Working with the internal combustion of the present
Originally published: 6/23/2020 on Weebly blog
I hope this three-minute prayer song will help bring you some peace in the heart and mind. In this time it is important to seek out the elements of water and earth as medicine. This song-prayer form is one of the great gifts I’ve received from my Peruvian teachers and from the plants in the jungle that I’ve built relationship with through ceremony. The songs are improvisational, not scripted, and I didn’t realize until I played it back that the sun (element fire) is the in middle verse - held and contained by the verses to the water and the earth. That’s when it can deliver its proper dose of fire-wisdom and radiant love of life. Some thoughts and suggestions on all of that follow the video below. Please feel free to learn and sing this song, adapt it, make it your own. I hope it helps.
Here is what the water taught me this morning: Our modern world has been built on the power of internal combustion. Western culture is primarily grounded in the element fire, and secondarily in the element air. We devote ourselves to an impatient, heated frenzy of success-hunting, as we climb the ladder to the heights. Like untamed fire, we believe "abundance" means "more, more, more." Untamed air is a tornado that rages along, tearing everything down in its self-absorbed spinning.
For a human to be a fully functioning spiritual being, we need to access all four elements and call them into action inside ourselves, so that they can balance and nurture each other and guard against the destructive potential in each element. The energies of fire and air need to be tempered by water and earth. It’s no coincidence that the most compulsive capitalists are the least willing to grieve (water) and the least able to express intimacy (earth).
Abstract intellectualizing and philosophizing, inane religious arguments over doctrine, and petty personal arguments on social media are the element air unbalanced by the waters of grief and the earth of interrelatedness. For fire to truly combust, it needs dry air. It needs space between the logs. When we resort to personal insults on social media, we are putting space between one another, and that that creates the environment for a more raging fire. Conspiracy theories are air located not in the head as thoughts but in the belly as primal fears. Unchecked fears in the belly careen into the world as tornadoes of envy, greed, arrogance, and tribalism. In Spanish, spiritual sickness is sometimes called aire malo (bad air). This kind of air can be nurtured, embraced, and healed by water and earth.
Our bellies are being opened right now and very old, primal energies are being spilled out. It’s not just a few decades of stored energy spilling out, but centuries, and not only 400 years, but many centuries of spiritual imbalance that are spilling out right now, in a giant cleansing and correction.
Here are some of the things you can do in your prayer work to help you get through all of this, and to be an agent for long-term healing:
Ask Mother Earth to receive into herself this energy pouring out from the humans. Remember that she is involved in this mass healing and, indeed, is orchestrating it. Ask her to help us open this old wound to the upper air and sunlight, and to take the heavy discharge down into herself, to be composted, to transform it into nourishment for the crops to come. Bless her and thank her.
Ask Mother Water to wash the old wound - both yours now and in the ancestor realm - and let her and Mother Earth hold you while you grieve. Grieving alone is a terrible thing, and if you’re not grieving together in community, at least ask the mothers of water and earth to hold you and wash you. And this week of the full moon, you can also ask Mother Moon to join in.
Ask the powers of the Spirit of infinity, of the great immensity, the Grandfather who feeds the light to the stars, to fill you with that big wisdom. Open the top of your head and ask Spirit to teach you the New Song. The old song has worn itself out. Ask for the New Song to be downloaded into your body.
If you are stuck in grieving, the medicine is action. Take a simple action in the physical world. Move your body, take a walk, get out in nature, even if it's the front steps. Sit with flowers and listen to birds. Don't intellectualize this, but let it in as medicine. Don’t confuse posting on social media for action. One simple action that summons earth energy is to donate money. It sounds abstract, but it moves energy and connects you to others. If you’re worried about your money, it’s a great time to be generous. For your rage, the medicine is grieving - best done in community. Lay on the earth and ask her to draw the tears out of you and take them down. For your fear, the medicine is sunlight on the belly, and asking it to penetrate down in and cleanse. Sunlight as the song of the first wisdom of the life force, penetrating down into the cave of fear in the belly, reminding your body to love life. The touch of trees, the song of the birds, and each other’s touch – these are all medicines.
If you'd like to go deeper with all of this, please join me for this one-night class on June 9th.
