. I cry and cry. And, finally, a calm inner voice says, “Now it’s clear. The only thing I can do is learn to work the strongest Nature-based magic I possibly can until the end of my days. Magic that can plant good seeds for a beneficent, rooted, green future that I’ll never see. That is how I can truly help.”

This book is one of those seeds.

Filed Under: Ancestral Spirituality, Home Featured Left

Green Hearts, Green Love

February 16, 2022 by Fowler

When I was about 9 years old, another girl and I were discussing what our favorite color was. My little friend, in a burst of childish patriotism, dramatically declaimed that her favorite colors were red, white and blue. I replied unhesitatingly that my favorite color was green—and that it was “underneath” all the other colors. We wouldn’t even have red, white and blue, I declared, if we didn’t have green.

Recalling this conversation more than 60 years later, I’m amazed that my 9-year-old self knew this. Yet it’s something I’ve always believed: The color Green gives meaning, grounding and life to everything—from the sustaining, microscopic green of plants’ chlorophyll, which, directly or indirectly, feeds all planetary life; to Gaia’s vast, exuberant, ever-ramifying life-web that exists around and within us, and gifts our hearts, souls, and senses with endless beauty and vitality. [Read more…] about Green Hearts, Green Love

Filed Under: Deep Ecology and Earth-Centered Philosophy, Home Featured Right

Acting Like We Have Relatives

December 16, 2021 by Fowler

I’ve been told that the Dineh people of the desert southwest describe someone who has gotten grievously off-track in his life and behavior by saying: “He’s acting like he doesn’t have any relatives.”

Among ancestral peoples, someone who acts like he or she doesn’t have relatives—someone who behaves as if they are not linked to their life-honoring ancestral ways, and who disrespects and rejects the human and non-human members of their community—is in major trouble. Those who rudely fail to acknowledge their connections or carry out their obligations to Gaia’s web of life, of which they are inevitably a part, are considered seriously ill, both mentally and spiritually. [Read more…] about Acting Like We Have Relatives

Filed Under: Ancestral Spirituality, Home Featured Left

The Path of Gaia

November 30, 2021 by Fowler

garden pathAfter writing Gaia’s Blog for over a year, I’m circling back to the most central questions: Who is Gaia? How can we understand and unite with Her as fully as possible?

In mythology, “Gaia” typically refers to the Goddess of the Earth, the ancestral Mother. Indeed, another way to refer to Gaia might be as Mother Earth, the entirety of the physical planet—the waters and forests and prairies, and more fine-grained manifestations like the plants and animals.

To the visionary scientists who developed the Gaia Hypothesis 50 years ago, “Gaia” means the total, measurable physical/chemical/biological level of the planet, which, they proposed, is an intelligent, self-regulating system perpetually seeking homeostasis—even, or especially, in response to the ongoing breakdown of the biosphere. [Read more…] about The Path of Gaia

Filed Under: Deep Ecology and Earth-Centered Philosophy, Home Featured Right

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The Latest from Gaia’s Blog

Joy, Sorrow, and Standing for Life

  “One of the penalties of an ecological education is to live alone in a world of wounds.” --Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 1945. A few weeks ago, I began hearing chain saws across … [Read More...] about Joy, Sorrow, and Standing for Life

Magic Beckoning

Hello, friends of Gaia! Climate scientist James Lovelock, the central developer of the Gaia hypothesis back in the 1970s, died last week at 103 years old. An obituary in The Guardian states: “He … [Read More...] about Magic Beckoning

Green Hearts, Green Love

When I was about 9 years old, another girl and I were discussing what our favorite color was. My little friend, in a burst of childish patriotism, dramatically declaimed that her favorite colors were … [Read More...] about Green Hearts, Green Love

Acting Like We Have Relatives

I’ve been told that the Dineh people of the desert southwest describe someone who has gotten grievously off-track in his life and behavior by saying: “He’s acting like he doesn’t have any … [Read More...] about Acting Like We Have Relatives

garden path

The Path of Gaia

After writing Gaia’s Blog for over a year, I’m circling back to the most central questions: Who is Gaia? How can we understand and unite with Her as fully as possible? In mythology, “Gaia” … [Read More...] about The Path of Gaia

Blog Topics

  • Ancestral Spirituality
  • Deep Ecology and Earth-Centered Philosophy
  • Earth-Centered Practices and Ceremonies
  • Gaia and the Divine Feminine
  • The Sacred Land’s Wisdom

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