Natural Dharma

From the dedication chapter in Shantideva's Guide to a Bodhisattva's Way of Life.

"May all embodied creatures
Uninterruptedly hear
The sound of the Dharma issuing from birds and trees,
Beams of light and even space itself"
V37

and

"For so long as space endures
And for as long as living beings remain,
Until then may I, too, abide
To dispel the misery of the world"
V55

Emergence of Our Work

Last night I watched a beautiful film about Sharks, called Sharkwater (www.sharkwater.com). It was one of the most beautifully shot underwater films that I have seen in quite some time and highly recommend it to anybody out there. The film also highlighted the serous attention that ought to be paid to our planet's top oceanic predators--we have no idea what the impacts of loosing millions of sharks will have on the rest of the trophic levels below; this includes the phytoplankton and alga that produce a vast proportion of the oxygen that we breath.
On a final note, I was particularly struck by a comment made by the director of Greanpeace who said, "you have to bring people the story of the beauty of the world... to bring the story of the living miracle of life and show it to people."

As conservationist and biologists, we have to remember this key aspect of our work that involves re-enchanting people with the awesome beauty of nature. Bringing people into the "story of the beauty of the world" is a key aspect in our endeavor as conservationists because it facilitates a unification of our sentiments and emotional bodies. This then becomes a force that can be transmitted, passed between people, and amplified intergenerationally.

How can we live our life as messengers of the world's beauty?

Crystaline Vibrance

Measuring biological diversity is like measuring the angle of prismatic constituents within a crystal, or an iridescent feather. On its own, the substrate looks dull with very little luminosity. But contextually, the particulate constituent takes on a radiant luster. The relational elements of a system, repetitively organized, magnify the pattern of potential within them. This pattern, however, is simultaneously a result of the properties that surround the constituent (fundamental) unit and is yet utterly inexorable from the fundamental unit in and of its self. By appreciating the ways that a system collectively interacts, we become more acutely aware of the deeper, vivid reflections and textures that course through it like veins just below the surface, or like the color of a shimmering crystal that comes bursting forth when you align it properly with a roaring beam of sun.

MULA BANDHA

How do you honor the Earth?
Grow Roots
Integrate
And Reach your Tendrils
Deep towards the Core
Of the Heart
Of the Planet
Of the empty and Luminous Channel
The Self.

Do as the Trees,
As the Plants that branch and reach reticulate
Spinning on this Fair Blue Globe
And send yourself Deep
Into the Moist
Lightless Verdant Depths.

Allow the Plants to Teach You
The True Foundation
Upon Which We Utterly Depend.

All Life.

Honoring is just a Gesture that Ties your Action
To a Continuum of Actions
That Carry 'Weight of Process'
A Gesture around the Organizational
Impulses
The Lattice Work of Interrelationships
That is Life.

So grow roots and honor yourself
Roots of Mind and Action
A Drawing, A Condensation
Into the Liquid, Molten, Nectarous
Core of the Heart.
Effortless Effort.

Veg Work

This is what happens when a tree is felled in the forest: light! One of the primary determinants of forest succession is access to light and the intensity of that light.

This tree was cut by a small-holder 1-2 years ago.