Dear reader, this post is from the archives of AskGCW.
If your leaders guide you astray – away from what you know to be right and true and good, you must let your heart guide you instead. Trust yourself!
When your leaders are mistaken, misguided, ill informed, emotionally stunted, you yourself must step up and be a force for good in the world. You don’t have to shine on a national stage, run for elected office, or head a large corporation to make a positive difference in the web of all things.
Grandmother Cottonwood, winter afternoon
I ask you to allow yourself to become a force for good and kindness, guided by your heart and by Source in your own life, within your own sphere of influence.
If you feel alone in your beliefs and actions, hold fast! Do the right thing and you will respect yourself and gain confidence. Others of like mind will be drawn to you. And you will create ripples of compassion and loving kindness in the web of life.
The ripples you create flow from the center of your spirit and touch all things on the energetic level, the level of spirit. All creatures benefit from your heart’s wisdom and your wise and kind actions.
Let your guidance and leadership come from within, from the depths of your heart and spirit. Let Source be your partner, and you will make the world a kinder safer place.
Dear readers this post is from the archives of AskGCW.
Rumors of the demise of Mother Earth have been greatly exaggerated. This planet will endure, she will continue spinning on her axis, orbiting the sun. Day will follow night. The sun will rise in the East. The ancient cycle of seasons will endure, the moon will wax, become full, wane, then begin again in darkness.
Full Moon
The ancient cycles will endure even if humans are no longer here to witness the beauty, to name the seasons, and study the stars
Humans are slowly committing suicide as they ignore the warning signs of the stressed and overtaxed environment and atmosphere. I ask you to slow down and listen to your Great Grandmother the Earth. Learn her language. Pay attention to her signs, symbols, her distress call.
When you learn her language, the language of the web of life, you will learn the ancient ways of survival on this planet. You will learn to respect the amazing intelligence built up over eons of time within every living thing and every living system.
Tuning in to the messages and intricate interconnections of the web of life and hearing the voices of all living things here on this planet still means survival.
Technology in your pocket, shiny objects, expensive homes will not save or buffer you from the reality that you are a part of this web of life, a part of nature. We survive together!
Take action to divest yourselves and your human cultures of greed and corruption. Stop over-consuming our precious resources and hoarding wealth for only a few. These things damage the web of life.
Learn to use only what you need. Learn to be humble. Learn to love each step you take on Mother Earth, each breath you take into your miraculous body, each beat of your heart.
Wake up and embrace your precious life on this precious Earth!
Your thoughts, words, actions, and beliefs have very real consequences and effects that will manifest in your life in some way. This is power! Use it wisely!
When you emanate fear, fear returns to you. It is all you see. When you radiate love, love is reflected back to you. Your life is rich in love. When you hate and seek to tear down and destroy others, this energy will return to you in some way. You will feel the harmful effects.
Pay attention to the energy you put out into the world.
Cottonwood seed pods
When anyone is left behind or treated as less than others, less deserving, other, unworthy, this energy reverberates through the web of life and diminishes those who do the diminishing.
When you plant seeds of harmony with your eyes open, your ears unstopped, your heart tuned to love, harmony will be restored to the web of life. This means to you and your family. It means every living being will benefit from your integrity.
You have the potential to heal, to harm, to tear or to restore. Every thought, word and action of yours has significance in the world you wish to create for yourself and all others.
Beautiful spider web
Your thoughts, words, and actions are filaments in the web of life. You weave the web thread by thread.
Can you widen your perspective for a moment? Imagine rising up above our Earth like a soaring bird and viewing the beauty of our land from above…
…the woodlands, streams and rivers, the grazing deer, flocks of birds flying below, fields of green, shady and pleasant neighborhoods, the gardens and parks, lakes and ponds, farms and ranches, the quiet cemeteries, the playing fields…
…Vast oceans and seas, waves breaking on beaches and rocks, mountain peaks and deserts… clouds of butterflies migrating…
Flying bird, summer landscape
From this birds eye perspective you may begin to discern the magnificence and complexity of the web of life on this planet. Can you feel the peace and calm that seem to be generated in some areas?
Do you feel a kinship, a deep connection with all that you see?
But dear ones, as you soar above the Earth you may also see the devastation created by human alterations of our ecosystems, over-development and pollution. You may see some dying and diseased landscapes.
You may sense the anger and suffering inequitable policies have engendered. You might feel the widespread fear of disease for those with no safety net. You may feel the grief of those who have lost loved ones in the pandemic.
The web of life weakens when those with too much power believe the accumulation of massive wealth is the only thing that matters. When this grasping for wealth is valued over the equitable balance and distribution of resources, when health care is doled out for profit and those who cannot pay are left behind, the health and well being of all life on this planet suffer.
