It was a harmless enough email from my dear friend Babe on a brisk, beautiful October afternoon while on a road trip in Montana with another dear friend, Petunia. Babe was asking me and several other women who knew each other from shamanic studies more than 10 years before. Looking out over the brightly colored fall foliage of tamarack forests, I determined to read her email later. |
Two days later, after waking to a magnificent run rise over the Cabinet Mountains, I pulled out Babe's email again . . . India. Perhaps it was rich, colorful sky or the thought of visiting the Garden of 1000 Buddhas, in Arlee, after breakfast, but the idea of making a spiritual pilgrimage to India felt so sweet in my heart. |
My visit to the Garden of 1000 Buddhas was the perfect culmination of this trip, which included a Cinnabar Foundation board meeting and fascinating site visits with some of our conservation partners and time spent with my beloved friend, before heading to Missoula Airport for my flight home. While waiting for my flight to be called, I delved into Babe's email attachment describing the Sacred Earth Journey trip Shiva Dancing: Sacred South India with Andrew Harvey. |
I've known of Andrew's work since the mid-90s when I attended a workshop he held in conjunction with an Institute of Noetic Sciences conference held in Palm Desert, California. I knew he was born and spent his early childhood in south India, until he was sent to be educated in England. I knew, too, that he was as a scholar and author on Hindu mysticism and Rumi, and had been a student of Father Bede Griffith and Mother Merra. What I hadn't known was that his own spiritual journey had taken him to a place that intersects with my interests and passion — bringing spiritual principles into environmental and social activism. As I read briefly his concepts of Sacred Activism, which combine mystical knowledge and peace with focused, wise and radical action to preserve the environment, ensure human rights, protect all species of animals, and transform our political/economic/cultural systems that hold us in the grip of fear, war, separateness and poverty . . . I knew this was a journey that I wanted to make.