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Dear Still Water Friends,

This Thursday, while Mitchell is away, I will be offering you a practice of Touching the Earth that is very special to me. This past summer, while I was in Plum Village, Sister Chan Khong presented her very beautiful guided Touchings, and taught us how to customize these Touchings for our own lives. During this practice, I got in touch with some of the beautiful aspects of my roots, ones that I had never really felt before. Sr. Chan Khong suggested that we create our own Touchings practice when we went home, and that we try to practice them for at least 21 days in a row. Because I was so moved by the practice, I followed her instructions and practiced my own version of her Touchings for the next few months.

This practice created a very strong root in me, one that I hadn’t really felt before this. I felt empowered by the strong root, and more connected to the strong and healthy seeds within me. She describes the practice as being like the trunk and roots of a tree, rather than like the branches. In a storm, when we look at the branches of a tree, we see it moving so much, that we think the tree won’t survive such a storm. When we look at the trunk and roots, we see that the tree will be just fine. I started to feel like I could withstand so much!

The more that we bring our awareness down into our body, and away from our thoughts, and the more we focus on the deep roots that we have in our blood ancestors, our land ancestors, and our spiritual ancestors, the more stable and confident we become. We find the deeper sense of self that is within us, instead of always focusing on our little separate self. We connect with all of the support that we already have within, and we become strong like the roots and the trunk of the tree.

As usual, Our meditation period begins at 7. The best times to join us are just before 7, at the beginning of the session; at 7:25, just before the walking meditation; or at 7:35, just after the walking meditation.

I am excited to offer you this practice on Thursday, so you can take it home and make it your own.

I hope to see you then.

With much love,

Annie Mahon