Dancing with Heaven and Earth by Marlow Brooks
When I really allow myself to feel what’s happening these days; a global pandemic accompanied by crazy-making politics, rampant racial injustices, environmental catastrophes, and massive homelessness and hunger, I feel like I’m losing my skin. That it’s being peeled away and leaving my tender, raw flesh exposed and begging for a new layer of protection—or at least a soft veil to shield me.
For many of us, the intensity of the external forces surrounding us may feel overwhelming, disorienting and toxic. The old ways we’ve protected ourselves don’t work anymore and we may try, but we can’t glue back the old skin—it shrivels and flakes and what was once beautiful, seemingly safe, or fierce enough to shield us drops off like an old band-aid and exposes an unbearably frail and frightening abyss. Our intense vulnerability can call for a level of strength, equilibrium, and courage that could feel completely unfamiliar. Although we long to access the healthy energy we need to respond genuinely and effectively in the world, the way through may baffle us. The heartbreak over the intensity of suffering we experience around us can be overwhelming as we watch fires rage out of control leaving thousands homeless and our glorious forests charred in ruins. We may feel powerless to provide enough shelter and food for millions, to cope with rushes of unfamiliar rage in the face of rampant injustice, or to filter out collective fear from our personal fear.
The ways we have dealt with our lives have been stripped away and left us challenged to find new ways to cope with our relationships, our health, our livelihood, our families, our world, and the planet itself. When we have a wound, we know that it needs to be covered to prevent infection and wonder, how can we access similar protection on an emotional and spiritual level? We fear that the prickly, harsh, heat consuming our hearts and it’s perceptions will become toxic and we long for a new skin—a new way of coping, a renewal of our sacred contract with our personal destiny and journey on this planet.
It is difficult to know the path through this immense challenge when the mystery of life looms so heavily upon us. Often when disorientation and fear overwhelm me, I call on the arms of the Great Mother to hold me. As the ancient book of wisdom, the Dao De Jing counsels, she is mysterious and has no name—but if I can I slow down and be still, I can be held in vortex of truth. When I relax my mind, I can access the courage to heed the moment to moment beat of my Heart. According to ancient Chinese medicine, the Heart is the ruler of our body, mind, and spirit, and knows how to cope with any plight solely by being open, empty, and unconditionally present; heartbeat to heartbeat, moment to moment.
I remember that my Heart cannot think; it only knows how to feel the truth. Like a snake losing it’s skin, I feel the immense vulnerability of my being with a clear faith that a new skin is being formed. My body is creating, as it has so skillfully crafted itself from conception, a new layer of skin that can indeed cope with the challenges we face at this time.
How can we trust this inner knowing? Are we tempted to try to glue ourselves together with a new, tough, impenetrable skin that can help us grow immune to the cries of the world? Do we want to wear a skin that helps us ignore the plight of our Mother Earth, or are we willing to open to the clear, clean rain that descends from the thundering clouds and vast sky that surrounds us?
These days, it can be helpful to look to ancient and indigenous cultures for the wisdom to cope with this conundrum. For example, people of ancient China, as did many indigenous cultures, formed their written language from symbols that revealed not just a linear suggestion for what the word meant but an image that literally sprang from the original experience these ancient people were trying to communicate. This means that if we contemplate a traditional Chinese character carefully enough, we can enter a portal to the minds and hearts of their culture and learn from their ways of coping with the same human challenges we face today; disease, wars, hardship, environmental issues, and tribal diversity. It has continuously intrigued and thrilled me to decode the essence of these character’s meanings and apply it to my understanding of human nature and our ability to wisely negotiate the issues we face in our modern world. A magical treasure house of profound wisdom and intelligence lies hidden within them. Over the years, I have been especially captivated by the ancient Chinese character for Ling (see images) and continue to contemplate how it’s message can reveal a way through our disastrous state of affairs on earth. From a simple deconstruction of the character, we can learn how the ancient Chinese viewed human beings’ relationship with our planet and understood how to relate sanely with their sociopolitical situations, the natural environment, and the health of their own body, mind, and spirit.
There are many old translations for Ling; in ancient Chinese medicine it pertains to the more earth-based spirit of the heart which arises from deep within our bodies. It’s receptive, mysterious, intuitive, and contains our personal essence. Shen is the more immaterial spirit of the heart that manifests as the brilliance and clarity of sunlight whose rays warm and enliven our fellow humans, physical world, and nature. It’s more conscious and can be understood as divine spirit. For example, the sparkle of love and wisdom we see in someone’s eyes or the brilliant shimmer of the sun dancing off aspen leaves.
