our elders in nature have the answers that we seek:::: TRANSMISSION✶TUESDAY

the river exists

just in the same tangibility and reality that everything else in the world exists.

these trees, this cliff this earth around us has a vibration and a pulsation and a love and life. the river and the land say:

is that it's really important for you to realize that, as much as you pay attention to the pulsation of what is happening in our cities -- the pain, the concrete, all the people who are hurting and harming others — part of the confusion of that milieu is because of your living in separation from nature.

so you need to come back here, and be in the river, in the trees, and resonate with our heartbeats so you can be pulled back into the heartbeat of who you really are. 

when you are around only the things that were made by human hands — steel, buildings, cars, sidewalks, pavement — all the violence that was involved in the making of all of those things echoes and reverberates off of each other, adding to the noises and confusion. there’s not really a chance to shift your perspective when you’re in the middle of all of that. it’s challenging to connect to the solution.

coming out to nature may feel like a leisure activity but it's actually what you have to do to get healing and perspective.

when you’re in the crush of humanity and everything that human hands have created — yes you can cultivate love for each other and tune into what is good and tune into each others hearts and share food, bodies, hugs, comfort and community —

but when you come out to nature there are beings, trees, bodies of water, the sky, that already have the information you need, we are the elders and we know. the way you listen to us is not the same way you listen to a person. it is through a resonance in your body. just like your body learns from the body of other people, you body learns from bodies of water and trees and the heartbeat of the earth and the natural world.

when you come to the earth with your problems of heartbreak, despair, the intensity of living in the city and among each other, you don’t come to nature to escape, you come here for answers. you don’t come to ignore your problems, you come to receive perspective on them. 

you are rightly aware of the problems of escapism and the privilege of being able to leave. however, when you come and ask in prayer for guidance, it is very different than coming to suppress and ignore what is troubling you and your collective hearts.

just remember that this river medicine is for everyone and you can carry it back with you. that your body — as much as your body is a body of a city and a people who are struggling — you body is also a body of earth and water and pebbles and river. this is just as crucial as anything else.