Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Revelation in the Garden of Eden

The other day I found myself within a Garden of Eden--a magical place in the heart of Red Rock Canyon, Las Vegas, Nevada. Having gone deep into a canyon on an overgrown trail, a feeling that I was entering the wild came over me. "May I enter it? May I walk further?" I asked the giant sand stone cliffs, so immense as I got near them they seemed to get further and further away. Pools of water, overgrown vines, pine trees, willows, waterfalls and giant ferns surrounded me. Pristine is not usually the description used for Las Vegas Valley. I realized then that this wild place needs to be protected, needs to be kept wild, free from the hands of "Civilization." And for the first time in a very long time I recognized that I am not of the wild, but of the world of humankind. My civilization grows in a different way.

For so long I have rebelled against human society. Out of fear, out of traumas, out of the insanity of the world sometimes so apparent in wars, crime and delusional thinking I attempted to separate myself from everyone else. Then where do I belong? Last time I looked at my body, my mind--I looked like a human body, a human mind. And as I entered the sacred canyon I knew I was only a visitor there and felt careful and conscious of every step I made, how I made it, and how many steps I would take inside before I'd turn around and go home where I belong.

I went back to the maintained trail, sat on a rock and cried. Nature has a way of taking me to places, through its silent power, I would not otherwise go. How necessary it is for me to travel inside, to touch my own wounds, to heal and breathe with the silence deep in the center of my body. I felt the wild take hold of me--I felt the wild leave me in the canyons of my heart, of my body and mind. I felt the wild speaking, listening, and urging me to stay within myself. I wiped my eyes and watched two birds in a pine tree sing to one another. Their song echoed through the canyon amplified into the quiet expanse of the sky.

I am human. For a time the world of humans is my home. Twenty-nine with still a lot of life in me. Looking at the pain of birth and death, and the medicine that Life brings. The freedom to sit and walk in peace and the grace of letting go. How wonderful to honor the worlds of humans and nature--two worlds that can dance together in harmony.


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