Who am I to have an opinion?
I'm not a CEO or an Executive or someone with a fancy title. I'm just a deep feeling woman that reflects deeply on the world; deeply about connection and belonging, and deeply about what human beings need to truly thrive.
If we look back just a couple of generations, our Grandparents lived more in harmony with nature than we do today.
Today, we have lost the following of the natural cycles and rhythms of life; yet, the very thing that actually sustains life.
Here's a triggering place to start: Women's Menstrual Cycles.
When we are inherently connected to nature, our cycle syncs up to either the full or new moon. Bleeding on one, fertile on the other. Yet it's so taboo, but without this cycle, no human life would exist. But sadly, women don't know this. And are disconnected to their own bodies.
Tell me, How can we change the state of Freshwater when we aren't even connected to ourselves?
When Hauora itself, is the fundamental interconnectedness with us and Earth.
Here's another triggering one; Feminism has caused the pendulum to swing from one extreme to the other.
In many ancient teachings, this balance is key.
How can we be connected to Earth, heal the Earth, and live in harmony and balance, if we aren't even connected to the Earth, to the natural cycles of creation, and to the life-death-life cycle inherent in all things?
I may seem woo-woo now, but my voice is one meant to be heard and I didn't just go through all that I did to just stop here. No, I need to tell you that the answer is not found within psychology, or text books, or interventions or strategies.
It's found in ourselves.
It's the paradigm we live in.
In many ancient teachings, we learn that the Sun is the Solar Masculine. And the "Mother" Earth is the Feminine.
Tell me: if things are 'as above, so below' - micro/macro,
Do we respect, cherish and honor the Feminine?
This Feminine Energy on the micro scale?
and what might that look like on the macro scale?
When I was in my early twenties, I asked myself, what does it look like inside my womb?
I was undertaking an exercise to connect more deeply with myself and building intuition, vision and foresight. And yes, I have been on a big self-mastery journey of The Self and Soul for 10+ years.
What I thought I would see: pink flesh
What I actually saw: Millions of trees rising and falling.
As a female, I was already, deeply, inherently connected to the Earth. And my womb a portal of creation.
In Bill Plotkin's work, he teaches that animals already have this blueprint of who they are to become. This great and wise instinct that cannot be explained. That lives inside all of life.
What we need to do, is stop listening to the voice outside of ourselves giving instruction, and start tuning in to the voice inside that is real, true and in alignment with the Earth.
Anything else is control,
And control never really works.
It might for a short time,
But eventually, it crumbles.
It's not sustainable.
Instead of needing to see a change, a paradigm, quantum shift can happen in an instant.
That the solution does not come from actually changing anything.
It comes by fundamentally shifting into a whole new paradigm where we embody Hauora; wellbeing, connection to ourselves and connection to our planet. From that place, we already are the expression of health, wellbeing and truth. Everything is expression. Everything you can physically see is a creation. And moving from logic, thinking and planning - into being connected to our bodies, cycles and wisdom, is a powerful way to go.
Next Trigger: We overeat.
If we all stopped eating when we actually felt 'no longer hungry' - how much food would be left on your plate?
Your stomach can only handle so much food.
Yet your desire for more causes you to over consume something that isn't really healthy or necessary.
Where does that deep internal need come from?
A need to survive?
Or deep, intergenerational trauma around lack, war, famine?
Are you eating too much because deep inside, you actually don't feel....
enough?
So here we meet a society that deep down doesn't feel enough, is disconnected from self and Earth, and consumes -
It's not sustainable.
We value things that provide a change; a product that makes us see a difference, yet,
Where are the products that make you look exactly as you are now?
They don't exist.
So, can you see that what is needed actually, is a deep healing around identity, belonging and self?
And that our belonging itself, is actually, to Earth?
Our ancestry?
Everyone knows someone who went balls deep on Ancestry.com - it does something. It gives something. It's a thirst that once fuelled, provides a deep healing and deep meaning to a persons existence.
It was the same for me when I found out I have Tainui whakapapa; my entire life changed. It explained things that I couldn't ever explain.
Like the fact that Oreti and Aparima were two of my most cherished places; and it turns out my Great Grandfather worked with horses on the Oreti River, and lived in Riverton.
Again, it's inherent. It's within. It's inside our DNA.
We aren't stupid.
And the places I drove to in the North Island of New Zealand around Waitomo and Waikato, felt deeply like home, in a way that I couldn't explain.
Again, it's not logical. It's not found in the mind.
How does one stop being 'in the mind'?
Well, great question.
By being creative.
By being intuitive.
By being open.
By being in the body.
By moving the body.
= Again, all feminine qualities.
A deep reconnection to loving and embracing the Feminine aspect inside all of us.
Yes, male's have feminine energy and females have masculine energy. It's a yin/yang.
But what happens when we have broken families, terrible father figures and bad masculine examples in society, of men who want to control?
It creates dis-ease and dis-harmony. Especially in the feminine.
No love relationship is great when a man has a woman as a slave.
It's no different.
She shines differently when she's loved properly.
And if this is still the macro/micro conversation -
What does this mean for us?
That we need to fu**ing love ourselves properly.
See ourselves as enough.
Stop valuing science over creativity.
Start embracing softness, kindness, love and feelings.
Instead of logic.
(Although logic is amazing too. They BOTH are.)
Mental health is mostly cured by exercising, being in nature - right?
It's a human need.
It's the healing of the disconnect.
Hurt people hurt people.
Healed people heal people.
And the land you think you own, you don't.
You can never own the Earth.
It's not 'ownable'.
Sorry to inform you.
You're a guardian.
For the next generation.
A kaitiaki,
don't forget that.
And that is how I believe, we will heal the Earth.
-Stephanie MacDonald
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