[The first section of this blog is actually a book called Messages from Mother…. Earth Mother released at the end of October, 2012. You can read all of the Messages here or purchase the book with the first thirteen Messages at this page. It is also available as a Kindle e-book and at other internet venues and can be ordered from any bookstore in the USA, Australia, Great Britain, and other international sites.]
Mother: Hi, Sarah! Do you know that we’ve now been meeting for nine weeks here in the Sacred Grove? This is so much fun!
Sarah: Yeah, that’s pretty amazing. The time has flown by.
Mother: Indeed it has. So I’ve got a joke today. It’s a knock-knock joke. Are you ready?
Sarah: Hmmm … Do I have a choice? Just kidding, Mother. Of course I’m ready.
Mother: Knock knock!
Sarah: Who’s there?
Mother:Howl!
Sarah:Howl who?
Mother: Howl you know unless you open the door!
Sarah: Oy! Mother! Your jokes … they are so … precious. Yes, precious is the word. I really need to get you that joke book. I do. You are so funny.
Mother: Well, I try. I try. Okay, so today I want to talk about gratitude. So many spiritual two-leggeds speak about this. I think I need to talk about it too. I suspect I might have a slightly different angle on it.
Honestly, your culture is really not so good at gratitude. Most of you seem to have forgotten how amazing and magical it is to even be alive. To be living in a two-legged body.
Now some of you are aware of this. And some of you practice gratitude a lot. This is a good thing. But only some. Very few of you.
But geezy-peezy, when was the last time any of you said thank you to the trees around you? Not only are the Standing People—which the wiser ones on this planet call trees—cut down cruelly to make things like thank-you cards, or toilet paper, but all the animals and plants that live in those forests are also destroyed with this—what you call “clear-cutting.” And so few of you ever think of thanking them for all they’ve given you.
I mean, don’t most of you study this about trees in school? They give you oxygen. They give you firewood. They give you wood to build your homes, shade to cool you in the summer outside … I don’t think I need to list all of the things trees give you. Not to mention all that they provide for so, so many other species. But when was the last time you thanked them?
Same goes for the water, the fish. The animals. Oh, you don’t want to get me started about gratitude toward the animals that you eat. You do need to eat—I understand this—but what is it with the way you treat these animals, where they stand all day in their feces and are given chemicals to keep them from dying there in their feces? How insane is that? Then you turn around and eat that meat with the chemicals in it? I mean, that’s crazy!
Ay-yi-yi! I really wonder about many of you and your common sense. I coordinated this planet’s evolution so animals that live on the land eat plants growing fresh from the ground, or bushes or trees. The plan is that you two-leggeds who eat meat would go and hunt them. Or you can keep some of the plant-eating animals inside fences when they get used to you, or you herd them. That’s all fine. And I know you eat plants too. But to have these poor cows or chickens or turkeys or pigs standing in manure day in and day out, and then being dosed with chemicals that you’ve come up with—this just does not make any sense to me. And you wonder why so many of you are sick … but that’s another conversation.
I wish all of you understood how amazing it is to be alive on this planet. I love this planet so much and I love you all so much. All the trees and flowers and bugs. Oh, my precious buglies. I love all of you. The fish, the teeny-tinies that you use microscopes to see. I love all of them. I even like leeches. They’re kind of cute in their funny slimy way. They all have a place here on my beautiful planet. They eat things. Things eat them. It all works out.
But you all have forgotten what a blessing it is to be alive. I’m going to repeat that. And say it louder. You all have forgotten how amazing it is to even be alive here on this planet I take care of!
All you seem to do these days is take and take and take and take … I think I could say takea million times over again. I’ve been around a long time, you know. All of you two-leggeds are such newcomers. But troublesome ones most of you’ve become in the last wink of time, from my view on things.
So it would be really nice for you all to start giving too. Giving. Saying thank you to that tree outside would be a good start. Or giving the tree some good manure too. Not the manure from the places where the cows stand all day. That manure is a little scary.
Or saying thank you to the water coming out of your tap. Or to the lakes and rivers and aquifers that you even have water coming out of the tap. Or to the water where the fish you ate last night lived. Or the fish. The crab. The lobster. Whatever you ate. Even the parsley on the plate that most of you don’t touch in the restaurants. You can thank that too. I have no clue why you don’t eat that parsley. It is usually the healthiest thing on the plate for you to eat anyway.
Please be careful how many of these fish you catch though. I am concerned about how many of them you are eating and their ability to survive all your taking. Oh, don’t even get me started on how many of my species babies you all have wiped out so far. I don’t want to go there in this very moment … makes me want to cuss really loud, and I don’t think you’re ready for the types of cusswords that Mother can say!
Hmmm … you know, you can even thank me sometimes too. Directly, I mean. You can offer tobacco to me. Or cornmeal. Doing prayers outside and laying little piles of good clean tobacco or cornmeal at the base of trees is an old Native way of honoring me, your Mother. If you don’t have tobacco, you can gift me with a small amount of whatever food you’ve got there. The whole idea is giving back. Prayers count a great deal too.
Okay. There you have it about gratitude.
Oh, oops. Not quite finished. There is something else here. When you all start expressing gratitude more, and really feeling it, you would be amazed at how wonderful that feels. For you and for me. For all the beings on this planet. When you two-leggeds start saying thank you from a place of really feeling it deep in your hearts and your bellies, oh… it’s like the way you feel when you eat really good chocolate for me. All nice and happy and slightly buzzing. For all of you to be feeling gratitude and expressing it out loud is like amazing energetic chocolate for me on my level.
You see, this beautiful energy of gratitude just starts to move through your rooms and houses, to other two-leggeds around you, and four-leggeds, to the ground under your house, to the trees and the birds and the flowers. Oh, it’s such a sweet, positive energy. And I love it. It tickles me so and makes me happy. So happy!
I love to be tickled!
I’m going to give you some homework. The next time you eat, try to eat in silence. Even if you are with someone else, both of you can eat silently. Focus on every bite silently. Chew it slowly. Say thank you to each bite and to the food on your plate, each forkful of food. Try that. Try it several times. See what happens. Enjoy the food. Enjoy what I’ve created on this planet for you to eat.
Now off with you. I’ve got other things to do. I’m a busy Mother, you know.
I love you …!
Every single one of you, small and big and short and tall and teeny-tiny to big-big … all of you!
Messages from Mother (TM) 