“We can speak without voice to the trees and the clouds and the waves of the sea. Without words they respond through the rustling of leaves and the moving of clouds and the murmuring of the sea.”

Paul Tillich

Life is in continuous conversation with us through our senses. There is much to learn from plant, human, animal, bird, reptile, sea beings, insect, mineral, the elements, stars, and planets. Indigenous peoples from every corner of the world have lived in ways that attune to nature’s messages and rhythms through ceremony, medicinal practices, spiritual practices, rites of passage, and daily living.

When opening to life in this way, one finds an endless source of wisdom and support. Answers to difficult questions may show up through the flight pattern of osprey, an interaction with seal, an understanding that comes though bare feet in the sand, the sound of the wind rustling the grass, the silence of a night sky. Wisdom can also come through dreams or images which are ways in which our soul speaks to us, revealing archetypal themes which guide and mirror where we are working.

Within every culture there exists a framework and a mythology with which to interpret and engage with reality and our place within it. Chinese Medicine works within a cosmology of interconnectedness where nature’s rhythms and the elements are in a constant dynamic interplay that nourishes life at every level.

When we engage all of our senses- thinking feeling, sensing and intuition- we open to a creative wisdom that surpasses the limitations of mind alone, helping us to move forward with resilience, more of ourselves, and more to offer the world in which we live. We need only be open and available.