Welcome Home.

For directions to the gathering, click here.

If you do not want a go directly to jail card, a mandatory court appearance ticket, or your stuff tossed all over the ground as you enter the gathering, read this.

If the information on this blog does not answer your questions, send an email to gathering info and someone should respond.

Saturday, June 1, 2013

My Brain on Nature

When I get into the woods, my brain changes. The way my brain works changes.  The way I interact with other life on this planet changes.  Being in the rhythm of the woods is a magical part of the gathering. Everyone changes in the woods.

I connect with human beings under the canopy of Douglas Fir and cedar trees. My brain slowly returns to rhythms marked by sunrise and sunset, rain and sun. It is a helpless feeling at first because I am so used to the endless push to analyze texts, fix computer problems, and tame databases.  The pace is relentless not just in what I am doing but in the already identified list of things to be done.

Walking on forest duff, I deal with that which is in front of me. I slide into non-logical ways of knowing and stop thinking in words. Under the panorama of stars, I awaken all my ways of understanding. As Glen Slater writes in his article “Cyborgian Drift,” ,“the privileging of the intellect over other aspects of being—animal sensation, instinct, aesthetic response, intuition” is a form of “Blinkered vision”  (180).

Remove your blinkers family!

Turning off the computers, the phones, completely unplugging and focusing all my attention on the beautiful smiles in my presence, the tiny wildflowers in the meadow, the sound of the drums at night rolling out across the hills helps me reconnect with deep love,  with the energy that is around me now and I am present in a way that I am not present all the time.


At the gathering I deal with specifics and tangible issues.  Chop wood, haul water, cook food, dig shitters, hold the hands and hearts of my family and place my heart in their hands.  My brain away from computers and electronics changes, slows down, feels the love that it all around me.

I know quitting addictions is hard. The first few days you may feel disoriented, lost, unable to function but give it a week and feel the calm in your heart, the clarity in your mind.  Feel the love that is all around you. If you can't quit, keep your addiction to yourself. Please respect that many people who gather, do so to get away from electronics and the state of mind that goes along with them.

Some of you may disagree, may argue that your brain on computers is who you are and you would be no different away from the gadgets.  There's only one way to find out.  Take a break.  See what happens when you love and work at a human speed, not a computer's speed.  Hear the wind in the trees, see the butterflies in the sky, share a story with the person next to you  (especially if you don't know her/him) instead of the one on the other end of a gadget.  Find out who you are when nature is speaking through you.

 Gaia doesn't text.  The creek isn't on Facebook.  The tree's aren't on social media. Take a week or two out of your life to experience this other world and find out who you are On Nature.


6 comments:

  1. Karin---the best Rainbow blogger:

    I was at the place in the photograph of the trail with trees over it (a place very much like it)a couple of years ago on the astral while I was blessed to be "out" one night. What happened to me on that trail reassured me of a loving and positive future in several years for my immediate Family. Where is that place? How can I printout the photo?

    ginamarie gmemanuel@yahoo,com

    ReplyDelete
  2. If you're inteested in other people's takes on the importance of letting letting your brain be on nature, Your Brain on Nature http://www.yourbrainonnature.com/book.html or Last Child in the Woods http://richardlouv.com/books/last-child/

    ReplyDelete
  3. Ok ok......I agree but in my tent I'm plugging in ......atleast at Seed Camp and Clean Up.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Yuppers. Leaving behind cell phone, concrete concepts of time, my car and my wallet...that's going Home, for me.

    Whatever our ideas of self-importance are out in Babylon, at Home it's a level playing field. You aren't your clothes or your car or your house (or lack thereof). You are a worthy being, deserving of love and respect. Because you are. This is always true, of course; for whatever reasons when we co-create a safe space in nature it becomes easier to see. You gain respect not for your status but for your contributions, helping keep the Family healthy.

    Chop wood, carry water. Chop veggies. Kick veggies to your local kitchen. Share your labor, your supplies, your music, your wisdom and experience. Share what you have, and it all works out. Leaving the "leashes" at home helps make that happen. Those of us who want to can hear the chatter of Babylon most all of our days. The real treat is the silence!

    ReplyDelete
  5. I wish my girlfriend the best of happiness.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Ahhh well done, I can almost hear the drums in the distance.
    Love Now !

    ReplyDelete

What do you think?