Lindsey Swope, 2022
I was out in the woods a bit ago, and asked Nature for a general answer to the question of ‘How can we help?’ It is so easy to feel powerless in the face of the enormity of the climate crises, how can the actions of one small individual make any difference?
I received the answer ‘Acknowledge and Appreciate’
1) Acknowledge that Nature is Alive, it is intelligent, it has consciousness, it is more than just a backdrop of objects for a pretty Instagram post. This has been confirmed by the modern scientific community (see the work of Suzanne Simard and Monica Gagliano for recent examples!) and the understanding is continually deepening.
2) Appreciate Nature in all of its manifestations! Appreciate its beauty, even in everyday life – the play of light on clouds, the movement of wind thru leaves, the smallest blossom. Appreciate the many gifts of water; nourishing our cells, keeping our gardens alive, cleaning our bodies. And Food! So many gifts of food – coffee, chocolate, grains, vegetables, fruit, so much yumminess!
The power of gratitude is well acknowledged these days. We can support Nature by using that power to be grateful both for what Nature does for us as well as for Nature itself.
This may not seem like much, how can such a simple focus of Acknowledging and Appreciating Nature help shift the situation on the planet?
It can make the biggest difference of all because everything starts on the energetic level. This is Manifesting 101: to create anything you have to start with an idea, the idea is the seed which can then take root and blossom as a physical form. It is harder to change things once they already exist on the physical level, but if we can get enough people to incorporate the practice of Acknowledge and Appreciate into their lives, those ideas will take hold in the collective consciousness and we will begin to see their influence on developments in the physical realm.
I sat with it and realized, that’s really all any of us want – to be acknowledged for who we are, and appreciated for what we do.
If you feel you don’t have access to Nature, start with yourself! After all, we are not separate from Nature, it is in us as we are in it. Feel the water of your blood and the minerals of your bones and say to yourself: I acknowledge and appreciate the aspect of Nature that lives as me!