The Human-Nature relationship is at the heart of the Natural Communion Programs. The truth of this relationship is essentially unspeakable it is so profound and vast. Yet we are pretty oblivious, outside of academic understandings of ecology and so forth. In the realm of experience too often nature is reduced to a mere location for some human activity, the backdrop as it were.
The Natural Communion Programs at the Earthwalk Center are designed to help us enter into a state of increased sensitivity to all that Nature "is" and can provide, and to increase our conscious participation with the powers of Nature.
We now know, from modern science, that we have unfurled out of natures vast cosmic unfolding. We are an extension of the original fireball that gave birth to the cosmos. We are part of the ongoing creativity of the vast realm we call Nature. We can experience that reality; the reality of our belonging and unfolding directly, and in a variety of different ways.
Our relationship with nature also presents us with the challenges of impermanence, change, and the insignificance of the ego in the face of larger powers. These experiences expand and humble us into our true place in the great circle of life.
Natural Communion is a way of attuning to nature that opens us to experience a lost dimension of nature that provides guidance, healing, and food for the soul. A dimension of nature that actively reflects us back to ourselves and is a teacher.
Natural Communion is the outgrowth of several new developments in Western thought.
1) There is a new field called eco-psychology that is looking at the health effects on body, mind and spirit, caused by our deep alienation from “sense of place” and from the natural rhythms and meaning that participation with nature provides.
2) There are several newly emerging theologies and revisions of old theologies, which are expounding a renewed appreciation of the Natural World as God’s Creation, or even as God within creation, the “Light of the Firmament”. Either way nature is understood as revelatory of God’s word, presence, and power.
3) The "great work" of Brian Swimme and Thomas Berry in bringing the recent revelations of science off the shelves and putting them into the Story of the Universe. Until we realized the whole story of where we have come from, we cannot fathom how creative, intelligent, and loving the Cosmos is. We cannot recognize that we belong to this story. And if we accept premise number 2, without this larger story, we cannot fully apprehend the nature of God or understand our God-nature.
4) The recent popularity of the Eckhart Tolle book, Power of Now tells me that we are collectively getting ready for that next great shift of consciousness. We are beginning to learn to shift our identity from the past/future orientation of the ego mind into the Present, which we experience through our Hearts. This great shift in consciousness requires practice and I know of no better, more nourishing and transforming way to make this practice than communing with Mother Nature. Nature also naturally opens our hearts and leads us into this new state.
5) The wisdom of the Guide Lectures, the training of the Pathwork® and CoreEnergetics, and the love of the Pathwork Community, where I have learned how to work with my own and others conscious and unconscious obstructions to opening, expanding, grounding, being present and connected.
So what do we do? There are multiple techniques and combinations of techniques for different steps in the process.
1) We sit in a circle with all life.
2) We tell the stories of creation. We remember where we’ve come from and why we are here.
3) We allow ourselves to melt, to relax in body and mind, to awaken in the moment, present,
fully inhabiting our bodies, centered in our hearts. We "embody" our own being and nature.
4) We do ritual and ceremony to participate with the vast powers of nature and to feel a part of
her again. We learn to address these vast powers around us.
5) We learn to attune as deeply to nature in each moment as we can, becoming present to her
Presence.
6) We let ourselves linger and gawk with wonder at her beauty and intelligence. We let ourselves
resonate to and be filled with the presence of her peace, love, and beauty.
7) We learn how to look into the mirror of nature, and we are blessed as she invariably reveals
both our faults and our own true nature.
8) She brings us the light of the firmament and she models for us what it is to be composed in the
light. Through her a great study of God can be made, if we learn how to observe what she is
teaching.
So Please join me in exploring this exciting new tool for transformation I call Natural Communion. You will love it!
Below are a list of presuppositions that I arrive at and make from a Natural Communion Perspective.
Natural Communion Basic Assumptions
All Nature is sentient, has subjectivity, interiority, depth, being, spirit.
Nature is radiant with light/life force/love.
Nature's radiance is a source of replenishment, nourishment & healing for us.
Nature is wordless and helps us quiet our thoughts
Nature is fully present and can help us become fully present
Nature is expanded and allows us to fully expand.
Nature naturally attracts us and is a source of great pleasure and joy for us.
Nature is creative and inspires our creativity.
Nature needs and wants a relationship with us. We are her creation and have a place in her larger unfolding and we needed a cradle of such splendor in order to activate the sensitivities within the human.
We are not and cannot be separate from Nature, but we are confused and believe we are. Thus our awareness and sensitivity to this interconnection has atrophied. Healing of personal and planetary dis-ease will result as we awaken from this myth of separation and the disconnected state of consciousness that has resulted.
Nature has come forth from, and is the expression of an underlying ground of being that interpenetrates and transcends the known natural world. As such it is a reflection of the source from which it springs. We are all from that source and are all aspects of it. Nature can lead us back to that source.
Spirit enfuses all of Nature, Light in both its physical and spiritual dimensions radiates from Sun and Moon and Stars, from Rock and Tree and River. Being "is" and Nature can teach us how to Be.
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