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Results from activities that enable people to increase their globally balanced thinking (GBT.)
Dancing
"I moved on and breathed with a sword fern for a few minutes, aware of how ancient this plant is. Then I breathed with a huge old red cedar tree. Then I breathed with the moss growing on the tree. Each time, disconnecting myself by holding my breath, feeling the plant attracting me, urging me to breath, then finally letting go, interacting with the plant in a comfortable way. I can no longer view plants as the background to animal activities. This experience has taught me how I am in a dance with the plants, exchanging air lovingly. This activity, withholding myself from nature and then letting myself participate has been a powerful teacher for me."
Healing
" I went for a walk between rain storms on a very stormy day here on the Oregon Coast. I asked permission to walk in this very strong wind and connect with nature for this activity. It felt right to do this.
As I walked the wind pushed me along and I felt how warm and strong it was. It seemed to push me and cushion me as I became part of the wind. Just letting my mind push me along, I felt a part of the wind. That sounds backwards but it was not on a verbal thinking level but on a much deeper level. Here I was in the middle of a violent storm and feeling the greatest comfort. I was a part of this exciting world and I enjoyed it without thinking just feeling. My old brain was operating and the peace that came over me was profound. I walked several blocks and circled back home and the wind stayed behind me and it felt like I was in a big soft comforter. Just as I arrived home the rain started again, with hail and I was glad of the shelter of our house. The feeling of peace continued throughout the rest of the storm, during my inside activities.
I have a sore on my left leg that has not healed since last August when I had a growth removed in a surgery. It was almost healed until last week when it became infected again. It is very painful. During this walk all pain disappeared and when I later had to go to the Medical Doctors again to try to find out how to heal this wound, I felt peaceful through this very unpleasant experience.
The feelings of my old brain are a part of me and I would feel totally lost in the dessert of life without the ability to use them regularly. It is necessary to feel this peace from old brain activities to have self worth. This activity intensified these feelings and brought confidence to continue my day.
me, the dusk, the dawn."* * * Inner Authorities
For this activity I simply stepped outside and stood on the cliff over the river (thereby not heeding the wrangler that says I should wait until daylight and not just keep going to the same convenient place) and enjoyed the solitude (which counterated the wrangler that said I should be guilty for having so much beauty and solitude when many people crave this kind of natural area but never have a chance to expeience it), and I began to get a feeling for what was attracting me (thereby ignoring a wrangler that said I should be busy sorting out my work life and not standing around gazing into the night sky), which in this case was the water (and sonegating the wrangler that said the other RWN participants will want to hear something other than what you feel around the river which you always tell them about), and the trees (which put to rest the wrangler who says that if you can only see the silhouette of the branches then you're overlooking a whole lot of tree-ness) and the cloudy sky, (which superceded the voice of the wrangler that tried to distract me by making me think hard about an incident that happened during the day). I was also attracted by a sense of centeredness and stability (which went against the grain of a wrangler that wanted me to judgementally compare my life to lives of others who are 'better' than me), and I was attracted to this sense of inner calm and told my New Brain that this was really quite OK (which denied the wrangler that wanted me to believe that 'calm' has no place in a world that rewards extroversion and dramatic accomplishment). So my last thought in this activity was to be at peace and have faith that a tough ,life-changing decision that I have to make in a few days will turn out perfectly, (thus disolving the wrangler that says I am not going to be able to rise to the challenge).
What I learned from this chapter and activity are that I am a have a wrangler rodeo going on inside me constantly, that I have means of sifting through decision making processes that integrate old and new brain insights and needs and that I know there is an active inner guidance system that comes into focus when I allow multisensory nature connections to occur. If this ability to RWN on a multisensory level were taken away I would be like a dolphin with no echolocation, an eagle with no wing feathers, a grizzly bear with no denning instinct, a deer with no hearing and a sandhill crane with no migration senses.
This activity enhances my self-worth by allowing me the dignity o fhaving something of nature (the ancient wise Old Brain) alive in me all the time. This is a gift from the planet whose insights I continually rededicate back to the Earth and its human and non-human creatures.
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