## In this issue
– Westacre’s latest
– Meditation of life arising
– The Pathway of Love
– What you can do

## Westacre’s latest

Beltane blessings to you all. May your Summer be filled with joy and abundance. And a decent amount of warm sunshine.

It’s certainly started well. I joined my spiritual family for a few intense days of journeying and celebration in the woods. The photos are now being shared on our Facebook group, and they are stunning. The world we make as a community is a completely different reality. It looks like we were lost in Fairy for a few days.

And yet those connections are so real. They sustain us through the trials of everyday reality. And they inspire me to change.

I have this tendency to moan inwardly. I came home from that Beltane celebration to this amazing life that I have chosen for myself. This adventure of living in harmony with the Earth and in service to the magic of connection. But I noticed that, in contrast to the blissful days spent in the woods, I was thinking unhappy thoughts.

We were putting the final touches on the raised vegetable bed. We’ve lined it with geotextile, which will let moisture through but not soil, and filled the edges of that with rubble. In order to get the rubble in the right place, I had to climb into the veg bed using a ladder and then manually move the bits of brick around. My mind was moaning incessantly about how I don’t like climbing ladders. About how I would rather be doing something else. About how I wasn’t going to have any time to do my spiritual practice, …

And then I realised that I could choose different thoughts. I could continue the spirit of celebration I had just come home from. I could just be in the moment and celebrate the fact that Alex and I are doing this amazing work together. We have chosen a life for ourselves and we are living it. What is there to moan about?

Thing is, I actually enjoy the physical work. It’s very fulfilling. Every day we can point at something and say: we did this. And as we do, our dream becomes manifest.

We’re now one huge raised vegetable bed richer. All we need to do is to gradually fill it with soil and then start planting things in it. And isn’t that a great achievement?

Wishing you a Summer full of great achievements and manifestations of dreams.

Hilde

## Meditation: Life Arising

The world is so very green right now. Everything is celebrating the longer, warmer days with rich abundance of leaf and flower. Every plant and animal is expressing its deepest self, reaching for the full potential of its life.

We can use the rising energy of the season to strengthen our own souls and manifest our dreams. This meditation will help.

Go to your favourite meditation spot and settle yourself. Pay attention to your breathing without trying to alter it in any way. Just be with how your breath is in this moment.

With your out breath, allow your body to relax into the ground beneath you. Do this until you feel settled and relaxed.

Now you find yourself standing by the entrance to a cave. There is warm sunshine on your back, but the air in the cave before you is cool and dark. Ask for permission to enter. When you feel that you are welcome, enter the cave and go into the darkness as far as you dare. There sit down and let yourself adjust to the darkness.

After your senses have adjusted, you may find that the dark isn’t so dark after all. Ask yourself if it would be OK to go a bit further, a bit deeper into the cave. If it feels OK, walk further in, as far as you dare. Sit down again and let yourself settle.

Ask yourself one more time if it would be OK to go further in. It’s fine if you’d rather not. But if the darkness calls you deeper, go as far as you dare.

Here, in the deep darkness, you are surrounded by the Earth. Let yourself deeply perceive the solid Earth and the darkness around you. Touch the rocks you are sitting on and the walls around, if you can reach. Feel their cool solidity. Breathe in the darkness. Let yourself become part of it. Smell the atmosphere of the cave. See what you can see when your eyes are bereft of light. Be with the darkness for as long as you like.

In that darkness, you begin to feel the great power of the Earth. You wrap yourself in its solid strength. Allow that great life-giving power to enter you. Let it fill you.

The power becomes to great for you to contain, and it begins to break open your edges. You realise that with the power of the Earth you can be much bigger than you usually allow yourself to be. Allow your edges to crack and let the power reach up through the Earth.

Soon, you feel the Earth warm as it is kissed by the Sun above. You reach for more of that warmth. The power inside you, the power of the Earth’s dark potential, reaches up further and further until you meet the light.

Let the power inside you gently unfurl to that light.

After a while, clouds cover the Sun and it begins to rain. Drink in the blessings of the water. Feel how the water combines with the Earth to feed and refresh you. You gain the strength to reach higher, to unfurl more fully.

You are now growing leaves. They reach into the Air and gain strength from there as well. You breathe in particles that help you grow, and breathe out fresh, clear oxygen. Stay with that cycle of breathing as it helps you to grow more.

When the Sun appears again, you notice that you have grown a bud. This bud holds the full potential of what you can be. Drink in the warm sunlight and surrender into its radiance. Soon, your bud opens and you flower.

You are now a flower growing in the green of May. You are open to Life and its abundance. Feel what it is like to be so truly alive. Stay there for as long as you like.

When you feel ready to return, feel that gorgeous flower one last time. Sense your leaves stretched to the sky. Feel the strength of your stem. And slowly allow your awareness to sink to your roots.

Follow your roots down into the Earth to the place where you are sitting in the dark of the cave. Fully enter your body and feel your usual edges. Breathe in the power you have received from the Elements and the Life force.

When you feel complete, stand up and turn around. There is a faint glow of light from the mouth of the cave. Carefully find your way back.

When you emerge into the light, remember how much strength is available to you. Give your thanks to all those how helped you and return to your own body, sitting in your meditation space.

Take your time to gently start moving. If you feel a little spaced, make sure you eat and drink something. Do something practical towards the realisation of your dreams.

And may the blessings of the Green Summer be with you.

## The Pathway of Love

Don’t you just love it? All this vibrant green? This time of year when everything is young and full of promise?

I would encourage you to go with that love. Act on it. Revel in it. You can even sing the praises of the green and the warming sunshine to your colleagues at the office this time of year, and nobody will think you’re crazy. Take the opportunity. Let the small animal of your body love what it loves, as Mary Oliver puts it.

That love for the natural world does so much for us. For starters, it makes us happy. Just being outside among green and living things is proven to lift anxiety and depression. All you have to do is spend a little time.

It’s good for our bodies, too. We tend to move around more when we’re outside. The fresh oxygen and other chemicals plants exude are actively good for us. They keep us healthy in general, and help our healing when we’re ill.

Our love for the natural world we belong to also heals our souls. The sheer joy of spending time outside with that vibrant green is great healing for the parts of ourselves that are wounded by living in this crazy society. We are all hurt by a culture that puts money before any other consideration. Celebrating the simple beauty of what is true and alive is a great antidote. It feeds us and makes us stronger.

And when we have loved that deeply, and celebrated that joyfully, we will naturally want to defend this miracle of life. Loving what we love is our deepest motivation.

Do please go outside and spend some time in that vibrant aliveness of the May. Do the meditation of Life Arising. And if you fancy, try the exercise from the link below. It’s a very simple way to find your connection with the natural world.

http://www.ecopsych.com/naturelov30thank.html The link is quite old, and I had to scroll down to find the exercise. But it is so worth it, especially if you click through to the second page.

## What you can do

You can keep in touch with all of Westacre’s news and progress on Facebook and Twitter.

We are about to start insulating the foundations of the house, which requires a lot of digging. Should you fancy getting stuck in, or doing some weeding or lawn mowing, we could always do with an extra pair of hands.

You can find all our contact details at http://www.westacre.org.uk/contact/