Overwhelmed? Connect with nature.

I hear from so many professionals, executives, and entrepreneurs that they find themselves overwhelmed, anxious, ungrounded, out of balance off and on throughout the day despite meditating, exercising and consciously breathing. 

There are so many tools that I use for coming back into balance.  Essential oils, crystals, Breathwork, exercise, yoga, art and creativity, meditation, yoga all work wonders.  But when you are limited on time and resources - between meetings, clients, or diapers - there's one thing that only requires we gaze out the window - to the elements of nature. 

Take off your shoes, look at the trees. Watch the wind dance with the leaves. Savor the single blade of grass. Know that the flower blossom once started as a small seed. Feel the warmth of the sun on your skin. A few minutes of allowing nature to compost your stress will do you wonders.

There is a prayer I use when I want to reconnect with nature which entails calling in the elements and four directions. This prayer is a tradition of shamanic healing. Spiritual energy is all around us in many forms and on many planes of consciousness. By calling in the four directions we invoke the guardians of energy and consciousness.

Face the East – To the winds of the East, great eagle condor, come to us from the place of the rising Sun, keep us under your wing, show us the mountains we only dare to dream of, teach us to fly wing to wing with the great Spirit

Face the south – To the winds of the South, great serpent, wrap your coils of light around us, teach us to shed the past the way you shed your skin, to walk softly on the earth, teach us the beauty way

Face the West – To the winds of the West, mother jaguar, protect our medicine space, teach us the way of peace, to live impeccably, show us the way beyond death

Face the north – To the winds of the north, hummingbird, grandmothers, and grandfathers, ancient ones, come and warm your hands by our fires, whisper to us in the wind, we honor you who have come before us, and you who will come after us, our children’s children

Kneel on the Mother Earth – We’ve gathered for the healing of all your children, the stone people, the plant people, the four-legged, the two-legged, the creepy crawler, the finned, the furred, and the winged ones, all our relations

Face to the Sun – Father Sun, Grandmother Moon, to the Star Nations, Great Spirit, you who are known by a thousand names, And you who are the unnamable One, Thank you for bringing us together and allowing us to sing the Song of Life

Nature calms the nervous system because there is acceptance, flow, and grace. By connecting with the earth, air, fire, and water, we shed what no longer serves us, that stress gets composted into the earth, and we can come into balance.