FORCE OF NATURE - SILENCE

Nov 23

I am beginning a series, a training, and a book with this theme - FORCE OF NATURE. This is the first shared writing from the upcoming said things. I welcome your stories of teachings and healings from nature as well!

Here is my writing from a trip i took in September. The memory of it inspires me every time! Enjoy!

We are backpacking, carrying all that we will need for 5 days, along the trail from Usal, named for ‘United States of America Lumber’ company, as they were trying to clear-cut this area for decades to continue highway 1 along the coast, to Anderson Creek, where there is a secluded little black sand beach. Thank goodness the land, again and again, held out and said, ”no” to those who would blow up these rocky outcrops and clear-cut these thickly wooded inserts of forest to lay down pavement. The unadulterated natural beauty here, only accessible by foot, is worth the work to visit.

It is a very rugged up-and-down trail we are on. At some points, it disappears into trees, bushes, and poison oak. We even encounter a landslide where rope has since been tied by caring tenders of this obscure trail, between two fallen trees still clutching the sideways earth with stubborn roots. I work to get purchase with my sneakered feet into the loose, sandy, gravely hillside. I am hanging onto the rope for dear life as my beloved Jess works to give tension to the other end and make it easier for me. I am still holding on to the rope as I hear a scrambling of rocks and a shuddering of the bushes high above. I look back to see where I just nervously crossed. From way up the mountain, rocks as big as my head come bounding down. I see a cavalcade of potentially lethal strikes to my fragile human form. I see where I could have been pummeled and thrown down the steep slope by this movement of the earth, which did not seem to be propelled by my actions. I guess we were warned by the place's aesthetics, but I had truly not realized until this moment how actually at risk my life is here. I had been afraid of sliding down the hill, but honestly had not considered that the mountain might yet be falling down on me!

We are far above the sea in many spots, on arid hillsides with expansive views of the Pacific Ocean, wider views than my little mind knew were possible. At other turns in the trail, we descend through ferngully-like, lush landscapes and dive through underbrush down to trickling streams making their way to the ocean. The rises and falls here are dramatic. I am grateful for my daily yoga practice that keeps my body in tune for this kind of push - the many pushes, really, that we are having to make to navigate this landscape with heavy packs on our backs. Returning upwards from one of these low-lying ravines, breathing heavily, scrambling up the sketchy little trail, the path ahead looks to be evening out, which is a relief to my burning thighs and the heartbeat pounding in my ears. My breath is ragged, and my head is full of commentary that I am too breathless to speak as we reach the high point of the trail here. We are back out in the bright, hot sun now, with one last burst up the hill before a reprieve.

Ahead of us is the welcoming density of a shady forest. As we approach, though, it actually feels foreboding, like the forbidden woods in a fairy tale that you know you shouldn’t enter because this is where bad things happen, where the evil witch lives, or some such thing… The branches of the trees are old and scrambled all together. There is a bit of an archway over the path, but it is a scraggly, ominous reaching of creepy dark fingers of ancient, failing, falling limbs that both beckon and threaten overhead. I make jokes about the deep dark forest of the mind, horror movies, and such… We are casually chatting and dancing with our imaginations now that we have more breath. The path turns to the right, back towards the ocean, it’s scent comes in wisps upon the air, though it cannot be seen as now we are in the thick of trees. The earth to the right of us on this part of the path begins to drop away down into a deep, dark gulch.

Suddenly, we are hushed. My love pauses me, and I am caught mid-sentence as we stand on the edge of this dark chasm of redwoods, moss, ferns, and ..absolute.. silence….

The silence has stunned us into silence. We cannot even comment on it. The feeling arising in me is spiritual, it is emotional, it is full-body awe and wonder. I cannot remember… ever… feeling… so… much… silence…have we shushed the birds?

Oh, far away.. one. little. sweet tweet,.. birds do live here in this deep, damp, musty, and majestic redwood silence.

Silence. Wow.

There are no power lines overhead, no airplanes, and the sky is barely peeking through the dense overstory. There are no faraway leaf blowers, there is no incessant beeping, barking, no whir of generators, motors, voices…nothing.

Stillness overwhelms me. We stand, planted in reverence to this massive, passive, powerful

force of nature.

Creepingly, I feel sick with the sickness that we live in back home, the constant noise of construction, destruction, vehicles, beeping, humming of power transformers, buzzing of modems, the noise of everyones phones and conversations, alarms, sirens, signals, radio waves, EMF’s, and noisy white noise machines to drown out the noise of everyones noise living so close to each other, trying to find privacy and feigned silence in the city of Oakland. We are plagued by noise from all around us and within us. We are on constant alert. No wonder meditation is especially difficult for the city dweller. We have forgotten what silence and stillness actually feel like… Have I ever actually known?

I cannot remember feeling this much profound silence and stillness in my whole life. I have momentarily sensed it in meditation, tasted it in part, in relatively quiet places, between the scramble and flow of thoughts and “shoulds”… but this… this, in an instant, is the spacious blissful state sought by those who sit.

I let this expansive, beautiful dark silence drop deep into my being. I sense the softness of my body, softening, held gently in this resplendent redwood womb. I surrender to the open wonder of my heart. Nothing in me is gripping. I melt into the quiet, sublime radiance of the natural world.

I am.

I just am…

This just is.

This is how I am meant to be. In harmony with the great mother, this blessing of a planet…

I feel so nourished, so complete.

I am at ease.

I will take this with me for life…