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Living Arts
Essential Elements
by Jesse Wolf Hardin
It is midday as I take a break from writing to step away from the worn keys and glowing screen, the creeping summer heat speaking to my body and needs in a way that reasonable thoughts never could. Each afternoon the same burning sun and swelling temperatures that inspire my walk to the river seem to summon forth the dark thunder-clouds of the Southwest’s monsoon season. The river is at its most shallow this time of year, barely calf-height in some places, and so I make my way to the one broad, deep pool supported by a latticework beaver dam.
By the time I get there and strip off my clothes, the day’s first rain begins to fall on my bared shoulders, and I’m no longer hot, but chilled by the persistent canyon winds. It proves warmer in the river as I submerge, and internal discourse comes to a sudden halt as I am not only touched but seemingly filled by the attention-getting sensation of water hugging every inch of my body, its gentle currents stroking sensitized skin the way a cat might rub against a willing leg. I lower myself until the surface of the river laps just below the level of ears and nose, a child-learned technique for best hearing the enchanting, bell-like sounds that raindrops falling into a pool or river make. And like a child, I tilt my head and open my mouth in order to drink in the blessed moisture falling from the mottled blue gray sky.
On the way back, I enjoy the fertile and fruity smells of freshly dampened earth and my bare feet revel in its rain-softened feel. This is the ground we not only live on but with and through, regularly gathering and eating the nutritional wild greens that erupt from and are sustained by its rich volcanic soils, and collecting for our stoves any dying tree branches that this stretch of earth provides. The trail leading to our cabin climbs steeply away from the river, and my increased need for oxygen has me breathing heavily, noticing more than usual how good it feels to stretch and feed my lungs, consciously sharing atmosphere with all that lives or has ever lived, exchanging gases with green growing beings in a mutually beneficial cycle. I’ve cooled down enough by this point so that I can enjoy the heat coming off the cookstove as I add wood to its box, celebrating not only its bark-licking flames, but the fires of creativity, of passion, of burning life itself.
As full-time residents of the remote Animá wildlife sanctuary and teaching center, our lives are by necessity closely entwined with the elements. Two miles and seven river crossings from the nearest propane station or electric power line, we depend on the fires we burn as well as the fires of the sun to power our satellite Internet connection, computers, sweet music and L.E.D. lights, as well as to warm our cabins in winter and cook our food year round. It is the Earth that houses us, provides much of our food, and is a source of our insights, literally grounding us in self, place and purpose. The omnipresent winds shape the land’s character as well as its creature and human inhabitants, no less than they shape these cliffs and rocks, and we’re dependent on gifts from the clouds for the water we drink and use to fill our wood-heated outdoor tub.
The immense diversity and intense fecundity of our sanctuary is thanks not only to our protection and faithful plantings, choice elevation and overlapping life zones, but to the rare rain and spring fed river that winds its way through it. And as a natural healer, my partner Kiva has to regularly consider someone’s elemental balance, such as a paucity or excess of “water,” or a need for certain earthen minerals.
Our wilderness-based lifestyle may not be as deeply experienced in town, but it remains no less real and true. Even in the most urban environment with air-conditioned buildings and thermostatic controls, with all the food coming from a grocery store and grown in places unknown, we are both part and product of the basic elements. We are all bodies primarily made up of water. The chlorinated and the oft-recycled liquid issuing forth from apartment showerheads was first pooled in blood-salt seas, siphoned skyward and dearly distilled by a fortunately irresistible sun, and delivered via cloud transport on the winds I revel in.
It’s not only possible but desirable to connect deeper with each of the elements in our lives, prizing and conserving water, gathering rain like a pirate even where it is legislatively frowned upon, voting to protect mountain watersheds, getting intimate with it by swimming at every chance, ingesting it straight—not just in tea, coffee or pop—even if it has to be bottled. By staying tuned into even the slightest movement in the air, we sense not only approach but oneness and continuance. Being more conscious of our breath can help calm and center us. Noticing the pace, depth or shallowness of our breathing can serve as valuable biofeedback, drawing attention to what is triggering our feelings, fears, excitement or desire. Noticing how the air feels when we take it in can be a reality check regarding its purity, and motivation to become an activist against its continuing pollution.
You may have heard or read about what some call the essential elements of a gourmet recipe, a novel or painting. In the same way, the natural elements are not only the primary and basic components from which all else is built, but they are the features and the spirit providing for, empowering and helping to define our art-full, whole and healthful natures.
Jesse Wolf Hardin is a teacher and founder of Animá nature-informed practice and the author of seven related books. He and his partners offer empowering online Medicine Woman, Shaman Path and Path of Heart correspondence courses, as well as online counsel and healing consultations. Readers are invited for wilderness retreats, vision quests, student internships and events at the Animá Sanctuary, a wild river canyon and ancient place of power in the enchanted Southwest: Animá Learning & Retreat Center, Box 688, Reserve, NM 87830. www.animacenter.org.