Divining in Nature

A Post About Connecting with the Direction of Mother Earth – Especially for the Beginner (Who May or Nay Not Be Interested in Shamanism)

Years before I realized my own life-long connection to shamanism, I wrote up a little take-along guide for understanding one’s ability to “sense” for personal development while out in Nature. I have since changed very little of what’s written in this take-along. I thought to share it as a take-along post.

Not everyone will take up a shamanic path in this lifetime. But there are still a whole lot of Nature lovers out there who might like to exercise their range of natural ability for “listening to” Nature’s wisdom. This can be done with instinct, some knowledge of untapped natural ability, and some tips from cognitive mindfulness.

Below I explain what is meant by Nature Divination, a short explanation of psychic ability and the ways we “hear,” and safe practice in deciphering messages through a safe and mindful filter for personal development.

I hope you find this useful. Please let me know!

Divining Nature

A Field Guide for Growing Your Natural Ability (orig2018)

The Sum of the Practice: Don’t make it harder than it is. Don’t “try” to receive. Just pay attention to what you hear (see, or sense, etc.)


To Divine Is: To seek an answer from The Divine. Divination is the act of seeking an answer from The Divine. (Think of the many ways people do this, including prayer. It’s more common than uncommon, even if Nature is what is described as The Divine or as a messenger “of”.)


Intention/Purpose Tips: Nature is easiest to receive when we simply intend to love and appreciate it. It already knows what we need to understand and when we will understand. Don’t “try.” Be.


Bring your questions and concerns, but then turn to only examining and appreciating the sensory aspects of your surroundings or an element in your surroundings that you’re drawn to. (Just like the give & take conversation in any other relationship, give your attention.)


The Ways We Receive ( or Hear): People receive in different ways. It is important not to expect information to come in any particular way, but instead to observe whatever comes, then focus on that. For example: If you watch for a visible sign, you may miss an auditory sign. Drop all expectations, and be open and observant.


Psychic (meaning imparted without words) categories are listed for you on the next page, so you can understand the many ways we receive. Think of “psychic” to be like the connection you have with a close friend, when you can communicate with just a look.


Wisdom & Knowledge “Layaway”: Journal (or even photograph) your observations, even if you think you have not succeeded. Divination is the same in a way as dreams and other impartations. Wisdom and knowledge often unfold over time as we grow spiritually and as our understanding grows.


Did you know that sometimes, you are meant to not understand… yet? Higher Knowledge will often teach you how to know when you are hearing from it and when you are only hearing your own mind (assumptions, wishes). It will give you plenty of experience in both, so that you will learn to decipher the difference and trust when you’re hearing from The Divine (Consciousness, God, Goddess, Oneness, Universe, etc.).


So, know that you have never failed! Trust takes time.

Safety Tips / Using Mindful Filter: If you’ve ever attended diverse spiritual groups, interfaith or interspiritual groups, you likely will have found that people of all beliefs and/or non-religious ethics can meditate, pray, or divine in their own ways and come to the same conclusions.


Personal growth conclusions should not involve hurting oneself or others and should not promote separation of creation/peoples.


Conclusions (wisdom & knowledge) consider unity and what’s good for one and All. You can understand more about why it can seem like higher power calls for separations by understanding that Nature will challenge you at times to make the “good” decision. It is part of trust building.

Psychic Categories (Ways We Receive): You may have one or more abilities. “Clair” means clear. Take a look at “The Clairs.”

Clairvoyance: Use of Third Eye. You are likely to see visual messages and signs in your head. (Clear Seeing)


Clairaudience: Think of an audience listening. You are likely to hear messages inside your head. (Clear Hearing)


Clairsentience: You sense (inside the body, not outside) or have a strong gut-feeling that rings with truth. Sometimes you’ll know that you should or shouldn’t (like a warning) do something, but you’ll have no explanation for the knowledge. (Clear Sensing/Feeling)


Claircognizance: Info downloads to your mind, quickly. You may pick-up on feelings, knowledge, even words like an automatic download of information having no other sensory aspect. You may feel like an all-of-a sudden expert, or sometimes say, “I don’t know how I know this!” or “These words just came from my mouth like someone else was speaking for me.” (Clear Knowing)


Clairtangency also Psychometry: You sense (outside the body, not inside) when handling or touching an object. You may know its history or the history of an owner, for example. (Clear Touching) Don’t touch poisonous plants!