When kindness empathy and mutual benefit are seen as weak, when living together in harmony is scoffed at, when co-existing in peace doesn’t manufacture enough money to fill the bottomless pit of greed, the web of life weakens.
Do not allow the precious and complex beauty of our world to become damaged beyond repair under the weight of such stupidity greed and negligence.
Choose leaders who seek to assuage suffering, who do not turn their backs when others are hurting. Choose leaders who are rooted in reality, who make decisions based on the best advice available, who use their power for the good of all humans, all beings, the web of life.
When there is balance within the great web of life on Earth, all her beings can thrive.
Dear ones, Please do not underestimate your contributions, your necessity to the web of life. No matter what your calling is, what work you’ve chosen to do, your feelings, words and actions in this life leave an energetic legacy for all living beings.
Amazing spider web
Think of the gardens you’ve planted, the trees you’ve nurtured, the love you’ve expressed and shown, the meals you have lovingly prepared, the pets you have held to your heart, the smiles you have freely given, the songs you’ve sung; the empathy, kindness, connections, the heart to heart connections alignment with divine light, the joy you’ve felt, the seeds you’ve sown, the lives you’ve touched with thoughtfulness, wisdom, and attention, the unconditional love for others that flows from your heart – these are the lasting legacies that you have bequeathed to the web of life, your families, and your communities.
I ask – is your true legacy measured in stocks and bonds, dollars and cents? Money can be spent, lost or stolen in a heart beat, leaving your heirs with only their inner resources, courage, wisdom, integrity, honesty and the clothes on their backs.
Your true nature is to be mortal. Every living thing must pass through the final transformation. One day your hands will relax and release their hold on objects and the material wealth of which humans are so fond.
Your body will stay behind while your spirit lives on. You will leave this material world which is so precious, so dear, yet so impermanent, ever shifting and changing.
Late winter landscape, dusk
So while you are here, find joy in your embodied life with the senses and emotions and intelligence you’ve been given, love with your whole heart and express that love in ways others will feel and understand. Do the work that satisfies your soul. In this way you expand and strengthen the web of life.
You are an essential participant in the web of life whether you know it or not.
Let your life create strength and resilience and peace and love in the web, your lasting energetic legacy.
Drum! if you don’t have a drum get a wooden spoon and cooking pot lid, an old wooden box, a metal wastebasket…
You don’t need to be a student of percussion, you don’t need to have any practice or expertise, you don’t need to be good at it, you don’t need to perform for an audience.
Now begin! Match the rhythm of your heart as you beat your homemade drum. Now add your feet and get moving. Let your body sway and express what you are feeling. Let your whole self dance and move and twirl and stretch and twist and flow with the beat. You need this!
Try new patterns with your makeshift drum. Go slow then speed up, start with a simple pattern, moving into more tricky rhythms. Try multiple noise making objects that you can beat on shake or rattle without breaking or damaging them.
Now as you drum and move, let yourself vocalize and sing. Make beautiful sounds and not-so-beautiful sounds, let them express what you are feeling- joy, freedom, frustration, anger, fear, worry… happiness…
Try growling like a tiger, singing like an angel whooshing like the wind through an evergreen tree. Make up new words, create personal lyrics, specific to your life, or have no words, just the sounds of your voice.
Go high, go low, spin your voice like sugar, let it slide and play. Cut loose and let yourself be one with the sound that originates deep within you and continues outward into the web of life.
Celebrate your life with sound and drumming. Get your heart and body and voice activated. Energize yourself!
Raise up your deepest requests and desires on this wave of heartfelt sound and rhythm. Ask for the world you wish to see and for the life you wish to live. Ask for all the inhabitants of our dear planet, animal vegetable and mineral to prosper with full and robust health, for the web of life to be repaired.
Red winged blackbird
When you drum and sing with focus and heart and sincerity, the spirits cannot fail to hear you and be moved by your requests.
When you plant a seed you trust in the web of life. You open yourself to the mystery of creation, the alchemy of earth, air, light and water. You affirm life.
When you plant a seed, you stand in the present moment with hopes, dreams and a vision for your future, a knowing of the world you wish to create.
Ornamental grass in autumn
When you plant a seed, you work in partnership with all that is, with the spirits of nature. You become an integral component in the web of creation, a facilitator of life on Earth.
When you plant a seed, you trust in the future and surrender to divine timing, knowing that germination will occur exactly when seed, earth, air, sunlight, and water come into the proper balance and proportion.
You set the process into motion and surrender to the mystery. In this way, you release control and allow the miracle to unfold.
