Grounded On The Earth

In honor of Earth Day 2024, this is a guided practice of attuning to the reciprocity of breath with the trees, of grounding into the earth and raising into space, and of knowing we not on our own. We are part of a connected system.

Transcript

So let's start by noticing the ground.

And for some people,

That will be literally.

Most of us,

We're in a building of some kind.

We might be in a building that's very close to the ground,

Several floors up in a building,

But that's okay too.

The ground is there,

Even if it's several feet down.

Notice your feet,

Your seat.

Notice what you're supported by.

We can look around.

We can really notice what is here.

You can notice that we're in a particular moment in time.

We can notice that we're having a certain experience in this moment,

Experience in our body.

Our body might have places that want to be moving a little bit.

I'm gonna stretch,

Maybe.

You can notice all of that.

And we could allow ourselves to move if our body wants to move.

We might do a little tension and release.

Tense your whole body up.

And release,

Let that go.

We also notice our body is breathing.

It's moving with our breath.

We can notice the pace,

Rhythm,

The ease in the breath.

If we were to go on a vision journey,

If you have a visual mind,

You might visualize the actual pictures of what we're working with,

Or you might have more of a felt sense.

That's taking myself back to yesterday afternoon when I was in the forest.

And the elder had sent us all off into a walk in the forest and to really attune to which tree is calling us.

Oftentimes,

When we're in a forest situation or with plants,

We kind of go right up and hug the tree.

And she's saying,

Actually,

Just hold back a little bit and see which tree invites you to connect with it.

So you might have a favorite place in mind.

Maybe it's somewhere you go all the time or somewhere you remember going.

I remember being in the Redwood Forest in California.

And I remember very vividly my experience sitting on a tree in the forest.

So if you have any memories of that,

You might bring those up.

Could be a lot of different things.

It'll be different for everyone,

Of course.

But see about bringing yourself into somewhere in nature.

Or maybe tune into the nature that's around you right now.

What would you see as you're looking around?

Here where I live,

It's spring,

Early spring,

So there's no leaves yet on the trees.

You can really see the skeleton,

The branches,

The structure of the tree.

You might be somewhere else in your mind or in reality.

There's such a uniqueness in trees and in the individual branches and leaves.

And yet there's a coherence.

When I was in the Redwood Forest,

There was a sign there that said,

As tall as the tree is,

Many of them were 400 or 500 feet tall,

That their roots go side laterally as long.

When you think about being in a forest of trees,

There's a lot of interconnections and interweaving of the root system.

Even though each tree is unique and each branch is unique,

That their roots connect.

If you were to imagine that you're standing on that branch and you're standing on the tree,

Imagine that you're standing on the earth and that there's roots coming down from the soles of your feet,

From your toes.

We go through a layer of soil.

There's probably some other things growing in that soil,

Like grasses also have a very dense root pattern.

As we go further into the soil,

There might be rocks that roots have to make their way around.

We might get down to bedrock,

To an aquifer of fresh water.

Where do your roots go?

How do they root?

How do they connect?

What's happening below the earth?

Unlike the trees,

We can walk around on the earth.

But from this base of knowing all of the strength of the rootedness,

The groundedness,

Maybe it's that we come back to noticing our feet.

What are the sensations in your feet right now?

And as you come up through your body,

Notice the strength of your legs.

And as you come up through,

Notice your torso,

Your belly,

Your back,

Your chest,

The arms and hands up through your head.

Be aware of your whole body,

From the top of the head,

To the whole of your back body,

To your heels,

The back of your arms as strength.

The back of your arms as strength through the back of your legs.

And it doesn't have to be perfect.

You could just notice that it's here.

Let go of thoughts.

Keep your awareness in the energy of the body right now.

Through the front of the body,

The face,

Jaw,

Neck and shoulders,

The front of the arms and hands.

And if you wanted to put your arms up,

It would be more like a tree lifting our arms.

We also can continue down,

Noticing our chest,

Our belly,

Back to our legs.

Notice the rootedness of our body.

And when we bring our awareness from the soles of our feet,

Up through our legs,

Up through our belly,

Our chest,

Our heart,

Our throat,

Our mouth,

Our brain,

Our head.

Of course,

It doesn't stop there either.

We can keep going.

Notice the energy above your head.

There's probably a building roof over many of our heads.

What's past that?

We go up into the sky.

Might have rain or clear skies,

Wind or stillness.

Go up into the sky and then into the stars.

There's so much above this body that we're in.

And we could go to the front of us as well.

We're standing in a forest.

Maybe you're imagining that your heart center is connecting with a big trunk of a tree.

Notice the energy in front of your body.

Maybe you're standing with your back to the tree.

The tree has your back.

There's open space in front of your heart.

And there's solid support in your back.

And the earth below and the sky above.

We have a place here.

Notice that this body located in space is breathing.

And as we breathe out,

And as we breathe out,

We're nourishing the trees.

So trees breathe out,

They're nourishing people,

Animals.

Tap into that rhythm for a moment.

Most often when we work with the breath,

We're working with our own internal experience of breath.

The movement of our own body with the breath.

We have a reciprocity with the plants,

With the trees.

They breathe out oxygen and breathe in our CO2.

And with each out breath,

We're nourishing the trees.

Let yourself feel that you're part of this.

We're not a tree standing in the middle of a field with no roots,

No place that's connected.

We're part of this system.

As we walk on the earth,

As we feel the wind on our face,

On our skin,

The textures of the tree,

If we're touching or hugging a tree.

Maybe that solid support if the tree is at our back.

We could let this in,

Let ourselves know that we're part of this.

We're not separate.

On a very material practical level,

We're part of this.

And on a more subtle level,

We're part of this field of energy.

The energy of the earth,

The sky,

The space.

And in Braiding Sweetgrass,

Robin talks about at some point we were all indigenous and that we can reclaim our connection.

Even though our life in this modern world,

Especially if we live in a city or around a lot of people,

Is inherently disconnecting.

There's so many distractions and sensory input.

So many people,

So many aggravations,

So much fear.

And so much joy and so much pleasure as well.

Let's sit with that knowing for a moment more.

I'm not all on my own,

I'm part of a bigger system.

I'm breathing out for the tree.

It's breathing in and breathing out for me.

I'm aware of my roots,

Of the sky,

Of the space around me.

Notice the rhythm of your breath.

Let yourself be comforted knowing that the trees are breathing out for us,

That I'm breathing out for the tree.

Let your breath be smooth,

Continuous.

Notice the ease in your breath.

And as you scan your body,

Notice if there's anything that could be more comfortable.

Maybe to release tension out of your jaw or through the back of the neck and shoulders.

Remembering that we're rooted in the earth and on the earth.

We have the air to breathe.

We have the space to move.

And in that subtle energy field that we're connected there as well as in this practical on the earth in our body connection.

Reviews

lovely - sitting in a forest, and resonated with the idea of a tree calling to me. thank you!