Clairgustance: Please don’t taste random things in Nature. But you may have a taste in your mouth for no apparent reason, which imparts knowledge, because you are clairgustant. (Clear Tasting)


Clairscent: You will smell smells which impart information. (Clear Smelling)

Use common sense when in Nature. Do not touch, sniff, nor eat plants unless you know that you can and should. Visit your local interpretive center for information about species in your area.

Let me know what you found to be most interesting, or let me know about your own experience and technique!

Approachable, in Our Current Genuine

About this post category: These are slap-downs of thoughts. In these posts I will address “us,” meaning any people who may concern themselves with making a safe space for others whether others are their friends, their kids, their students, their clients, their patients, etc. “We” are concerned with making a safe space because we know how valuable is safe space, and we know that personal maintenance is a normal thing that goes along with getting better at making those spaces.

We have opinions. We have the ability, with practice, to withhold opinions should we choose to do so at certain times. Even better though, is being our genuine selves and reflecting outward the result of daily personal growth and maintenance.

Here is why.

Outward expression of opinions may create unsafe space for others, especially when it comes to those we hold most dear. In that case, they may become withdrawn when they really need to reach out, they may become aggravated and defensive, they may seek help from whoever will listen without judgment even if those other sources can hurt them.

Regardless of how we feel about concepts or people with different opinions, most people crave safe spaces. When they have a safe space, they may respond in kind – making the sharing of perspective easier. When the sharing of perspective is safe and easy, a person with a harmful opinion has a chance to change their own mind. (Maybe.) Even if they keep their harmful opinions, we remain facilitators of safe space. We remain chance-givers. We remind of possibilities and of choices and of personal power (the other person’s) by simply being safe people.

We will outwardly express ourselves. And…

A measure of trust is established before someone feels safe enough to cry, to share, to ask questions. By remembering this one thing, it is easier for us to self-check our attitudes, thoughts, and behaviors when we want to be open to the needs of others.

Instinctively, a person looking for help with a sensitive issue will first watch us and listen to us. They will notice changes in our posture when topics similar to theirs are mentioned. They will listen, not only to words, but to our timely silence. They will hear tone of voice. They will know if we have compassion regardless of personal opinion -or- if we have fiercely guarded opinions that divide our understanding of humanity as a whole.

And, it is okay if they see things in us that we have not yet seen about ourselves!

It is human. (Anyway, no one wants to approach some stiff robot.)

If it is extra important to us to be providers of safe spaces however, we can simply stay in (or return to) the routine of daily personal growth. And, we can remember that every bit of genuine personal development will make our safe spaces more meaningful as well as truly unique to each of us – in our own current genuine!

What makes your safe space different and special?

Gratitude (w/Trees and Rocks)

On the Trail: Gratitude (New Playlist: On the Trail)

I finally got around to creating this playlist – as it’s own thing.

In this video, I set the intention to find a lesson example for gratitude and how it works in us. I looked for and found inspiration from Nature – to find a focus of gratitude for a class that I was going to teach. If you are not accustomed to going out with an intention, I hope to inspire you to practice doing it! It’s really wonderful.

Also, I mention loving kindness meditation (Metta) in the video. If you are interested in learning about meditations, please mention this to me! Thanks.

Siren Immersion

Nothing happened. This is not a situation post. This is about the first thoughts and the first emotions that we experience when hit with stimuli.

I live right near The Garden State Parkway. If I don’t hear engines, honking, and sirens for a few hours, I think something might be wrong out there. So I take a peek out the window.

Sometimes the sounds out there remind me of things. Three years after Covid-19 officially “hit” the US, I recall the emotions associated with all the extra ambulances with sirens blaring, zooming up and down that road to get respiratory patients to the hospitals. (You tend to really notice those things when you live near a main roadway.)

The sound was terrifying. For a while, the sound meant terror. It meant that something really scary and mysterious was going down because we all knew very little about the virus.

But, there is more than one truth isn’t there?

The other truth is that the sound of sirens means that caring was active and help was on the way.

As usual, I processed this while in the trees (and this time while staring into said roadway too). Then all of a sudden, I was less fearful. Help was literally everywhere, zooming up and down roads, and in helicopters headed to the helipad – which is also near me.

It was beautiful to experience an immersion of this truth. It was more “real” than the terror of virus, and this reality I wish for everyone or I wouldn’t bother with this blog!

