cultivate

I want to tell you a story.

While I was in Missouri with my family in April, I was able to sneak away to one of my favorite places to hike. It is a conservation area just a short distance from my parents’ house, and used to be farm. When I was younger, you could still see remnants of the barn and foundation of the house. Now, all that is left to indicate that humans once resided there are daffodils.

My walks outdoors are a form of realignment, meditation and prayer. Particularly when I am able to spend a couple of hours out of sight of other humans, I am able to open up to what is beyond my being. I have inevitably found that nature provides me answers to questions I didn’t know I had.

On this particular day I stumbled upon the bones of what looked like a fox or coyote, but really could have been any number of forest critters. A few days later, walking through my neighborhood I came upon a dead hawk beneath a white pine tree just a few steps from my house.

In our April Open Studio session we talked about attunement, and I shared these stories. What does tuning in to our surroundings do to our own internal alignment? We discussed the practice of noticing and interpreting what draws our attention. I began to wonder what these dead animals were trying to tell me.

Honestly, I argued with myself. “Not everything is a sign, Sarah,” I said. “Sometimes a dead bird is just a dead bird.” I wondered if I was reading too much into a simple example of the cycle of life.

Then, this weekend, I walked through my favorite state park. I took a trail I rarely take. I’d been walking for about three miles when I saw fur out of the corner of my eye. A lot of fur. After another quarter mile or so, I saw bones. I decided to investigate, as I do.

What I found was like nothing I’ve ever seen. I found skeleton after skeleton—probably at least a dozen, maybe even two—scattered across an area the size of my backyard. They were deer, it was clear by the size of the skulls and the hooves left behind. It was no question that this was the work of a predator, based simply on the way the bones appeared and the amount of scat surrounding the territory. It was a freaking Deer Boneyard.

Now, I’m not particularly squeamish about such things. While I tend to get woozy at the sight of human blood (even my own, evidently), in the natural world, death and remains are just part of the cycle of life. Less cute and cuddly than baby animals, but an important and inevitable part of it nonetheless.

I have all sorts of thoughts about what this discovery might be asking me to contemplate, (clearly the universe thought I wasn’t listening closely enough) but I also couldn’t help but think about something that one of our members brought up in the Open Studio session.

“There is no creativity without destruction,” she said. Demise ultimately leads to transformation and rebirth. And yet, we are at best uncomfortable with death, and more often than not, terrified of it.

I’d put together the practices for May around the theme Cultivate. After my walk in the woods, I knew that there was no way to discuss cultivation of ourselves and our creative practices without discussing destruction. And so, here we are, a few days late…but I believe the delay was worth it.

When I think of the ways in which nature reflects this, I’m amazed. Farmers burn fields in order to prepare them for planting. Forest fires are a natural part of healthy forest growth. That which has died is composted to create the rich, fertile soil that feeds the living.

There is no creativity without destruction.

This month, the practices are meant to be done in order, all in one sitting. The meditation will help clear your palate. The creativity ritual is just that—a ritual that asks you to contemplate what needs to be composted to feed your transformation, and the journal prompts will support the integration of the practice. In fact, if you’d like to come together in community, we are hosting a special Open Practice Session (free to members, $39 to the public) to walk through these practices together.

Sunday, May 15

1-2:30pm

Check out the video below for a little more information about the special Open Practice Session, and how it connects to the lunar eclipse on May 15.

 As always, the regularly scheduled Open Studio session is planned for May 24 from 7-8 pm via Zoom. We’ll have a chance to unpack the practices, explore this idea of cultivation and support one another. I, for one, can’t wait!