Living in Connection with the Natural World

Friday, May 24th, 2013

The paq’os I have worked with in Peru have taught me that one way to experience the energetic connection in our bodies is through entering into a receptive in nature. Walking through the damp grass and fallen leaves in a wooded forest after a rainfall, feeling a connection to everything living beginning to permeate into senses, makes it easier to silence our thoughts and listen. We are not individuals; we are part of the energy of the atmosphere. We are to hear the voices of the wind, the smell the scent of the earth and the aroma of growing green plants that appear electrically vibrant after a rainfall. We can see leaves shimmering, hearing them rustling in a cool, damp breeze, and are able to track birds flying overhead, hearing the echo of their caws cutting through and penetrating the heavy, damp air. Their sounds echo as they pierce the quiet mist surrounding that ebbs and flows as sunlight occasionally breaks through, with intense streaks depending on the time of day. We may feel a silent chill settling into our bones as the sun begins to fade behind a ridge and day light begins to wane.

We are deeply connected and are an embodiment, an expression of the natural world -whether or not we consciously realize it – through our breathing. We breathe in order to live and bring the air of the atmosphere into our lungs to survive. If we move more fully into this connection, into ayni, our minds become still by reaching into the deep interior of our bodies, to places where thoughts do not exist – a state paq’os refer to as haimutay – and the state I believe Thomas Ogden was referring to when he wrote about the autistic contiguous position. There are primitive, preverbal states for sure. In these psychic spaces, we sense without thinking – even if only for a moment. Through maintain an open state of receptivity, in haimutay, the elements of nature surrounding us, can be take in, with the potential for restoring us with life, with kausay.

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