Nature
“Oh, come on Harry. All you mortals get all hung up over your precious souls. You’ve never seen your soul, never touched it, never done anything with it. What’s all the to-do?” said Bob the Skull, the spirit of intellect, to Harry Dresden, a professional Wizard.
Bob the Skull’s opinion popped up in my head yesterday when my husband told me about a friend of ours who, after reading several books and doing some hard thinking, figured out why exactly USA attacked Iraq and how exactly the bad guys are going to take a total control over everything, and forever deprive everyone of their freedom. I listened to it and thought “all we mortals get all hung up over our precious freedom. We don’t use it, don’t exercise it, don’t do anything with it. We are content to follow the rules, be raised and brought up, trained and taught. We are happy to obey society, traditions, religions, laws, regulations, media, PR specialists, marketing agencies, teachers and gurus. We do what we are told, live like we are told, anyway, so what’s all the to-do when it comes to freedom?
We get all excited and twitchy when someone suggests that our freedom could be taken away. We fear that we will lose it, we fight and kill to protect it, we write books and make speeches in praise of it and condemn those who attempt take it away and yet, when we look deeper, we may realize that freedom can not be taken away.
Freedom can not be taken away not because we already gave it away, but because freedom is what we are. Freedom is not a condition granted, a privilege, a gift, it is simply us. We don’t have it, we are it. We can not possibly lose it. In any situation, in every single moment, in every single circumstance, we are free to choose, free to decide who we are, free to choose how we relate. When we are present to who we are, when I am present as who I am, I am simply free.
I thought about Bob the Skull again today morning. A friend of mine sent me a link to a website about unusually intense solar activities, about solar storms and all the havoc they are going to play with Earth. “Oh, this is another one of those ‘we are all going to die!’ scenarios” I thought with a true, polish cynicism. What is it about humans? What is it about mortals? The world is always coming to an end, a disaster is always looming, someone always prophesies the end of all life.
We mortals get all hung up over our precious life. We hardly ever experience it, we are to busy being scared of it, trying to survive it, suffering through it, trying to protect ourselves from it, most of us never does anything with it other than spending a lot of time trying to accumulate things, so what’s all the to-do when it comes to life?
We get all excited and twitchy when someone suggests that our life could be taken away. We are terrified of losing it, terrified of life ending and yet, when we look deeper, we may realize that life can not end.
No matter what the circumstances, no matter what the situation, we can not lose life because life is what we are. Life is not a condition or a circumstance, it is not limited to our bodies staying more or less in their current shape. Life is not something that animates our ideas, opinions and thoughts, and shapes them together into a person. Life is not limited to what we think of it, life is not limited to our stories about it. Life has no end, no beginning and no limits because we have no end, no beginning and no limits, and we are life.
No matter what the circumstances, no matter what the situation, no matter the state of the physical body and no mater what story our mind tells us, or what story of who we are we have to let go of – we are who we are. We are life.
It is not possible for us to lose our freedom. It is not possible for anyone or anything to take freedom away. It is not possible for us to lose life, nor is it possible for anyone or anything to deprive us of it. There are no such things as disasters. It is not possible for anything bad to happen because no matter what happens, no matter how things change, transform, evolve, we are who we are. Life and freedom. And we don’t change.
I love being with nature, with trees, because of the way they relate. There is no “noise” in relationship with trees. There is no “little voice in my head”, there are no stories, no “right way” to be, to talk, no “right thing to do”. There is only space to be. There is no talking.
I realized recently that, while striving to remain present to who I really am, I fall again and again into the trap of focusing on the trauma that prevents me from being who I really am. I try to let go of it, clear it, work with it, open through it, heal it. Trauma is not who I am and yet trauma is what I write about, talk about, think about. Rather than simply being myself I am forever “trying to be myself”.
But when I forget about the trauma there is space. No better way to say it. Space. Clear, open and endless. And I can do whatever I want because that space is me and I am that space.
It is not a space within existing reality or outside of it, it is not a space inside of my house, it is not a breathing space – it is a space, period. I can do whatever I want because there is nothing, literally nothing, to stop me. Because there is nothing there. Except for me.
This is the beauty of it – it is empty and I am there.
