Hello and welcome.
Today's meditation will be about deep time.
Deep time is a way of thinking about the earth in larger terms.
Our short-term thinking gets us into trouble.
It allows us to create systems of oppression and systems of capitalism that destroy the earth and its creatures.
Today's meditation will walk us through planting and growing an acorn.
We may never sit under its shade,
But future generations will.
Being able to think about seven generations into the future,
Seven generations into the past,
Is one way to think about the impact our decisions have on people,
Whether 100 or 1000 or 10,
000 years from now.
Before we continue,
This is a good place to offer land acknowledgement.
Land acknowledgements allow us to recognize the harms that were perpetuated by the people who came before us,
And also act as a call to action to recognize the history of the peoples who were harmed in the places we now occupy.
This is especially important in our current climate as we use the earth imagery to heal.
We must also reconcile the harms perpetrated upon it.
I am recording this on the unceded and occupied lands of the Comanche and the Mescalero Apache,
Before then the Wichita,
And what is now known as West Texas.
I offer this land acknowledgement in the recognition of the harms that white supremacy and Western-style colonialism have had in indigenous communities here in the US and around the world.
Let's go ahead and get started.
Maybe we'll do some deep breathing so come to a place where you feel comfortable,
Be seated or lying down.
Feel free to place one or both hands on the belly.
Start to breathe in deeply through the nose,
Maybe exhale through the mouth.
You may close your eyes if you would like.
Notice how the belly rises and falls with the breath.
What year is it where you are?
Think about it.
Then go ahead and place a zero in front of that year.
The year I am recording this is 02022.
How does that extra thousand years feel?
We'll sit with this for a few more moments.
The extra thousand years.
Alright,
Let's go ahead and imagine that we have an acorn.
What is this acorn look like?
Does it have a little cap on top?
About its roundness,
The small ridges along the sides,
The point at the bottom.
The acorn is in your palm and it is perfect.
It is what we need to start thinking deeper about time and our connection to it,
As well as to the seasons.
Pick a place in your imagination where you would want to plant this acorn.
What color is the earth that you're on?
Is it the rich brown earth?
Is it a red earth?
Is it a combination?
Are there other rocks nearby?
Other trees?
Is there a clearing?
Are you going to plant this acorn in your own backyard?
Find a local park?
Wherever you have in your mind decided to be with this acorn,
Where you want to plant it,
Let's go there now.
As you stand here,
You are ready.
Let's begin to dig into the earth.
You have a trowel in one hand,
The acorn in your pocket,
And a watering can nearby.
Go ahead and acknowledge the earth here.
Acknowledge the people and the animals who are on this land before you.
Begin to dig,
Just a hole big enough for this acorn.
Doesn't have to be very deep.
The acorn will take care of the rest.
Use your hands to move the earth away.
As you move the earth away,
Be grateful for its life-giving properties,
The richness and vitality.
You may be here longer than any of us.
When you're ready,
Plant the seed.
Drop it into the hole you've just dug.
Place the earth back over top it.
Maybe even grab that watering can.
Put a little extra water on top.
Maybe even place your hands back over top that recently dug earth.
You may want to say a prayer here,
Or send some good thoughts to the seed.
Encourage the seed to grow,
Its roots deep into the earth.
Even imagining the roots touching the earth's energetic center.
You can sit back now.
Your acorn has been planted.
It will grow healthy and strong.
And as you sit here,
Imagine what the seed might look like a year from now.
How it will have grown.
Small,
Perhaps.
Just a little twig,
Perhaps,
In the place that you put it.
Imagine what this will look like in five years.
Your acorn may have become a bit more of a sapling,
Still small,
Still courageous.
Maybe a few branches or a few leaves to gather the sun's energy into nutrients for itself.
Can you imagine the street will look like in 10 years?
How much bigger it will be?
How much taller?
Maybe a few more branches.
What if you come back to the spot in 20 or 30 years?
Perhaps you know you won't be able to see this tree for yourself in that time.
But look ahead anyway.
Maybe your family checks on the tree from time to time,
As you've entrusted it to their care.
Are the branches large enough yet for people to climb?
Is there shade?
Is it enough to be able to sit under it,
Perhaps even read a book?
What will this tree look like in 50 years?
A hundred years.
What about the other creatures nearby,
The squirrels,
The chipmunks,
The birds that have started to make it their home in this time?
The insects too?
The cicadas in the summer,
The peepers in the spring?
Maybe even some fireflies in the summertime?
In that amount of time,
Perhaps some branches have fallen over the years?
The leaves creating a lovely new forest floor?
Let's jump ahead 500 years.
Under the shade of the tree,
Moss still grows on rocks?
Maybe that meadow is no longer a meadow.
Perhaps there are more oak trees nearby?
Younger than the one that you planted,
But they are seedlings of your own tree.
Other plants may have sprouted up too.
Ferns and mosses.
What about the rich,
Damp earth of year after year,
Of these leaves gathering and rotting away?
Is this the circle of life for creating a rich earth for these creatures to thrive on?
What will this tree look like in a thousand years?
Is your family still caring for it?
How big is its trunk after a thousand years?
How tall do those branches go?
Is it as mighty as a sequoia?
The knots in the bark of the trunk of the tree,
So large it might take ten people,
Twenty people holding hands to go all the way around it.
Your tree is mighty and strong.
Maybe surviving all kinds of things.
Lightning strikes.
War,
Maybe?
Has seen people and animals shift,
The seasons and the climate.
And yet it still stands.
It has created life in an ecosystem of its own.
Sit here in the stillness,
A thousand years from now.
Under the shade of this tree.
This is a deep time.
We know that we will not be here a thousand years from now.
But we can imagine what it would be like in this space,
In this time with this tree and its creatures.
Maybe even your family through the generations.
And the people and the seasons,
Year after year.
How your current actions and those actions of our society affect all of it.
If you want to continue this journey,
Try to imagine two thousand years from now.
Is this tree still here?
If not,
What has changed?
About five thousand years.
The ecosystem,
The planet,
The people on it.
How has it changed?
What can we do now in this moment to ripple out into the next five thousand years?
How has it changed?
How has it changed?