Blessings.
I hope this three-minute prayer song will help bring you some peace in the heart and mind. In this time it is important to seek out the elements of water and earth as medicine. This song-prayer form is one of the great gifts I’ve received from my Peruvian teachers and from the plants in the jungle that I’ve built relationship with through ceremony. The songs are improvisational, not scripted, and I didn’t realize until I played it back that the sun (element fire) is the in middle verse - held and contained by the verses to the water and the earth. That’s when it can deliver its proper dose of fire-wisdom and radiant love of life. Some thoughts and suggestions on all of that follow the video below. Please feel free to learn and sing this song, adapt it, make it your own. I hope it helps.
Here is what the water taught me this morning: Our modern world has been built on the power of internal combustion. Western culture is primarily grounded in the element fire, and secondarily in the element air. We devote ourselves to an impatient, heated frenzy of success-hunting, as we climb the ladder to the heights. Like untamed fire, we believe "abundance" means "more, more, more." Untamed air is a tornado that rages along, tearing everything down in its self-absorbed spinning.
For a human to be a fully functioning spiritual being, we need to access all four elements and call them into action inside ourselves, so that they can balance and nurture each other and guard against the destructive potential in each element. The energies of fire and air need to be tempered by water and earth. It’s no coincidence that the most compulsive capitalists are the least willing to grieve (water) and the least able to express intimacy (earth).
Abstract intellectualizing and philosophizing, inane religious arguments over doctrine, and petty personal arguments on social media are the element air unbalanced by the waters of grief and the earth of interrelatedness. For fire to truly combust, it needs dry air. It needs space between the logs. When we resort to personal insults on social media, we are putting space between one another, and that that creates the environment for a more raging fire. Conspiracy theories are air located not in the head as thoughts but in the belly as primal fears. Unchecked fears in the belly careen into the world as tornadoes of envy, greed, arrogance, and tribalism. In Spanish, spiritual sickness is sometimes called aire malo (bad air). This kind of air can be nurtured, embraced, and healed by water and earth.
Our bellies are being opened right now and very old, primal energies are being spilled out. It’s not just a few decades of stored energy spilling out, but centuries, and not only 400 years, but many centuries of spiritual imbalance that are spilling out right now, in a giant cleansing and correction.
Here are some of the things you can do in your prayer work to help you get through all of this, and to be an agent for long-term healing:
Ask Mother Earth to receive into herself this energy pouring out from the humans. Remember that she is involved in this mass healing and, indeed, is orchestrating it. Ask her to help us open this old wound to the upper air and sunlight, and to take the heavy discharge down into herself, to be composted, to transform it into nourishment for the crops to come. Bless her and thank her.
Ask Mother Water to wash the old wound - both yours now and in the ancestor realm - and let her and Mother Earth hold you while you grieve. Grieving alone is a terrible thing, and if you’re not grieving together in community, at least ask the mothers of water and earth to hold you and wash you. And this week of the full moon, you can also ask Mother Moon to join in.
Ask the powers of the Spirit of infinity, of the great immensity, the Grandfather who feeds the light to the stars, to fill you with that big wisdom. Open the top of your head and ask Spirit to teach you the New Song. The old song has worn itself out. Ask for the New Song to be downloaded into your body.
If you are stuck in grieving, the medicine is action. Take a simple action in the physical world. Move your body, take a walk, get out in nature, even if it's the front steps. Sit with flowers and listen to birds. Don't intellectualize this, but let it in as medicine. Don’t confuse posting on social media for action. One simple action that summons earth energy is to donate money. It sounds abstract, but it moves energy and connects you to others. If you’re worried about your money, it’s a great time to be generous. For your rage, the medicine is grieving - best done in community. Lay on the earth and ask her to draw the tears out of you and take them down. For your fear, the medicine is sunlight on the belly, and asking it to penetrate down in and cleanse. Sunlight as the song of the first wisdom of the life force, penetrating down into the cave of fear in the belly, reminding your body to love life. The touch of trees, the song of the birds, and each other’s touch – these are all medicines.
If you'd like to go deeper with all of this, please join me for this one-night class on June 9th.
Blessings.
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