Amphitheather
"Amphi" means 'on both sides'. This gives an interesting meaning here, where on one side are seats, made of the bodies of trees and on the other side, the trees themselves.
Find a comfortable space on one of the benches and consider the communal aspect of sitting in a round where trees are your neighbors. Give thanks for the place you sit, acknowledging this capacity is born of the gift of the tree for wood. As always, ask permission to be present with the trees.
If it is spring through mid-autumn, spend time breathing (respiring) with the trees. Exchange molecules together. Every time you breathe in, breathe the breath coming from the leaves. Every time you breath out, feel the leaves absorbing your breath. Let this exchange occur for several minutes just feeling that exchange and connection and the way in which the immediate exchange of particles inspires you quite literally.
What about the winter? With no leaves on the trees, they have slowed their rate of respiration and draw from the deep sources of sugar within their trunks. Can you let yourself imagine this for a moment? Can you feel the slower rate of existence while still acknowledging these trees have an abundant source of fuel to get through the winter? How does this resonate with you? Do you slow down in the winter? Do you wish you could slow down in the winter? What happens, here and now if you let your own respiration take a slower rate like that of the trees. What other areas of your body do you draw resources from? How does it feel to let the trees teach you a slower, deeper rhythm for living? How does it feel to sit in circle, to sit in communion and exchange breath and wisdom both? What else do you feel/hear/sense the trees doing, saying, sharing, telling you about life on this earth? What do you decide to share with and tell them about?
Find a comfortable space on one of the benches and consider the communal aspect of sitting in a round where trees are your neighbors. Give thanks for the place you sit, acknowledging this capacity is born of the gift of the tree for wood. As always, ask permission to be present with the trees.
If it is spring through mid-autumn, spend time breathing (respiring) with the trees. Exchange molecules together. Every time you breathe in, breathe the breath coming from the leaves. Every time you breath out, feel the leaves absorbing your breath. Let this exchange occur for several minutes just feeling that exchange and connection and the way in which the immediate exchange of particles inspires you quite literally.
What about the winter? With no leaves on the trees, they have slowed their rate of respiration and draw from the deep sources of sugar within their trunks. Can you let yourself imagine this for a moment? Can you feel the slower rate of existence while still acknowledging these trees have an abundant source of fuel to get through the winter? How does this resonate with you? Do you slow down in the winter? Do you wish you could slow down in the winter? What happens, here and now if you let your own respiration take a slower rate like that of the trees. What other areas of your body do you draw resources from? How does it feel to let the trees teach you a slower, deeper rhythm for living? How does it feel to sit in circle, to sit in communion and exchange breath and wisdom both? What else do you feel/hear/sense the trees doing, saying, sharing, telling you about life on this earth? What do you decide to share with and tell them about?
The longer I live here on earth, the more I love the light of sunrise, the silent tumble of snow from motionless branch, mute raven’s track in mud, moonset at dawn over a field of silky grasses, sleeping cows, spiders, thin trickling of the world’s water
.
Now, after all these years, I’m becoming literate in the other language. My feet know the twist of knobby spruce roots. My hands caress soft moss beds. I’ve smelled leaf mold on autumn mist, tasted sun-hot blueberries. And occasionally, as I touch, taste, and listen,
the boundary between nature and me becomes a threshold: I step across. The wild either slips into me, or comes leaping up,
like a silver fish, flashing out of my own dark wildness.
–BETH POWNING, FROM HOME: CHRONICLE OF A NORTH COUNTRY LIFE