New Age, Alternative,
Metaphysical Publication
Aquarius-Atlanta.com

Touching Ground:
A Wild Woman's Tale

By Loba

Once upon a time I knew not my home, my purpose, my soulmate, my river... I lived in the dark sides of cities amongst strangers speaking a language I did not understand, in a search for substance and meaning, for love and a sense of belonging. Walking the city streets, I remember all too well the uneasy feeling, being so disconnected from the earth that I felt like a balloon somebody had let go, a thin string dangling, reaching helplessly towards the ground from way up in the drifting clouds. I remember my butoh dance mentor commending me on my energy, my passion, but, she said, “you are too much out here” (waving her arms around). “You need to dance from your belly!” I tried desperately to heed her advice, but how could I dance from my belly when I was in denial I had one? I shaved my head every week for over a year. What was it I was trying to shed? I didn't even know, I just knew I had to keep purging till that something was gone.

Finally I got out of the city for a week, my first extended visit to the wilds in years. I was with my crew of crazy friends, and out there on the wild Lost Coast, I felt like I loved them more than I ever had before. But when it was time to go back to the city, all of a sudden I just lost it. I laid myself down in the sand and started bawling like a baby. I just felt this ripping inside me, and it was then I knew that to survive, to fully be alive, I had to get back the experience of the land. The words “New Mexico” and “caretaker” came into me so strong at that moment. Nothing like that had ever happened to me before, and I knew I was getting a message and had better listen. So right then and there it become my quest, to find a place to caretake in the “Land of Enchantment.” I loved my friends so much it was hard for me to imagine I could stay away from them, but I remember how in my goodbye circle with them I cried and said "When you see me next time, I'm not gonna be the same." A part of me knew I was coming back to self... knew I was on my way home.

It is ten years later now. I have spent them falling deeply, and ever more deeply in love with my canyon home, my beautiful soulmate Wolf, and with this self I never knew existed. From beneath the masks I once wore was revealed a woman, as needy and vulnerable as giving and strong. A nurturing woman, feminine woman, a woman who loves her body and all its “imperfections.” A woman who knows her home inside and out, running barefoot through river bottoms full of stickers and sharp rocks, knows where the plants grow, and which she can eat and which she can make tea with. A woman who knows her way, and has led other women barefoot up steep hills in the dark with no moon, no flashlights, bending close to the ground to feel which way the trail goes... is it over there? (No, feel the ground with your toes, it's here!) Yes, a grounded woman, rooted to canyon soil, fed by its river, singing where I am heard by no judgmental ears. Singing to only my sister elk and graceful heron, bats and bobcats, mountain lion and coatamundi. To the raccoons and ringtail cats, skunks and swallows, hummingbirds and scorpions, rattlesnakes and bumblebees. I sing to you my song of grounded celebration, my voice echoing off the canyon walls, the canyon singing back to me.

There's no magic spell or mantra for grounding, it's something you have to simply breathe, live and do. As my sweetie Wolf writes, it's not about chanting “Om” so much as chanting “home.” It's about the places we become one with.  Feeling the needs and direction of the Earth we are each parts of. And when we experience at every level how we ARE the place we live, the favorite park, the medicine rock, the sacred canyon – nothing and nobody can shake us from our purpose and truths.

If I can “come down to earth,” so can anyone. The connection that feeds me can feed you in a neighborhood backyard, or through a special rock you pick up off your altar. It isn't something you “get,” because you already have it. You just need to feel it, pay attention to it, and then act out of that sacred center. We can find it in even the busiest moments, a refuge of quiet vision and knowingness from which we can reach out, touching others most intensely and meaningfully, cuddling with the power and promises of the Earth, creating art and community, standing up to threats and defending what deserves defending. Grounded in being, in presence and place – we're sacred, flawless, and never alone.

Hallelujah, we're home!!

Loba hosts women at a riverside wildlife sanctuary for quests, wildfoods gathering and preparation, an annual Wild Women's Gathering, and more. Contact The Earthen Spirituality Project, Box 516, Reserve, NM 87830.