Kindling the Native Spirit: Sacred Practices for Everyday Life - Denise Linn 2015
The Call of the Spirit of the Land
The Call: Remembering Who You Are
The first step to ignite the native spirit within you is to connect with the natural world. This begins by understanding that everything in the universe has consciousness. Even the most hardened skeptics would agree that animals are conscious beings. And modern science has discovered that plants can respond to the energy field of humans. However, even though science hasn’t decreed it to be so (at this time), no less conscious are the stones, mountains, and rivers. Native people always knew that everything has a consciousness. Blessings were asked of the Spirit of the Sea before a fishing trip and the Rain Spirit during a drought. To those earth-based clans, the spirits of the natural world were real. The earth was called “mother” or “grandmother,” and clemency was asked before digging into her flesh. In every way, native people honored their connection to the living, conscious world around them.
The idea that something as big as our planet might be alive is very difficult for some people to comprehend. However, it’s fascinating to notice that the earth regulates her environment in much the same way that the human body self-regulates in order to maintain constant conditions within itself. For example, a human body in good health maintains a temperature of approximately 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit. During the summer and winter, despite the fluctuations of outer temperature, the body adheres very close to this norm. When body temperature drops below this, you begin to shiver and your skin contracts, raising body temperature. When body temperature rises above 98.6 degrees, your pores will open and release perspiration, thus bringing body temperature back down through the cooling process of evaporation.
Similarly, the temperature of the earth has remained at an average of 55.4 degrees Fahrenheit for 3,800 million years, even though the sun became 25 percent hotter and brighter during this period of time. As the sun became hotter, the plants on Earth drew in more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, thus reducing the greenhouse effect warming the planet. In other words, Grandmother Earth devised a way to maintain her constant temperature for millions of years . . . until now, when human interference over a short period of time has made it difficult for her to stay in balance.
Another example of the remarkable ability of the planet to self-regulate is the salinity of the sea. The level of salt in the ocean has remained at 3.4 percent for thousands of years, even though rivers are continually washing salt from the earth into the sea. Similarly, the oxygen content of our atmosphere stays at 21 percent, which is the necessary level for life to exist on the planet. When you know, in the depth of your being, that the earth is alive and each of her elements is alive, it can transform your life in subtle yet profound ways.