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A Sense of Place

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What Place is This? Our spaceship among the stars

What Place is This? Our spaceship among the stars

Last updated on: February 23, 2013 at 8:23 pm by Traci

What Place is This? Our spaceship among the stars 2013-02-23T20:23:59+00:00 Traci

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Last week I pondered the geographic specificity with which ancient Irish kingship was based. Most of us, when thinking of our “place”, think in terms of the very specific, whether that be our favorite tree, back garden, neighborhood, county, province, state or country. What we rarely imagine is our place on and within the living organism of our planet, which is itself a spaceship among the stars.

the pentacle surrounding our planet : satellites orbiting : video capture “Nova, Earth From Space”

I am an initiate in the Faery/Feri tradition of witchcraft. This tradition works with a dedicated set of Guardians that may take on various guises within the multiple lines of the tradition. One of the exercises students engage with is that of meeting the Guardians and developing a relationship with them. For me, the Great Powers have always been planetary or cosmic phenomena. A moment that significantly contributed to my current worldview occurred when working with the Guardian of the West: Water Maker. During my time exploring who this Guardian was, and what she represented, I was confronted with the destructive force of our oceans. In one meaningful encounter she referred to me, and all of us, as ‘The Human’; just as she did ‘The Tiger’, ‘The Palm Tree’, ‘The Seagull’. Each species was a whole. There was no individuality; only interconnectedness.

I invite you to watch the following video. It features predominantly U.S. astronauts, but is not U.S. centric. I enjoyed watching while in a dropped-and-open state of consciousness. In fact, the video is great prep for a light trance.

Now, take a moment. Still yourself, using whatever method you choose. Drop–into the bottomless space of your own Being–and breathe. Let yourself expand. Allow your consciousness to completely fill your glorious body. Feel the edges of your own skin from the inside. That incredible fabric of living tissue that offers a boundary between us and everything. Feel the porousness of this boundary. It’s paper thin. Is it real? Allow your consciousness to move past your flesh. Feel how you continue, layer upon layer–expanding through space: this Knowing we call Mind. How expansive.

Is it possible for your consciousness to encompass the entire planet? Perhaps experiencing consciousness as a holism. Are ‘we’ actually singular? Is it possible to experience ourselves as cells moving within a larger Consciousness? And can we simultaneously experience that larger consciousness while holding the consciousness of the single cell? Can you feel the thin etheric body that surrounds our oxygen rich rock? Push yourself up against this “skin”, this boundary. Feel your back pressing against it, turn and feel your face pressing into it. Feel how porous it is. Then push through it, into the still quietness of space: our home….the origin of the star dust we all are.

Give yourself time here. Listen to the song of the spheres. When you’re ready, breathe yourself back down on each exhalation: back into the planet’s atmosphere and through the layers, back to your own geographic location, returning to the comfort of your own beautiful skin. Once you are fully home, take one last inhalation and breathe out–filling yourself up completely and blessing the experience.

These living systems, living Beings: the human, the planet, the ocean, the current, the wind, the monkey, the serpent, all have consciousness. Do you falter here? Do you wonder whether all that your eye beholds is the same as you–that all of ‘That’ is conscious? How many ways of knowing and being alive are there? If you haven’t seen it already, take a look at the Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness. Science is finally admitting a fraction of what the ancients knew: that every ‘thing’ made of star dust is Alive. Give them time and they may finally admit to more than just mammals and birds.

Now that your sensual self has been stimulated, have a look at this video. It’s longer, dryer, and unfortunately is only available for viewing in the U.S.; but if you can watch it, it provides a beautiful glimpse of the interconnectedness of our living spaceship among the stars: Earth

NOVA: Earth from Space

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