This morning, my husband Al and I were walking home after group meditation around 7:15 a.m. The sun was just coming up at Sunburst Sanctuary. Deer browsed in the meadow, and numerous bluebirds flew across the road ahead of us. But what really caught my attention was all the chatter coming from the birds in a cluster of tall sycamore trees.
“What are they saying?” I asked Al, who kept quiet. “They’re not saying, ‘Look at me!’ because they’re trying to attract a mate. And they’re not saying, ‘Get away from my spot!’ because they’re building a nest.”
Finally, I called my friend and excellent birder, Cary. She answered my questions with: “They’re saying, ‘It’s a beautiful day!’”
I think she’s right. Those birds could also be celebrating the end of daylight time getting shorter. With winter solstice, the days start getting longer, just as winter begins. How curious! This day lengthening continues until summer solstice, the longest day of the year. Sunburst Sanctuary’s standing stones help us celebrate these celestial moments. Of course, the southern hemisphere celebrates summer solstice when our northern hemisphere is celebrating winter solstice.
Around the world in ancient times, many celebrations began that are still held today at or near the winter solstice. Some age-old stories about the rebirth of the Sun are connected to this time of year.
At Sunburst, we enjoy a day of quiet meditation, and an evening of dining with friends (a potluck), as well as physically tracing our Hopi labyrinth. Walking the labyrinth “resets” us for a new beginning, a new year. This is a beautiful experience, walking among the colored luminaria.
This year the moment of Solstice takes place around midnight, when rain is supposed to begin. Perhaps this portends a wet winter. The other amazing occurrence will be an eclipse of the Sun by the Moon on Christmas.
My friend and astrologer, James Kelleher, informs us that our current winter solstice has the Sun aligned with the center of the Milky Way galaxy. “The galactic center isn’t an exact point, but rather an area in the middle of the galaxy, and it will take the Sun a long time to move through this area. This alignment has already been going on for a few decades and will continue for about another hundred years.…
“I think we can say that this event represents a realignment of the world’s collective consciousness with the laws of nature. We are being asked to center ourselves, and remember what is important. The vehicle that is being used for this reminder is the environment of the planet. …The power of destruction is being utilized in order to get our attention. So it is no surprise that we are experiencing the onset of a destructive period for the environment.”
Taking James’ sobering comments to heart, let us each do what we can to help our Earth in 2020.
The Sunburst Annual Cookie Baking and Craft Making Event took place on a rainy Saturday in early December. This has been a Sunburst tradition for many years, a time to gather in celebration of the upcoming holidays, to decorate the beautiful Chakra Christmas tree (also a Sunburst tradition), and share in a potluck dinner. Many delectable desserts are baked and decorated to be served over the upcoming Sunburst holiday events. Stay tuned!
How fun to take a hay ride on a sunny fall day! Two Meetup groups converged on a recent Sunday afternoon to learn about Sunburst’s agricultural activities. Farmer Sean Fennell explained permaculture’s main principles, some growing practices, and answered questions as the visitors explored Sunburst’s vegetable gardens and fields.
A highlight of the afternoon was meeting the cows, their calves, and some very friendly horses, right in their own expansive pasture. Even the many deer roaming this wildlife sanctuary are aware of the love and goodwill extended toward them.
This day the groups were Santa Barbara Food & Farm Adventures and San Luis Obispo Food & Farm Adventures, organized by Gerri French and Teresa Lees, respectively. Sunburst hosts numerous private groups for their own events, be it an overnight campout, two-week yoga training, music workshop, or non-profit leadership retreat.
Individuals also find Sunburst is a wonderful retreat destination. The Sanctuary offers opportunities for a personal retreat, or participation in a Sunburst-sponsored activity. Weekly Sunday gatherings include an inspiring meditation service (with child care), followed by a vegetarian brunch (featuring freshly picked vegetables), and an afternoon hike (most Sundays). Other types of events range from poetry readings, silent and meditation retreats, to astronomy evenings. Check out the events scheduled for the next few months at www.sunburst.org/events.
