Heart of Being courses

Heart of Being- CYCLE OF LIFE - THE EARTH ELEMENT

THE INNER GROUND

Earth element corresponds to the centre, the middle, the fulcrum. It is located in the centre of the other elements which surround it and acts to balance and harmonise them. Earth represents our personal self which is central to all other aspects of our being; including our spirit, soul, animal nature and essence. In the West, our self is usually identified with the ego or personality. In the Chinese system it is called Yi and represents personal consciousness. Basically it is about our personal conscious identity.

Flesh, the substance and form of our physical body, corresponds to the Earth element. Our body is constantly at the centre of our life in this world, so acts as our earth and ground. We ground and centre all other realities within our body. Our relationship to the world around us is through our body which literally gives us a place to be on this earth. It is within the flesh that we anchor our spiritual reality to bring all that we are into this physical dimension. That is the aim of being here, to incarnate, to literally come into flesh. It is therefore central to our existence as a human being.

Embodiment is a major role of this phase, how to become centered in our body and our self. Then we can have an embodied identity rather than an abstract or conceptual identity. This implies being connected to our body sufficiently, so that our sense of who we are is body-centered. By being in touch with this earthly reality we can be real. If we live in our heads and not our bodies the perception of what and who we are, is based primarily on ideas, mental images and belief systems.

The body acts as our earth so all other forces are drawn to it as if by gravity. By living in our body all elements, spiritual energies and essential states can touch us. That includes nourishing energies from others, nature, the earth and heaven. It is through our bodies that we get personally and spiritually nourished, especially by loving healing touch.

In our times our sense of the natural world around us is so diminished, living in our high-tech and urban environment that we have become divorced from the rhythms and forces of nature and so from the elements of life themselves. Why humanity gets so rigidly attached to beliefs and ideologies, is precisely because apart from mental frameworks, our current culture has little else to base itself on. The earth as a realm of existence is becoming a mystery to us in an increasingly virtual world.

The aim of this course is to reconnect us to the earth element through our body. Doing so, we will get in touch with our earthly nature and thus have greater access to the natural world. By identifying with our bodies and less with our minds, we become down to earth and so more comfortable with the world we inhabit. Getting more grounded we don't lose sight of the spiritual realms, simply we bring them into this one. Being at the centre, this element has this capacity to connect, balance and harmonise all dualities as well as all the other elements. The sacred and the mundane, the transcendent and the ordinary, the heavenly and the earthly become unified within us.