Conscious Traveling

So, the other day I made a pretty simple commitment: every morning when I first go out my door (as close to dawn as I can make it), I will open my heart and greet the world, consciously sending love to the trees, the birds, the flowers. If I forget, I will come back and start over again. And it doesn’t matter if I’m at home or somewhere else—I will tune in first thing. Because of my sanguine nature, which loves to hop from one thought to another, this turns out to be not so easy. I can put on a shoe and be five thoughts down the road before getting on the second one. Nevertheless, I notice this practice slowly sinking into my morning routine.

I’ll have the chance to practice the away-from-home part this summer with a little traveling (a trip to my western Kansas hometown, for example, where I’m planning to enlist my relatives’ help in getting acquainted with the nature spirits we grew up with).  I see that it matters HOW I travel, as opposed to what I see, the QUALITY of my seeing rather than the amount, and my ability to pour positive energy into wherever I am.

Barbara spends part of each month at the ocean and writes that some years ago Mano told her: “When at the ocean we would like you to feel the sacred earth beneath your feet when you walk on the sand, to open to the ocean energies, to take in and give out blessings as the waves move in and out.”

“I walked a while,” she said, “before I remembered to feel the sacredness of the land. When I did there was an immediate shift of energy and awareness. I felt a blessing rising out of the land and expansiveness from the ocean.”

Then came the issue of how much time to give to these exercises with nature. This is a big one for me, as I habitually am ready to stop just about the time I really get going—always thinking “I’ll stay longer next time.” When I consider how long is enough, reading Bobbie Sandoz’s Listening to Wild Dolphins always comes to mind. Her powerful encounters with the dolphins always occurred after she had stayed in the water a lot longer than was comfortable. Perseverance! Now Barbara feels this rub: “I was ready to leave and my [nature spirit] companions asked me to stay longer. I don’t understand why I wanted to leave so soon.”

Mano responded: “The question is not why you wanted to leave; it is why you are so shallow, avoiding the depths. True, you are willing to go deeper than many, even most. Yet there is a level of fear and caution within the human consciousness. This is a tension between heart and mind. Your heart wants to go deep, and your mind is cautious. Keep working with this to move through the collective block.”

“Take a faerie walk each day,” he said, “going beyond a simple walking through space on the land. Be conscious of your feet giving and receiving energies deep within the earth. Let your heart include all of nature around you. Be aware of the sky and the clouds above the trees. Relate with your companions. They have asked for permission to teach and show you things as you walk.“

I love and count on my home routines, even when I’m not entirely religious about them. But, again, extending them to travel requires some creative  memory prompts. I liked this journaling Barbara did last summer on her yearly family vacation at San Onofre surfing beach. She remembers how her friend Pat would always go to the seawall when she arrived on Balboa Island, giving a moment of awareness to her surroundings. Barbara elaborates on this by calling council.

“Mano, how can I serve?” she asks.

“Let the beings of this land come into your heart space,” he advises.

“I open my heart in welcome to the wisdom keepers of this special strip of land,” she offers, “where thousands of surfers come each week. I open to the adventure of the ocean.”

She feels the presence of a being without being able to discern the form, and addresses it: “I greet you in love. And I realize it would have been better if I had come to the sand to speak to you when I first arrived.”

“I come to see what you are doing and who you are,” the being says. “It seems you easily forget who you are and what you are about. In that you are like all of the rest, with little awareness, appreciation, or blessing for the hosts of this sacred space who give blessing without end and receive little appreciation in return. However, Mano has told us that you are different, and I can see a big heart energy flowing from you to mother nature.”

“Thank you for your observation,” Barbara replies. “You are accurate about my forgetfulness and I intend to change. I see that when I come to camp here with my family I actually forget, or at least do not hold high priority for who I AM and what I am doing in my service to Mother Earth. I can see this is just one more way to stay true to myself and to those who love and trust me. Is there anything else?”

“We have seen enough. Thank you for opening yourself to us. It helps us to get a deeper glimpse into human consciousness. Let us take some deep breaths together; that is so much more valuable to us than words.”