Throughout the ages humans have reverently noted the celestial movements of the Sun, planets and stars. Winter Solstice, the longest night of the year, is a celebrated event in numerous religions and cultures. This beginning of a solar year, the increase of the light, was the original New Year.
Sunburst Sanctuary chooses the Saturday closest to the winter solstice for a celebration of the return of solar light and the lengthening of day, much like ancient peoples. In the afternoon, the temple is open for a six-hour silent meditation and prayer, with a chime announcing the start and end of each hour when meditators can come and go as they like. An evening group dinner allows us the opportunity to reunite with friends new and old, after this quiet day of reflection.
After dark, luminaria brighten the path through Sunburst’s labyrinth, inviting an awe-filled journey around circuits of potential self-discovery. This walk can offer an experience of mental, emotional and spiritual “reset” as one travels to the center point and back. The center point represents one’s innermost being, so the path is a journey inward to reconnect with soul, and with purpose. The journey outward represents our intention to emerge anew into the world, perhaps with new inspiration, and new resolve.
For more information on Sunburst’s upcoming Winter Solstice celebration, click here.
The morning dawned with an air of excitement permeating the Sanctuary grounds. Adults and children alike anxiously awaited the beginning of a family friendly Regenerating Earth and Spirit event that would encompass three different components. And what a day it proved to be!
A brief introduction to highlight the planned activities by Sunburst’s permaculture expert, Sean Fennell, and Shakti Ranch’s Natalie Riggs further fanned the fires of anticipation of what the day might bring. And rare gifts it did. Natalie’s incredible ability to help each person connect with the resident Sunburst horses on a deep inner level of mutual exchange was phenomenal! Even folks who normally experienced trepidation around horses were happily and gratefully moved by Natalie’s ability to gently guide them to connect from their heart centers to the horses and the horses’ ability to “know” just what each person needed. What a transformative experience for all!
If Natalie proved to be an amazing horse whisperer, then Sean Fennell proved to be an equally amazing soil whisperer! His ability to tenderly weave the spiritual and material into a beautiful synchronistic interplay of permaculture principles, ethics and hands-on practices were greatly appreciated by everyone who accompanied him to the gardens to witness firsthand Spirit and Nature working seamlessly together as they helped plant vegetables, put up a small hoop house, and proceed to the orchard to plant apple trees.
Is there anything more fun than a hayride? What a thrill it was to join the kids as we all enjoyed a hayride to and from the compost area where Sean explained the logistics of making fine compost as well as noting the intricacies of Nature’s own way of ensuring that there’s no waste. Her ingenuity in designing natural systems of cohesive cooperation between life forms both above and below the soil is inspiring.
Alfred King’s expertise on grafting was yet another amazing highlight of an incredibly fulfilling day as many of us listened intently to the history and methodologies of certain grafting techniques. More exciting, however, was the opportunity for each of us to perform an actual graft on a tree to take home with us.
It reminded me of a sweet experience as a child of helping to make cupcakes, and the thrill of being surprisingly gifted with quite a few to take home! How proud I was to announce that I had helped make those lovely cupcakes. How equally thrilled each of us adults were, now that we’d done our first grafts!
And the magic moments at Sunburst continued as a few weeks later a new group of adventurous souls embarked upon a Nature hunt on the Sanctuary hills. The event? A Paleontology Workshop headed by Sunburst’s own science teacher, Moksha Badarayan, and Sunburst docent, Craig Hanson, who would lead eager trekkers up the hillsides to hunt for ancient clam shells and shark’s teeth. And boy did we find some beauties! The Earth Mother’s energy seemed so palpable that we adults could not help but morph into the innocence and excitement of childhood once again as we each hunted for the perfect petrified clam.
I had never witnessed such huge clams or imagined they could exist! Two young ladies repurposed a child’s wagon into a clam wagon to haul our large clam shells down the hill, stashed momentarily. Now the youngest trekkers joined the rest of us in the hunt for sharks teeth up Shark Tooth Hill.