From this place all the stories, all the rules, all the limitations, all the “you can’t do this” or “this is not possible”, or “this is not how it works” are just things that people say. Nothing more than that, just things we say. The things we say belong to trauma, they belong to the noise. Without trauma nothing needs to be said.
This is why I love hanging out with nature so much, because nature doesn’t say anything. It just is. It doesn’t say anything therefore the “you can’t do this” or “this is not possible”, or “this is not how it works” simply doesn’t exist.
This is also why I love fairy tales and never, ever read the “let me tell you how it is” kind of books. Because I can relate to fairy tales the same way I relate to life, to reality, as who I really am: there are no rules, no limits, nothing is impossible.
Everything is possible in a fairy tale. Everything is possible in nature. Everything is possible in life. And the only thing to do is to do whatever I want.
It is wonderful to be outside. I begin to believe that living in houses really wasn’t such a good idea. It is so spacious, so open, so unguarded to just be out in the world where trees are, where birds are, where the sky is.
Working in my yard today was such a pleasure. I was pulling generations of old, dried ferns out of the ground. It was not an easy task, they resisted, clung to the earth with all their might and did all they could to become slippery and fragile, twisting, bending and crumbling, doing anything to defy me. I was pulling really hard, slipped and collapsed on the ground, laughing. The bed of ferns I fell on top of was cool, soft and fragrant, the smell of fresh, moist earth exhilarating, and the sky was so gorgeous, and I was happy.
My yard needs a lot of work. When we moved to this house, about a year and a half ago, the yard was a disaster. Hardly anything was still alive, what was alive was hopelessly overgrown and tangled. We put some work into cutting and pulling the brambles, cleaning out the space for new plants … and … we got busy. From time to time we would realize that the yard needs landscaping but neither of us had any experience with plants, there was so much work, we had no time, there were other priorities, we were too tired. The yard continued to look bare, dusty and dismal and we knew that something should be done, that it should get fixed. Occasionally we would plan to call someone, get someone to come and do something, but we never quite got to it.
Which is why my recent and sudden love of gardening was surprising, not to say strange. I spent hours outside those last two weeks digging, planting, watering, pruning. I enjoyed myself so thoroughly that it took me over a week to register that this is not like me. Not only working in the yard is not quite normal, but even more strange is me doing it for pleasure, because I like it, because I am happy doing it.
This is what happened, I realized, this is what’s different. Before the yard was a duty, it was something that had to be done. It was a space that didn’t work for me esthetically, and needed to get fixed.
But today, as I was pruning roses and cutting faded geranium blooms, there was such a peaceful, spacious, restful space. The kind of space that really close friends enjoy, friends who can sit together in silence for hours simply being in each other’s presence, feeling the connection. I felt that my house was surrounded by friends. I didn’t need to talk to them, just being with them was enough. Letting go of my mind, relaxing my body, and simply enjoying being alive.
And it made me wonder – why do we want to save Earth? Why do we want to save nature? Is it because we believe we should? Because it’s our duty? Because it’s the “right thing to do”? Is it because we are really, really scared and want to save our collective butts? Is it because we need nature to survive?
And if we didn’t need nature to survive, if it could collapse without taking us with it – would we miss it? Would there be a hole in our lives, a hole that’s left when a loved one is gone?
Do we actually like nature? Do we enjoy it’s company? Or do we simply use it for whatever it is we need?
Our mind would have us act out of fear. It would have us be terrified of an imminent danger, always ready to defend ourselves, to fight for survival. Our mind would have us act because we should, because we need to, because we have to, because it’s right, it’s a duty, it’s an obligation, because it is our job.
But when we let go of the mind, when we come back to who we are, who we really are, I believe we act because we like it, because it feels really good, because we really enjoy it, because it’s fun.
Which may be why after nearly every session with Brooks during which I open really deeply to who I am, when I ask him: “what do I do now?” he doesn’t say “go save nature and save the world”. He says: “go have fun”.
There is a city I’ve been creating for one of my stories yesterday. A city that lies on the border between the human reality and the elfish forest. It’s precarious position influences it’s reality: the basic layout of the land is set, laws of physics, for the most part, are consistent with those of the human world, plants, trees, rocks, can not move around or speak – but they are alive and conscious.
