Sustainability and the Beauty Way
The Earth gives so freely. She supplies us with food, and water and all the nutrients we need. Why then, do we feel the need to take? To take instead of receive? We have come to a place and time where the relations that we as a global society are having with the Earth are no longer sustainable. When I say place and time, I mean as we exist here, on this timeline, where we have forgotten to live in balance with the Earth.
We have forgotten not only how to be stewards of this land but also how to honor it. Now, the Earth is responding, trying to get our attention with fires, hurricanes, earthquakes, floods and tsunamis. She is asking us to remember the old ways. The ways where we can live in harmony with the Earth; the ways of reciprocity and sustainability.
To fully remember these ways we have to look to our indigenous ancestors. The people-of-the-Earth who are still people-FOR-the-Earth. Some indigenous ways have been lost while others have been well kept and tended to. Some of these old ways of being in relationship to the Earth have also been re-emerging, and just in time.
The Beauty Way is a way of walking the Earth that not only recognizes the beauty of the Earth, cultivating deep appreciation and gratitude, but it also continually offers the beauty back. When we offer beauty to the Earth and all our relations it is a way of giving back and saying thank you for all that she provides. This giving and receiving creates a balance.
Our offerings of beauty can be in the form of a song or music or art. It can be something made with our hands that we plant in the ground or rest at the foot of a grandmother tree. We could offer food or seeds or we can offer our time working with the Earth. We can place leaves and flowers and stones to create Earth-art. We can offer beauty in all of our actions and the way we respond to each moment of every day. We can offer smiles and laughter as well as our sorrow and tears. When we live from our hearts in this way, with deep and beautiful appreciation, we are cultivating sustainability on a very deep level.
When we become comfortable in our Beauty Walk, it is easier to wrap our consciousness around tangible sustainability as well. We don’t take what we wont use. We recycle and re-use. We grow our own and are aware of our impact on our surroundings and our footprint on this Earth. We begin to rely on and grow our community in a way that allows us all to share what we have to offer and receive other’s offerings as well. We begin to want less and appreciate more.
Consumerism is a vicious beast and it’s constantly staring us down, whether in the grocery aisle, driving down the road, or in our incessant need to compare ourselves to others. We have dug ourselves in pretty deep as we try to keep up with the Have’s all around us, not realizing that sometimes to Have-not simply means we don’t need it and don’t want it. Consumerism is a dis-ease of society that has us distracted from what needs to be done to heal ourselves and our world.
The Beauty Way is a remedy for consumerism and unsustainability. The Beauty Way reminds us to pay attention to the blooming flowers and their sweet fragrance. It reminds us to listen to the messages that rustle the leaves when the wind blows. It reminds us to be grateful for our own breath and each step we take on this path of life and every experience we have to live, love and grow. The Beauty Way allows us to participate in this dance and recognize that there is no place that God, Creation of Love and All That Is, does not exist.
A Navajo Prayer and Blessing – Walking in Beauty
Today I will walk out, today everything unnecessary will leave me,
I will be as I was before, I will have a cool breeze over my body.
I will have a light body, I will be happy forever,
nothing will hinder me.
I walk with beauty before me. I walk with beauty behind me.
I walk with beauty below me. I walk with beauty above me.
I walk with beauty around me. My words will be beautiful.
In beauty all day long may I walk.
Through the returning seasons, may I walk.
On the trail marked with pollen may I walk.
With dew about my feet, may I walk.
With beauty before me may I walk.
With beauty behind me may I walk.
With beauty below me may I walk.
With beauty above me may I walk.
With beauty all around me may I walk.
In old age wandering on a trail of beauty,
lively, may I walk.
In old age wandering on a trail of beauty,
living again, may I walk.
My words will be beautiful.