STONES & FEATHERS

I don’t know why, but kids love throwing stones in the water.  They can do it for long stretches of time and be totally amused and at peace.  I enjoy it too, especially tossing five or six in the air so they come down and create a tinkling song: piddle-dee-dop. 

I’ve always loved stones and have often travelled home with a few in my suitcase – some as rocks and some as polished jewelry such as ammonite from southern Alberta and labradorite from Newfoundland. Perhaps it was all those trips to the Petroglyph as a child and the family drives to abandoned rock mines in the Bancroft area that opened me to their wonder. 

I recently bought a Celtic knot ring with a blue topaz stone in the centre and was fascinated its healing qualities were associated with both peace and communications.  Peace and communications: how remarkable these two energies are linked, but then of course with a quick curiosity, it seems obvious. If people are not communicating there won’t be peace, and if people are not at peace when they are communicating, something is likely to be missed.

Being at peace, I find, is probably one of the hardest things to accomplish and maintain.  There are so many distractions, needs and wants that captivate our minds leaving peace so easily forgotten.  “I want peace, and oh, I also want the latest smart gadget, and I want to get the laundry done and finish that email. Did you see the latest flyer? Those sale prices end on Thursday.”

Someone gave us a fridge magnet that reads: Peace.  It does not mean to be in a place where there is no noise, trouble or hard work.  It means to be in the midst of those things and still be calm in your heart. (Unknown)  How do you get like that – calm in your heart? 

I probably spent most of my life trying to figure that one out.  Growing up, I felt there was something else to living and being alive other than what I was seeing, so I studied mythology, shamanism, sound therapy and literature to learn to read between the lines and into the magic.  And lo and behold, what was there was peace – patiently waiting for me to slow down and climb aboard. 

There was no title I had to earn, no PhD to obtain, no secret code to decipher; I just had to slow down.  I’m not talking about sitting on the couch and doing nothing, I’m referring to the nervous system.  People can be sitting in a chair but they talk so fast, you know everything inside them is churning like crazy. When our nervous system gets overstimulated by stress or electronics we enter an altered state – altered from peace – and it happens so quickly we’re not even aware it’s occurring.  We do know, however, that it’s uncomfortable and we want to feel something different, something less stressful.  Often we don’t even know that what we want is that feeling of peace, that grounded, natural feeling of inner calm, so we search for comfort in destructive ways and often end up feeling numb instead.  Numb does not equal peace.

I recently learned a method to realign with calmness from a fellow named Joshua Bloom.  He suggested you close your eyes and imagine a feather floating down from the sky and softly drifting down your back until it comes to rest at the base of your spine.  Keep your awareness there and exhale into it.  Inhale into your belly and exhale out the base of your spine. 

I had a difficult time meditating and clearing my mind but this kind of centring is more natural and profound for me.  After a few minutes of exhaling, I’ve slowed my nervous system down and returned to a peaceful flow, a stream of tenderness and magic.

Huh, interesting.

Maybe that’s why kids love throwing stones in the water: Nature takes them in hand and invites them into that flow, that timeless space of bliss.

Piddle-dee-dop.