Beautiful warm weather, blue skies, adventurous spirits, and loving company graced both events. As rewarding as it can be journeying inwardly to connect with Spirit in the quiet of our souls, thrilled at the prospect of a direct personal encounter with Spirit, it can also be rewarding to journey outwardly with kindred souls, discovering Spirit’s presence, beauty, and myriad gifts in Nature.
In the silence of my soul, words, sounds, scents, impressions, thoughts and feelings seemed greatly amplified, yet with a gentleness and sweetness almost indescribable. And as I walked slowly and mindfully through the Sanctuary gardens with friends old and new, joy swept over my being in such gentle waves that my only reaction was exactly what our teacher, Sharon Ray, hoped it would be – a taste of what the Silent Retreat should evoke: A journey into the Path of SMILES and a deeper connection to Divine Spirit through silence and mindfulness.
A dedicated practitioner of the teachings of Thich Nhat Hahn, Sharon has embodied the concept of mindfulness in her daily life and needs not verbally extol its incredible effects on her quality of life, spiritual awareness or demeanor—it expresses itself naturally and gracefully in the truths and virtues that are her life’s guideposts, and in her very demeanor, speech and interaction with others.
Thich Nhat Hahn invites us to train ourselves to walk with reverence. Wherever we walk, whether it’s at the railway station or supermarket, we are walking on the Earth and, therefore, upon a holy ground. To walk with reverence everywhere is to find nourishment and solidity with each step. Each mindful step brings us back to the here and now, reminding us that we are alive on this beautiful planet. It propels us into present moment awareness. Ultimately, all of us are looking for our solid ground, our true home. The Earth, and the Present, is our true home. We can’t be grounded in our body if our mind is elsewhere.
Following the Path of SMILES, we are guided by the meaning of this wonderful acronym:
S is for Smile – uplifting my vibration M is for Mantra – expressing my heart’s desire I is for Inhale and exhale – aware of my breath L is for Letting go – of my name and game E is for Ears listening, Eyes watching – I come to my senses S is for Sensing – the Presence of the Divine in and around me
Experience being the greatest teacher, I have to humbly agree that for the two days I practiced mindful walking and the Path of SMILES, the beauty and wonder of the Earth and its creatures around me was greatly amplified. Being in the moment was joy unbounded! There was no room in my mind for anything worrisome; my mind was totally absorbed in the moment, whether I was mindfully eating, looking at the beautiful pond and gardens, walking the labyrinth, listening to the birds, or perusing the roadways looking for tiny pieces of quartz crystals amidst the gravel.
As the Master Hahn himself says:
No one has lived in the past or the future, only the now. The present moment is filled with joy and happiness. If you are attentive, you will see it. While you are walking, smile and be in the here and now, and you will transform that place into paradise.
Yes! I do enjoy the beautiful sanctuary where I happen to live; however, during every Silent Retreat its beauty, peace, tranquility, and divine resonance is, for me, amplified a hundred-fold! Ah, the power of many together!
Thank you, Sharon Ray, for bringing this priceless gift to Sunburst as a prelude to an approaching beautiful spring when the subsiding rains and entrancing green hillsides beckon us into mindful walking. And thank you, Thich Nhat Hanh, for reminding us that the very ground we stand on anywhere and everywhere is still Sacred Earth, and has the power to connect and ground us if we are mindful and receptive!
And the magic moments at Sunburst continued as a few weeks later a new group of adventurous souls embarked upon a Nature hunt on the Sanctuary hills. The event? A Paleontology Workshop headed by Sunburst’s own science teacher, Moksha Badarayan, and Sunburst docent, Craig Hanson, who would lead eager trekkers up the hillsides to hunt for ancient clam shells and shark’s teeth. And boy did we find some beauties! The Earth Mother’s energy seemed so palpable that we adults could not help but morph into the innocence and excitement of childhood once again as we each hunted for the perfect petrified clam.
As the Master Hahn himself says:
