There’s a Ritual for That

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Ashley River Brant is a multidimensional artist and healer whose focus is on awakening the creative and intuitive power within us all. She is the creator of Soul Tattoo®, a ceremonial intuitive tattooing modality, and the host of a podcast called Weaving Your Web. She also brings forth her medicine as a filmmaker, photographer, illustrator, and writer. With Sounds True, Ashley is releasing her first book, Tending to the Sacred: Rituals to Connect with Earth, Spirit, and Self. In this episode of Insights at the Edge, Tami Simon talks with Ashley about how creativity and ritual have given her a “bridge home” to a sense of purpose and belonging from the traumas of her childhood. Ashley describes how she moves through life with a “divine team of support” composed of both earthly and cosmic beings, and she offers us a ritual for connecting with our own spirit guides. They also discuss tapping into past-life memory as a process for healing present wounds, creating space to practice “sacred listening” to nature and our ancestors, and the four pillars of ritual Ashley uses to create a life of intention.

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Tips and Tools to Heal Our Relationship with Mother Ea...

Ashley River Brant — April 27, 2021

Reciprocity

Tending to the natural world is essential. We can no longer ignore or expect the Earth to just be there giving us all that we need, shutting out her cries. Her resources are limited. She is our mother, and she is burning, melting, and roaring in a call for help for us to tend to her needs. Animals are becoming extinct and others are abused and mistreated for profit, as are our trees—our sacred lungs here on Earth. We are meant to connect to the natural world as if it were a friend, a sister or brother, mother or father. We are all a part of the same Earth family. The trees need the air we exhale, yet we forget that we rely on them to breathe, as well. We forget, so easily, just how important this relationship is for our mere existence. Our connection is such a simple act, but we’ve completely lost our intimacy with the natural world as a collective and it’s begging for us to return to this harmonious kinship.

The Earth is our mirror—the truest reflection for our collective. Its self-destruction and decay shows us the separation we’ve created with it, with ourselves, with all that is Sacred, and with each other. When she burns, it mirrors the repressed anger we are holding from not meeting the needs of our Spirit, for not listening to truth. Her polluted oceans reflect the pollution of our inner waters—our disrespect and dishonoring of the emotions and intuitive wisdom of the feminine. The remedy is actually quite simple: conscious communication, love, and connection can help restore this balance. Once we each form a relationship with our elemental allies, our awareness will shift to honoring and protecting, and change the way we relate to the natural world as a whole, just like a connection with any growing relationship. Our future depends on how we tend to the Earth today.

earth is our mirror

Working with the Land

When working with the natural world in our healing, we also must cultivate a relationship with the land that supports us where we live. We thrive when we are connected to and work with the land that holds us. Simple ways to do this include:

Spend time with the land. Listen to it. Get to know its natural features, its seasonal blossoms and cycles.
Research and recognize its indigenous origins. Who lovingly tended to the land before you? How can you honor these people? Are they still active in your community? How can you support them?
Join a local land conservation group.
Try to source fresh herbs in your community or in the wild, instead of bought in plastic imported to your grocery store. Look for community gardens, farmers markets, CSAs, or even plant them yourself! For dried herbs and plants not native to your bioregion, check out your local apothecary to support small Earth-conscious businesses. Always ask where they get their herbs and if they are sustainably harvested or organic.
Plant walks are also a great resource for learning how to spot medicine in the wild so you can forage yourself, and they can also teach you more about what grows near you. Find a local herbalist who you resonate with and support them.

Ways to Further Reciprocate:

Talk to the trees like a friend. Ask them for guidance and support and listen with care and respect.
Plant trees and flowers. Reforest and replant. Revive our dying plant species.
Stop utilizing single use plastic, especially if you have a company that sells products. Our oceans are drowning in plastic and our sea creatures are suffering. We
are disrupting balance because of our addiction to consumerism. Plastic does not disappear and most of it doesn’t get recycled. You can nowadays find a plastic-free alternative for almost anything you could ever need with a little bit of conscious attention. Do your research and be mindful of your plastic consumption. Choose consciousness over convenience, the larger vision over a quick fix.
With everything you take from the Earth or that is made of the Earth, say a simple thank you before using or consuming it.
Say intentional prayers and blessings for the Earth and her healing.
Withdraw your support from companies and groups that are not in support of the Earth’s health and sacredness— companies that use unsustainably harvested resources or unnecessary plastic, those that engage in unethical farming, and fast fashion.
Share with friends and family how to be more eco-conscious. Does your mom recycle? Is your brother still using plastic straws? Does your best friend need an iced coffee served in a plastic cup every day or can they bring their own cup to the coffee shop? Gently offer suggestions to support the Earth whenever you see fit.
Support companies that focus on Earth connection and protection. We vote with our dollars and money is energy. Give your energy to those supporting the Earth.

This is an excerpt from Tending to the Sacred: Rituals to Connect with Earth, Spirit, and Self by Ashley River Brant.

ashley brant Ashley River Brant is a multidimensional artist and feminine healer bringing her medicine through as the creator of Soul Tattoo®, a ceremonial intuitive tattooing modality, as well as with film photography, illustration, writing, as the host of Weaving Your Web podcast, and through her online courses. Ashley uses her gifts of mediumship and connections to the loving spirits of the natural world to offer a feminine voice of healing expression for collective transformation in all her work. Ashley’s focus is to assist her clients, and all who are drawn to her work, in awakening to a new wave of feminine power, attuned to the mystery, honoring the creative and intuitive power within us all, and embodying it with grounded presence and purpose, so that we may all heal, open our hearts to the sacred, and align with our authentic expression and soul’s true essence. Ashley will be releasing her first book and first oracle deck with Sounds True in 2021.

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There is a saying that goes “hurt people hurt people.” I believe this to be true. We have been conditioned, in environments of scarcity and violence, to react more with fear and self-protection than curiosity and connection. As a result, we live in a world that is deeply in need of more kindness, more ease, more connection, more sweetness. It’s time we offer more sweetness and ease to ourselves, to one another, to our planet.

Now, this does not mean being a Pollyanna or “sickly sweet.” It does not mean being addicted to sugar and finding other ways to hurt ourselves. It means moving through the world and offering sweetness to ourselves and others. It means setting good boundaries and protecting our community and the hive from those who would “rob” us of our sweetness, of the sustenance (love, connection, inclusion, belonging) that helps us endure.

But first, we have to allow ourselves to taste and feel the sweetness on our own. We have to practice being deeply grateful for what is sweet in our life, holding it with reverence, and freely sharing it with others.

We invite you to build your own relationship with, and deep worthiness of, sweetness. We invite you to find and taste the sweetness in your life. Times of abundance and sweetness are special, and we must remember to taste them fully and live into them. We must also remember to share them.

What sweetness do you have in your life? What sweetness can you share with others? What sweetness do you crave from others? How can you cultivate more sweetness in your life? What does that look, sound, and feel like? Where do you deny yourself sweetness? How can you give yourself permission to taste and share all of the sweetness that comes to you? How can you bring sweetness into the lives of others?

Honey Tasting Meditation

For this practice, you’ll need some (ideally) local honey. If possible, find out what you can about where it came from and what was in bloom at the time it was made. This will help deepen your relationship to the place you live. If you cannot find local honey, that is okay; you can still complete the meditation as instructed.

Find a quiet spot in a quiet moment and sit with your jar of honey. Before opening it, sit in a few moments of conscious breathing to quiet your mind.

Start with your sense of sight and smell. Hold the jar of honey up in front of you and observe its color and viscosity. Take note of how it looks in the light, in the dark.

Next, open the jar of honey and bring it to your nose. Inhale deeply. Notice the sensations, images, or thoughts that come to you as you breathe in the aromatherapy of the honey.

Now, reverently taste the honey. Take a small amount on a spoon and meditatively savor the flavors, sensations, feelings, and images that come to you. Chew the honey. Hold it on your tongue. Allow yourself to indulge in its many flavors. Do this again with another spoonful (or as many as you want) but take your time.

When you’re done, write down any messages or insights you received from the experience and the nurturing and healing power of the honey. Take this moment of sweetness with you into your day.

Excerpted from The Wisdom of the Hive: What Honeybees Can Teach Us about Collective Wellbeing.