Wild Blueberry Council
Marlow Shami
Fall 2000.
Welcome to the NaturalSense™ Newsletter
A quarterly newsletter
Volume 1, Issue #2
Brought to you by Marlow Shami: Marlow is a spiritual healer, writer and photographer. She conducts Nature As Healer workshops, energy healing meditation circles, and publishes this quarterly e-mail newsletter, NaturalSense™.
Her specialty is the healing connection between humans and the natural world, and she is a doctoral candidate of Integrated Ecopsychology and Applied Ecology.
In her private healing practice in New Haven and Litchfield Counties in Connecticut, she sees both people and animals. She is a faculty member of the Touching Spirit Center, Litchfield, CT. You may contact Marlow via e-mail at
MShami@aol.com.
"Sit down before fact like a child, and be prepared to give up every preconceived notion, follow humbly to wherever and whatever abyss Nature leads you, or you shall learn nothing."
T.H. Huxley
Contents
* NaturalSense™ E-newsletter purpose
* Wild blueberry Council, an essay
* Resources / Reviews
NaturalSense™E- Newsletter encourages proactive approaches to identify and repair the roots of our personal and collective discontent.
AN INTRODUCTION TO FEATURED ESSAY
I invite you to take a walk with me in your minds eye. As you read, remember how you too can create healing experiences outside in natural attractive areas.
Whether you go walking solo or with people and animals you enjoy being with, this is the bottom line: The power of our healing is energized when we go outside. The nature within us and all around us responds in healing ways when we take ourselves out of the four walls corralling our nature (i.e., get the heck out of the house/office)!
I remember my inner voice once saying, "hey, we answers are just waiting for you to ask the right questions!" Sometimes just letting go of expectations is all that is needed to "ask the right question."
Sometimes all that needs to be done is to make room to hear with silence. What developed as I followed attractions to details, colors, sounds, memories and visions was just what I needed the moment I took my walk. This is a true story and testimony to the creativity and intelligence each of us holds.
Essay ~ Wild Blueberry Counsel
By, Marlow Shami
An important academic deadline had been pressuring me all summer. As the pressure grew, so to did the list of daily self care rituals and practices temporarily dropped. The tension grew with no release in sight. I was at a stand still, with one crucial element of the project. My internal quake-o-meter was now registering off the scale. I had my priorities straight: get the project done, be sane later. I knew better, but the vice grip of this deadline clouded my natural ability to nurture the delicate, fluid, life balance practices my psyche, body and mind thrive on.
I was exhausted, and one day dejectedly, slunk out of the office, my project incomplete. The hazy humid half hour drive north began to open an unacknowledged area I'd compressed and held tightly within. I noticed it as it began to soften; my breath became deeper, more relaxed, and my shoulders dropped. Late afternoon shadows stretched black on gold light across the rhythm of rural route 118.
I pull into this makeshift dirt parking area. This wildlife sanctuary extends over hundreds of acres in the Litchfield area of Connecticut. The boardwalk circles through and around the parameter of a pond and wetland area. The air is clearer, less dense here. Arching my back in a stretch, my gaze drifts upward. The early evening sky yawns wide and blue.
Pink flowers spike into the sky. Tall reeds of marsh grass and chestnut brown tipped
cat 'o nine tails rustle in waves through the boarder areas of the wetland. Perfect reflections mirror sky and plants all the while holding the dance of water walking insects, sleepy afternoon fish and the stone still greenness of a bullfrog waiting for a winged dinner to arrive.
His call is distinctive, territorial and celebratory; a red winged black bird sits atop the tallest branch of a swamp maple, a shiny black sentry noting my entry into his domain. Dragonflies, darning needles, and young frogs, some still sporting a stub of tail, linger on the sun bleached silver boardwalk. Recent rains have raised the water level, I take my sneakers off and walk into the cold green water. The shock radiates a renewed sense of life through my body. Water feels like a conduit between this overtaxed, dulled human and her true source of power.
My project's mucky block begins to clear. Senses open and this quote comes to mind, " I go to nature to be soothed and healed, and to have my senses put in order." - J. Burroughs. The muck has begun to transform into a fine silt, settling, down, fertile, receptive and calm. A quiet awareness arises, it is all about and with in, the source of origin unknown.
