Sunflower Medicine

Will you join me on my morning walk, just before sunrise?

I woke early and dressed in denim capris and a green tank top to head out the door for my morning walk. It was early July, somewhere between 5:30 and 6am. I took a hydrating drink of cool water to fill my cells with fluid again after a night's sleep. I slipped out the door and down the stairs of the little 4-plex where I made my home with my youngest son, Teren.

Around the brick building and down the hill to the trail I walked, happy to feel a slight coolness before the heat of the day hit. Onto the trail, I mused that I seemed to be the only one out enjoying this trail just before sun up. But, since I had my tendencies toward privacy, I concluded that this was okay with me.

I walked a little slowly at first, just to limber up after a night in bed. As I walked, I took in the freshness of the dawn air and the quiet of the surroundings. It's always so nice to be out before the streets fill with traffic and the busyness

of the work day.

The marshy area of the creek on my right held red-wing black birds that now perched quietly amid softly shaded cattails. This watery run-off or waterway had no particular name, so I had dubbed it, "Laughing Brook". During the time I lived in that 4-plex, I enjoyed painting a wide variety of objects and selling them in a local adjacent artistic community. I had business cards printed with the name, "Laughing Brook Studio". I had established an appreciation for, and real friendship with this waterway, and the creatures and wild-plants that made this their homes.

Down across the quiet avenue and back onto the trail, I picked up my pace to get my metabolism going. I walked to maintain my health and muscle tone, as well as to drench myself in the beauty of Nature. I sent heart-felt "hellos" to all of my herbal friends- mullein, sage, yellow dock, sweet clover and grindelia as I passed each one.

Eventually, I could see the busier street up ahead, which was my signal to arrive at the spot just before the bridge, do a quick pivot and head back toward home. Just before I reached that marker, a small field of Sunflowers drew my attention. The trail went right through them, and as I approached, I sensed a change in the energy all around me.

The sun was just about to peek over the eastern horizon as I felt a distinct sense of the sacred. I suddenly felt the living awareness of the Sunflowers, who were literally waiting for the sun to rise. I slowed down as I entered this "temple" of energy. I felt that I was a visitor within a gathering of pilgrims who awaited a momentous spiritual event.

Just then, the sun ascended, and I watched as its golden glow quickly moved across the earth. I felt the Sunflowers rejoice with a feeling of celebration, and in praise of the one God/Source as reflected in the glorious energies of the

living sun.

I turned to look at each flower "face", with the single bright eye in the center. The phrase came to me, "Let thy eye become single", a phrase that Yeshua or Jesus had taught his disciples. There was such a feeling of profound beauty here... such an experience of shared peace and renewal filled the country field that

I felt it to my core.

I continued my walk back home, knowing that I had been blessed to experience one exquisite dance of Nature that is usually hidden from human awareness. Back into my usual routine of daily life, I carried that glow and sense of renewal the rest of the day.

Now, years later, when I walk on any trail, I say Hello to my Sunflower brothers and sisters, and acknowledge their living awareness.

We are all children of the Sun- each of us awakening to the light within, and bathing in the life-giving energies that sustain all of life on Planet Earth, mother Gaia. This very ordinary field of Sunflowers showed me that when we gather together to practice in a sacred way that we multiply the creative force of our own joy and of our own divinity.

The Sunflowers show us that reverence for the light of the one Source of All Things within a million exquisite forms can be beautiful, indeed!

Elisha Soleil Gabriell

LaughingGoddess.International