Our Heart longs to contact and express our personal truth and when we have the courage to dive deep into our inner universe and shine heavenly light in its direction, our Ling is enlivened and moves up toward our Heart where our inner and outer worlds can meet and enable us to make positive changes within not only ourselves but the environment around us.
The etymology of Ling beautifully expresses this process as our heavenly shen spirit meets in consort with with our earthly Ling spirit. The bottom of the character pictures two pairs of dancing legs, signifying human beings; more specifically, female shamans, performing a ritual dance for rain. They are feminine beings dancing on the earth; an earth full of rampant suffering, confusion, chaotic strife, and awesome beauty and intelligence. The potency and clarity of their individual dance invokes a rain of blessings from above to quell the fires, calm the chaos, and quiet any fear that surrounds them. Three mouths above them signify their readiness to receive a flow of moisture and guidance from Heaven. In the case of my work of art, I painted them red to accentuate the raw, hungry, nature of their prayer for nourishment and support from heaven—from the universe. They dance to bring moisture and light down to feed their inner being and the world around them.
Above the mouths is the character for rain, releasing four precious drops into their open mouths from the roof of Heaven. Not only does the rain that pours from the sky enable crops to grow and rivers and lakes to fill but it also offers the comfort and inspiration we feel when it rains in our spirit. We can weep. We can open to fresh cleansing moisture as it moves downwards from our lungs and soothes our hearts with each breath, clearing the way for a fresh start, a new outlook, a new form to be crafted into.
Ling is a wonderful image to express our longing for a new skin; a dance to call on the strength to endure affliction, the resilience to bounce back in the face of aggression, and the courage to face the depths of our fear. A ritual dance that calls for wisdom and receptivity in our inner world and peace, and integrity in our outer world. When our earthly soul and our bright spirit are in balance, we can dance with reality every moment—from heartbeat to heartbeat. This is an image of transcendence and transformation. We, like the ancient shamans, can plant our feet deep in the earth and with our mouths open in surrender, call for guidance, invoke magic, and be ready to receive a new vision.
When we demand and pray for a new fluid to fit the time like the ancients did, it will descend and soothe our spirits with the relaxation and flexibility needed to move with the heartbeat of our world. If we call on the light of the divine to meet and illuminate our original nature, then we can more courageously navigate our personal challenges here on earth and treat ourselves and our precious planet with love, care, and respect. We can grow a new skin with the resilience to withstand the devastation we humans have brought upon ourselves and our Mother Earth and the grief that comes from witnessing our ignorance.
We have ignored the sacred qualities of our world and the spiritual potential of our human nature for centuries. Even though the character for Ling has survived, its original message is hanging by a thread and is almost extinct in China today. It was erased from the revered medical texts during the cultural revolution in the in the 1960’s and 70’s and has rarely appeared again. The the Maoist regime banned anything to do with spirituality and simplified Ling into a meaningless character that is no longer connected to its magical origins. Within the character there are no more images for shamans, no more rain, no more dancing. In those days, one could get arrested for talking about spirit or shamans because it suggested that an individual could have the power to actually invoke changes in the environment and therefore could pose a threat to a totalitarian regime. I remember the look of abject terror in my Chinese friend’s eyes when I asked him about the translation for the character for spirit because he was brought up during the cultural revolution and remembered too well the consequences of discussing such things. Anything to do with the translations or meanings of the old character such as “mysterious, spiritual, supernatural, marvelous, or transcendent” were considered a threat to the status-quo and thus erased from books, dictionaries, texts, and ordinary language.
These days, Ling is not banned in our western culture but it’s meaning may be in danger. Materialism, the abuse of technology, and a war on our precious environment scare away the spirits, both earthy and heavenly, that could wake us up to transformation. But it is not too late; we can grow a new skin, dance a shaman’s dance, and call on Ling to rise to our hearts and invoke rain from heaven to quell the fires that rage through our forests and the rain of wisdom to wake us up to a new day, a new way.
Marlow Brooks is a healer, artist, writer, meditation teacher and long time student of Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche and Kobun Chino Roshi. Marlow lives in Boulder, Colorado and conducts workshops worldwide. For the past 21 years she has taught a year-long course, “The Psychology of the Five Elements and Plant Spirit Healing” at Naropa University. Marlow has written 3 books, “Singing Our Hearts Song: A Guide to the Five Elements and Plant Spirit Healing”, “The Way Through”, a book of poetry and painting, and “Words of the Heart.” Her workshops are lively, rejuvenating, and inspiring. Participants can expect to walk away experiencing the deep support of the natural world and it’s elements as well as a fresh perspective on their life’s journey towards their personal health and true calling.
http://marlowbrooks.com