Being strongly influenced by their closeness to the elfish world the citizens of the city, though decidedly human, relate differently than humans usually do. They can feel and communicate with feelings. They can relate to trees, animals, plants, as they would to any being equally intelligent and conscious as themselves.
They can communicate with each other without words, without thoughts, through feelings and sensations, without language. Their language, when used, tends to be somewhat strange, they don’t pay as much attention to rules of grammar and such, focusing instead on the melody, the feeling and energy that certain words and sentences carry.
Being very closely aware, conscious of and connected to the flow of reality people of this city don’t have much tendency to gathering or hoarding stuff. They feel it as a disturbance, as a separation and exclusion from their surroundings. Being uninterested in profit they work for pleasure. They tend to focus on developing their interests and passions throughout their lives.
Their openness and strong awareness of each other makes hurting one another a very unpleasant experience for the one inflicting hurt as well as for the one receiving it, therefore they seldom do it. Though they do get angry and deal with conflicts, generally they don’t hurt anyone intentionally, there is hardly any crime.
There is a governing body in the city, although it plays a different role than it does in human cities. Since there is no crime, there is no reason to discipline nor to enforce. The governing council plays the role of space holders and facilitators. They make sure that there is always a space for everyone to flourish and develop, they give assistance when needed and, when necessary, mediate and reorganize situations that cause conflicts. The office of councilor is not a paid position, it is a service that everyone in community undertakes at some point or another, always taking care that there is an equal amount of men, women and children on the council for the purpose of having the broader perspective possible.
The institutions of marriage and family are not very common. Because of the great sensitivity and connection that everyone has with the rest of the community, individuals are free to pursue their own interest and their own way of being without ever feeling lonely or alienated, therefore often they have no reason to congregate into families. They form partnerships that last for different amount of time, some are short affairs, some are life-long, but very rarely do they enter into a formal union. Children are cared for by everyone, though they have very strong connection with their parents when they are young.
I showed this description to my husband last night.
“I like it” he said, “I want to move there”.
“much like an utophia – perfect reality sort of thing” I said, “this is what our earth could be like, right now”
“enlightened people” said my husband
“yep” I responded, “because nothing that I’m writing is a fantasy, it’s all truth, it’s all real”
“I know” said my husband, ” that’s why I like your idea so much”
“Sustainability, in a broad sense, is the capacity to maintain a certain process or state. It is now most frequently used in connection with biological and human systems. In an ecological context, sustainability can be defined as the ability of an ecosystem to maintain ecological processes, functions, biodiversity and productivity into the future.”
This is a definition of sustainability published by Wikipedia.
I read it today and it occurred to me suddenly: what if there is more? What if the opportunity is much greater than “maintaining process or state”, maintaining the status quo? Why stop at maintaining? Why not transform? Why not open to new opportunities that we have never dreamed of before?
It is wise, conscious and loving on the part of humans to repair the damage we have caused to nature, to Earth. It is a smart thing, a good thing, to reverse the way our life is organized, to change our destructive habits, to avoid further damage and to reinstate what has been broken or interrupted. It is a good thing to fix things.
But does nature really need fixing?
When I listen to the old oaks growing on the hill by my house, when a young cherry tree stops me as I pass by it to help me open to who I am exactly when I need help, when I feel the way slender and graceful eucalyptus trees shift and reorganize gently to open to sun or frost, it becomes clear to me that I am the student, they are the teachers.
Nature is present, aware, conscious as what it is, as who it is, effortlessly, naturally. Trees open and adjust to the reality around them. They are who they are only, fully, completely, holding space for everyone and everything else to open to their uniqueness. Gently, graciously, respectfully.
Whenever I open to their presence it becomes clear to me that I am the student, they are the teachers.
There are more ways to be than that of the mind. There are more ways to organize in relationship to this reality than the way of human society. What we are striving to achieve, what we are looking for, studying for, practicing for – love, harmony, balance, peace, enlightenment – is common in nature, it is normal in nature. It is normal for trees to be who they are, it is normal for humans to be who we are.
If we listen. If we open to the opportunity of nature being more than a fragile system that needs fixing and saving, if we accept nature as an ally, as a partner, as a peer, the opportunities of transformation and growth will become unlimited – because there are no limits in nature.
