• Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Gaia Blog

Gaia’s Blog: Seeds for a Resilient, Earth-Centered Future

  • HOME
  • GAIA’S BLOG
  • ABOUT MARY JANET
  • CONTACT

Ancestral Spirituality

All humans alive on Earth today have our origins in indigenous traditions and lifeways, whether our ancestors were from Europe, Africa, Asia, Oceania or the Americas. Just a relative handful of generations ago our forebears were living practical and spiritual lives that were attuned to the sacred living web of the land. What can we learn now, from our own ancestral traditions and inner promptings, that will guide us in overcoming the negative, anti-life conditioning of the presently-dominant culture, and live more harmoniously on our Mother Earth?

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 Flowing Green Love of Autumn

September 27, 2021 by Fowler

One day last year, walking along a nearby mountain stream, I entered a place that felt sacred and mysterious. Shaded by a grove of willows, the creek’s waters gently flowed and purled around some stepping stones, evoking a sense of quiet, of waiting. I felt the presence of a water spirit and started singing to her. Very soon she began to sing back. She ended up giving me a beautiful song, which I was fortunately able to echo and record, line by line, as she sang it. When it was over, with great gratitude I inquired, “is this a song from the Mother of the Waters?” And I heard very clearly: “No, it is a song from a Mother of the Waters.” [Read more…] about The Flowing Green Love of Autumn

Filed Under: Ancestral Spirituality, Home Featured Left

Allying with Orchil the Weaving Goddess

September 1, 2021 by Fowler

In the Celtic spiritual tradition, some speak of Orchil, the Weaving Goddess. She sits in the Underworld at two looms. On one loom, the warp extends down into the fiery heart of the planet; on the other loom the warp goes up to the blazing stars. Poised between Earth Light and Star Light, partaking of both Up and Down, Orchil weaves the weft on Her two looms, connecting every star to every other star, generating the infinite fabric of our planet and ourselves. [Read more…] about Allying with Orchil the Weaving Goddess

Filed Under: Ancestral Spirituality, Home Featured Right

Recovering Our Indigeneity

February 24, 2021 by Fowler

What does it mean to be indigenous? Ecologist and author Eileen Crist, in a recent interview, usefully outlines 3 principles held by all indigenous cultures. Indigenous people live sustainably and bioregionally, that is, they live “within the contours of the land.” They regularly celebrate the natural world through an annual cycle of festivals and ceremonies. And they see “everything as alive, as wondrous in itself.” *

In other words, indigenous people don’t simply love “the land” in the abstract—they know themselves as part of the place on Earth where they live. They’re not just casually attentive to the more-than-human world of Nature around them—they experience themselves living within it, in a web of relationship that is continually studied, affirmed and celebrated. And they don’t pray to a remote, abstract God—they attune with the immanent spiritual energies, beings, and deities of the land around them. Indigenous people’s personal and community lives continually mirror and express these realities, from birth to death, from a long-ago past to a calmly beckoning future. [Read more…] about Recovering Our Indigeneity

Filed Under: Ancestral Spirituality, Home Featured Left

The Wheel and the Virus: Teachings from the Dark

January 13, 2021 by Fowler

Here we are again, in the darkest time of the year. After our holiday celebrations (most of them based on the land-connected traditions of our ancestors), now we settle into the rhythm of short days, dark evenings, and cold weather, already dreaming of spring. And indeed, the dawning of spring is always a riotously happy time, on the land and within ourselves. But, in the meantime, every year most of us do our best to avoid the lessons of winter. [Read more…] about The Wheel and the Virus: Teachings from the Dark

Filed Under: Ancestral Spirituality, Home Featured Right

  • Go to page 1
  • Go to page 2
  • Go to Next Page »

Primary Sidebar

The Latest from Gaia’s Blog

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

Becoming “Woke” on Behalf of Gaia

These days we’re being confronted on all sides with a wide variety of human grievances. We’re even being urged to re-examine the very words we use, to become more “woke” to systemic discrimination and … [Read More...] about Becoming “Woke” on Behalf of Gaia

Standing Firm in Gaia

Back in the 1990s I participated in a weekly psycho-spiritual therapy group. During one session, while sobbing in despair about all the human assaults on the natural world, I let it slip that I … [Read More...] about Standing Firm in 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

ENews Sign Up

Join my mailing list and receive an occasional short email from me with my latest blog writings.
—Mary Janet

Gaia-Blog.com • ©Copyright Mary Janet Fowler, Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA.
Reproduction of this material in whole or in part is strictly prohibited without written permission.
Web development: EJ Communications