March: Root and Rootless
RESOURCES:
Remember everything below is OPTIONAL and only to be used to support your practice and study. No need to do any of it if it is not supportive.
- Contemplate the sacredness of trees, your own relationship to the trees in your area or the places where you love to walk/be. Every day either sit, in meditation or just enjoying presence, by an actual tree for 5 minutes, or have an image in mind of a tree that you love. Same tree every day. And at the end of the 5 minutes bow in thanks to the tree. At the end of the month, see if the tree has anything to say to you. Has the relationship evolved? Anything to share with the group?
- Listen to this podcast from This Old Tree series about India's Kabirvad Banyan Tree. Explore the relationship between poets and trees in general and Kabir specifically.
- Listen to this podcast interview -35mins with Constantino Aucca Chutas about restoring Andean forests from a perspective of community and reciprocity
- Read Braiding Sweetgrass chapters: A Black Ash Basket p141; Maple Nation p167; Putting Down Roots p 254.
- If you didn’t watch last month, watch the story of Artist and Poet Maria "Vildhjärta" Westerberg as she befriends her forest, her guru.
PRACTICE SPECIFIC:
Consider the roots of your practice and the ability to shift roots, to develop ground, nourishment from different sources as life shifts and demands adaptive creative rooting and rising.
A Zoom Practice (75 mins or can be done in smaller sections) with MP celebrating Vrksasana
Tonglen Tree Reciprocity and Gratitude Contemplation - Audio 25mins
Perineum and Feet are our focus this month - in each practice begin with a few minutes of breathing into, connecting to earth through this first cakra area and your feet. On days when there is a lot of challenge/fluctuations moving through, stay in the base all the way!
Contemplate our gurus of the perineum from Bobbie Bainbridge Cohen, Angela Farmer, Leslie Howard, Mercy Sidbury, and more recently Lauren Ohayan and our dear Michelle Marlahan
Please comment on your reflections regarding any of the resources, themes, practice insights or questions arising out of the classes or your own practice and share below.
from Gia
Kabirvad Banyan Tree
Robin Kimmerer: “Plants are also integral to reweaving the connection between land and people. A place becomes a home when it sustains you, when it feeds you in body as well as spirit.“
BUDDIES FOR MARCH
Mary and Megan
Sue and Bonney
Catherine P and Traci
Lynelle and Sandra
Rings of Tree and Fingertip!
from Gia
