Council of Gnomes Blog

In my conversations with people who are tuned into the world of nature spirits and are striving to listen deeply, questions about hierarchy often come up. What is a human’s proper role in this new, expanded picture? Often enough, in my own attempts I feel way down on the totem pole of wisdom, rather than at the top, as human beings are supposed to be—sensing that I have more to learn than I have to give. My nature communication group was recently wondering about the need for a…

I am always thrilled when I find people who are moving with beautiful, natural grace and confidence in their connection with nature spirits. Somehow being around these people gives me energy and hope in the direction of deepening and giving myself over to these subtle layers of reality. Now I am honored to be part of a small new group that is giving its attention to nature communication—speaking with the land, in the first part of our meetings, and then speaking with one another about what we’ve gathered…

In conjunction with her talks and workshops at East West Bookstore in Mountain View in May and Center for Spiritual Living in Santa Cruz in June, Barbara wrote two articles for Connection Magazine: “Nature Needs Us As Much As We Need Nature” and “Everyone Has a Divine Plan”. This month’s blog combines these two articles. “When I was 60 my husband and I moved to a small cottage in the heart of a redwood forest. I built a studio to explore painting the energies of the land. Jim…

Barbara will be presenting a workshop showing her DVD “Healing Burned Woman” June 26 & 27 in Santa Cruz,  Center for Spiritual LivingReservation 831 335-3145Friday night is free. Showing Burned Woman’s Story, Nature and Barbara’s Story, 7:00-9:30Saturday Workshop: 10:30 – 3:30 $44.00. Day of Workshop $55.00Using movement, chalks, awareness questions ritual, the focus is to: Empower you to recognize and honor your inner guidance and spiritual gifts. Heal scars left from the Burning Times. ___________________________________ The garden in this beautiful spot where I live has 40 rose bushes in it. Last…

On a tip-off from Barbara, I have been listening to the April 1 to 14 talks from the “Guardians of Nature” telesummit (http://guardianspiritsofnature.com). I missed most of them in real time but decided to purchase replay access. So far, each of them has held something quite important for me—a reminder, a coherence with Barbara’s notebooks, a new thought or anecdote that has caught my imagination and thus can serve as a touchstone. The “Choose Love” title comes from Australian Michael Roads, who ends his talk with this encouragement:…

In this time of great change, all attempts to reach toward a new paradigm of unification—joining again the elemental, angelic, and human realms, the right brain with the left, spirit and science, the complex marvels of nature with the human fiddling that is instinctive in our beings—all of these attempts surely have a role to play. They don’t always agree or even get along, and probably none of them, alone, is complete, but we can honor them and strive to reconcile and integrate them. My brother has worked,…

On Friday the 13th, Barbara and I were back at her dining table talking about our respective journeys and how they related to what the blog is to become. We were remembering our first planning conversation at this table, nearly two years ago, and Barbara exclaimed: 30 blogs later! Let’s call Andrea to take another picture. (Andrea Boone lives on Barbara’s land and took a similar picture for the first blog, published April 22, 2013). We are feeling pretty chipper about this endeavor. We have some readers—some “preaching…

In early January I (Mary Jane) heard a two-day presentation—“Where Is the Elemental World?”—by Dennis Klocek, whose biodynamic agriculture work takes its inspiration from Rudolf Steiner. What I’ve always deeply respected about Dennis (I did a seven-month Consciousness Studies course with him some years ago) is that he is always working the indications from Steiner, testing them out, finding new applications, weaving them together by way of Goethe’s observational science. That’s what Steiner said we should do—move the original insights further, rather than simply forming and re-forming them…

 This exploration, this continuing attempt to bridge the long-time divide between humans and nature spirits, is of mutual urgency: humans need the elementals because they carry a living knowledge of the earth that we have lost; they need us, because we embody the great, progressive, experiment of freedom, of conscious collaboration on the planet. Barbara’s work with the elementals is founded on this shared need, and she is so secure in her inner serenity and her task that she can give herself over to their influence, without fear.…