At the moment a lichen covered boulder, tall and wide sits deeply rooted to my left. Exquisite mandalas, sage green and in varied sizes grace the stone. Blue gray masses, some scalloped edged, dapple in various shapes about the boulder too. I think the stone's sky turned face reflects the cosmos. We both stand gazing upwards. It is here, in an awed pause, my attention is drawn to the delicate high bush blueberry. It arches above the stone and dangles an abundance of small navy blue fruits, wild and ready to be eaten. I look all around me and wonder, how in the world the resident birds could have missed these tiny treasures. The flavor sweetly raises the corners of my lips and warms my heart. This sensuous berry eating stops time.
The gentle August air currents sparkle in the last of the day's pastel light, I feel consumed.
I am the explosion of sweetness, the swans gliding by, the layers of insect hums, drums, and rhythm. The seamless resonance of water and sky hold me and everything between.
A mosquito lands on my deltoid muscle and sips a bit of me. I encourage him to move on to another drinking hole and resume my walk. Turning away from stone and bush I am struck with the simple solution for my project. Out of the blue, between the sweetness of wild berries, and the elegant solidity of boulder, the answer arrived. In my connecting with this natural areas resident's, room was made for what I sought. I am clear about how to proceed and complete the project. The month's accumulation of muck and anxiety flush away then recycle back with all I need. Gratitude naturally flows up as I recognize the font of wisdom held in silent counsel with this natural area. Now, the challenge is to remember that I can do this anytime and with any problem or question. Remembering that I am a part of this diverse community will be less of a stretch each time I slow down, eat the berries, and listen to my attractions. The attractions I follow bring to my consciousness all that I need, maybe not what I expect, but certainly what I need.
RESOURCES/REVIEWS:
The Comfort Zone a quarterly newsletter for highly sensitive people (HSPs) - I thoroughly enjoy Elaine Aron's newsletter. She pulls together a fascinating mix of practical and theoretical information and resources for this creative / visionary minority population (and those who would like to understand us). Topics in her most recent issue include Unlocking Our HSP Gifts, Saying Yes When We Mean No, What's An Archetype Good For? and Yoga For HSPs.
To subscribe write: Comfort Zone: The HSP Newsletter; P.O. Box 460564; San Francisco, CA 94146-0564 ($30. a year) or visit her web site
http://www.hsperson.com
Einstein's World by Michael Cohen is a magical realist didactic novel. The book switches between Cohen writing in the first person and Cohen telling a story about Rachel, one of his students at a fanciful version of the 1999 WTO meetings/protests in Seattle. In the story she leads two mixed groups through some webstring experiences. The groups include amazingly open-minded WTO officials and professors and a very thickheaded newspaper reporter.
This book is an excellent introduction for newcomers to Cohen's ideas.
Cohen's methods are experiential rather than theoretical, so while this book explains and illustrates some of his ideas, it is really just a pointer towards how to connect with nature, not a substitute for the real thing.
Excerpt from a review by John Scull. See the full review and much more about ecopsychology at the web site "Gatherings" www.ecopsychology.org
Michael Cohen Ed. D. - is an ecopsychologist, writer, and musician. He founded Project NatureConnect an online resource providing distant learning ecopsychology classes and degree programs. Check PNC web site
http://pacificrim.net/~nature/ book orders email:
nature@pacificrim.net
READERS WRITE COLUMN
NaturalSense™ from time to time publishes a Reader's Write column. Please don't be shy, email any questions or comments and I'll do my best to respond to them in a future column.
GIVE A GIFT TO A FRIEND!
Please forward this article to your friends and colleagues, since your recommendation is how NaturalSense™ grows. Anyone can subscribe to NaturalSense™. It's FREE. To subscribe or unsubscribe email
Mshami@aol.com with your intentions. Make sure to let me know what email address you would like to use for delivery of NaturalSense™.
Copyright © 2001, all rights reserved. Permission is granted to reproduce, copy or distribute NaturalSense™ Newsletter as long as this copyright notice and full information about contacting the author is attached. The author of this article is: Marlow D. J. Shami. Contact her by email at:
MShami@aol.com, or by phone at (203) 720-0302
Create balance and healing by deepening your relationship with Nature.
Marlow Shami
NaturalSense™
PO Box 186
Bloomfield, CT 06002
TEL: (203)720-0302