Nobody wants scary stuff. But when scary stuff can’t seem to be avoided, there is always an additional truth that really should not be avoided!

That truth, the one of goodness and inspiration, has the ability to remind-us-back into being whole and well, or into being better than we would be if our focus was only on the scary stuff.

Scary things need attention. Thus heroes in ambulances.

And… we don’t have to allow our focus to end on the scary stuff. The scary stuff is not the end of the experience, unless we give it permission to be the end.

FYI: The photo used in this post looks so “alarming.” It is actually Santa on a firetruck in the 2022 Toms River (New Jersey) Halloween Parade. I just thought it “worked.”

Identity, and Those Tree People

“She probably hugs trees,” they said with an eye roll.

“Great! Which one is she?”

Some wonder what’s up with the whole tree thing. And I’m actually not writing about the tress right now. I’m writing a little thingy about tree people, and others. (You’d know who you are.)

That we can connect with trees (and other plants) on a deeply personal level is mind-blowing, considering the stuff most of us were taught to know from childhood as reality and fantasy. Even upon deciding to seek a shamanic mentor as a mature adult, I believed at the time, that plant communication was a step further than I was willing to go.

(Shamanism had other plans.) 🙂

The thing about communicating with trees is that you have to be willing to put aside any ideas about your identity. This doesn’t mean you can’t have an identity. It means that you need to let go. Let go of whatever you think you know, and just be with that tree. That is when an entire world, of which you may not have previously known, opens up. Your reality then changes. Your identity then changes. With every bit of new and healing insight, your reality changes in a way that is comforting. It changes toward “more” and “better.” It changes the way you see problems, both big and small.

These kind of partial-shamanic-state experiences can vary and are different for everybody of course. But, in a world full of identity and the protection of it at any cost, I enjoy knowing when there’s somebody around who is in the practice of letting go of theirs – just long enough to come away with an improved sense of self.

It’s the stuff of healing. Identity, communication, something higher (however defined) are all involved in personal or spiritual growth.

Perhaps, tree people (for one example) have at some point in life become unafraid to let go of whatever self-identity they’ve worked really hard to obtain thus far because they’ve learned that their own current thoughts are not “the end.”

There is more to our story – to all our stories. And there is a rich history that waits for each of us.

Sometimes, it’s a good idea to embrace that sudden sense of adventure when it comes. Try a new (safe) thing. Make a connection with an aspect of Earth. See what it’s about. Find another piece of you that you didn’t know existed.

Tree people, plant people, cloud people, wolf people, all people… We can all connect with a piece of our world a little deeper, and in doing so, we connect more deeply with ourselves.

How do you “connect?”

Purpose-fuN

Ever have those moments when you feel like you’re doing something life-purpose-right?

Well, I’ll be honest when I say that making music is not my life purpose. But before anyone tries to console me about what I just said, know that there’s no need. Thus, this post.

In recent months, I’ve begun to understand more deeply that what we do is not nearly as important as the mindset in which we do it. (I thought I knew this. But a lifestyle of growth always shows more.) Keeping the right mindset then frees us to be creative and expressive because we’re not hyper-focused on approval. And so we heal, or rather “return.”

The trees and the birds reminded me this morning, of a time when I was honored to help lead others in meditative singing. Oh boy was I comparatively weird to everyone else! I mean, I swayed like the trees and expressed like the wind – indoors.

But is that weird? No. It is not. It is actually how we connect with our home, our Earth, our surroundings. It is how we blend in – in the most truthful sense!

But a funny conversation arose during those times years ago, regarding my “unconventional motions.” It was jokingly said that I look like a fool, so that others would feel more free to open up. Surely, they could not be embarrassed about how they dance and sing if I’m swaying all over the place right? They could not possibly look as wild as me.

Hm.

Yes.

This is my purpose, actually. It’s one. I gladly do it and admit that it can be really fun.

I think that we get some strange ideas about what inspiration has to look like. There are some times when it has to look professional in the traditional sense. But I think I’m going to be escaping the need to conform to that criteria in this life!

Anyway…

There was a time when I wouldn’t even play my drum if someone else was home. But I’ve learned that singing or vocalizing, music, and other arts are very instrumental in my expression and wellness. I will gladly share it for the purpose of inspiring anyone who may still be a little uncomfortable with themselves.

So tell me… what do you need to do for purposeful expression? It’s got to be something that makes you feel exactly the way you should be. What’s your purpose-fun?