You are a sower of seeds of the plants that feed you, beautify your world, hold the soil across the earth, shade your gardens yards and homes, plants that clothe and shelter you, plants that make this world green and pleasant and clean the air…
Prairie grasses
You also sow seeds of energy and intention. Let the seeds of your intentions run to love and connection. Let them strengthen and unify and heal the web of life. Let your intentions bless this earth and all who dwell here.
You may not know where or how the seeds and intentions you sow will take root and grow.
It is enough to plant your seeds with a trusting and loving heart and allow the miracle you have envisioned to unfold in divine time.
To heal the web of life on Earth, we must all clean up our act! Individually and collectively.
Begin within your heart.
Do the difficult yet vital work of healing your own hurt and bitterness, sadness and grief so you can be clear and help lead the way forward. Be part of the solution, be a weaver of the web of life.
(Please get help from a therapist, counselor, healer or friend for working with difficult emotions)
Learn to feel and know your anger and express it in healthy ways that will fuel you to your highest good and create true justice. When anger is expressed as hurtful rage at others and rotting hatred, great damage is done to the intricate web of creation and will come back to harm the rageful hateful one.
Dead ash tree
Ask for help as you move toward wholeness, otherwise known as healing. You are a powerful and vital element in the web of creation. Your healing and moving toward the light and releasing anxiety and fear benefits you enormously and creates a healthier and stronger web for all beings.
Dear ones, I ask you to pay attention to the magnificent web of life. Do not take this daily miracle for granted! Turn down the volume on your ear buds, close down Facebook, turn off the news and tune into your heart and body, your spirit. Tune into the music, the voices of nature.
Robin in winter
When you know your own wholeness, when you become a weaver of the web of life, your very presence will be a blessing to this Earth.
The web of life that has existed since before the Earth whirled into being has been weakened by human wars, torn by pollution, worn thin by widespread human anxiety, and broken in places by acts of violence.
We rooted and wild creatures are at the mercy of human behavior, the sometimes out of control egos, the mindless lashing out at others, the hurt flung out at random into the world, thinking that will make things better, but only adding to the garbage pile of ugliness that hurts all beings by damaging the precious web of life on which we all depend.
To renew our priceless web, we must work in harmony and peace with all beings, co-existing with our Earthly neighbors to heal ancestral wounds and resentments that keep us stuck, to face and reweave the patterns that cause resentment, war, greed, and violence.
Amazing spider web
I feel hopeful that we natives of planet Earth, humans, plants, one-celled beings, animals, insects, fish, arachnids, birds, all together can reweave the amazing web of life that sustains us here on our blue-green planet. Every living being including every human being who is able must step up and do our part.
Dear humans, I ask you to clean up your act now as we begin this necessary work of planetary healing. Bring in leaders at all levels who have a heart instead of a vast emptiness at their center that can never be filled.
Instead of leaders with inflated egos and mean spirits, choose those who set the example of compassion, human understanding, those who know that true power comes from within, from connection and common ground, not from a nuclear weapon. Let these compassionate and courageous new leaders inspire you!
Grandmother Cottonwood
The web still holds strong, even with the damaged and weakened places, for the power of love and connection and peace are stronger and more resilient than fear and pettiness and hate and war.
In freeing and healing yourself from unhealthy relationships, patterns, beliefs, and situations, you free others. In the web of life, all things, all beings are connected.
In this way miracles happen, coincidences occur beyond your awareness, without your conscious participation.
Set your course for health of mind body and spirit, then trust and allow the mystery to unfold for your highest good and the good of all beings.
Amazing spider web
Set your healing intention into motion, follow the instructions of compassionate helping spirit guides and helpers, and ask for more guidance.
Ask for spiritual guidance. Pay attention!!! Listen and act with integrity. This is all you have to do.
(True spiritual advice will never hint at or ask you to hurt yourself or another, will never ask you to curse anyone, will never advocate hatred or violence.)
When you are compelled to heal and free yourself from unhealthy situations and patterns, you are regaining your power, autonomy, life force, and vitality.
When you free yourself you unlock what may be many lifetime of enchantment. Then like Sleeping Beauty, you wake up the potential and renew the life energy that has been dormant in you
When you do the sometimes lonely and often difficult work of healing by moving closer and closer to your own pure spirit, your own soul, healing your wounded heart and psyche, reweaving the hurt, making yourself whole again, you send ripples of well being and freedom throughout the web of all things, making those broken places stronger and more resilient. Creating wholeness.
Red wing blackbird, bare branches
Through you, others are set free as well if it is their soul level wish. You cannot control the ripples of the web, you cannot control who receives healing. These assignments must remain a mystery to you while you are still in a body. You can only work on behalf of yourself and do what is right for you.
So much is beyond your knowing and control as a human being in a body. Surrender to the mystery!
Ask Grandmother Cottonwood 