It doesn’t matter how deep you are in the book called “self” chances are you’ve spent many a times putting energy inside new paragraphs that may or may not reveal the ninth wonder of the world: Who am I?
Ministers, psychotherapists, motivational speakers and long lists of friends have donated plenty of hours on this single path of exploration only to realize, when looking back, the portrait presented sort of looks like a tree with no leaves….a very large trunk with billions of avenues attempted but nothing seems to be leading the efforts toward a conclusion that sits well in your acid filled tummy.
Take another look at the tree…you see what it’s willing to share. Third grade science and digging in the backyard has taught all of us that all trees have a rooting system. What if we aren’t being given the best part of the tree? What if lizards, worms, snakes, ants and other creepy crawlers vacation below the surface because the best part of a tree isn’t what we see but what is hidden?
Native American’s teach us that trees are the greatest storytellers and healers. As Matchbox 20 front man Rob Thomas sings, “You are lonely no more.” Sitting next to a tree allows you to be massaged by a physical living and breathing listener…a heart and soul who’s battled many cold wintery days and brutal hot summers and still has the strength to create enough shade for you to cool off. Hmmm, sounds like a true friend to me.
If your back and legs hurt, nestle up to a tree, allow its energy to pull from the soil the ingredients required to help offer you freedom from pain. If your sad eyes stained by tears have become waterfalls, sit in front of the tree and whisper your story. For a tree catches with its limbs the wisdom billions have tossed to the side and stuffs it deep into its roots for a single passerby.
Four questions deserve your attention...ask them and then create the time to do nothing more than let Mother earth hold you with her long tall grasses and jasmine scented spring days. When most people pray they say, “I need, I want, please do this, that, I have to have,” without ever hearing the best way to attain a backstage pass to receiving it.
Who am I and what do I want?
Where am I and why am I here?
What will I do and how will I do it?
Who are my allies and how can they help?
Sounds silly doesn’t it? I mean, these are questions that pop in and out of our heads like Pop Rocks bathed in Coca Cola. But have you waited for the answers?
Seven days ago, four separate generations of martial arts Masters met in a single place: Grand Master Jung brought his Korean history to America and taught Master Lee who through tradition shared his wisdom with Master Harris who continued the educational process by setting finely tuned rhymes, reasons and purposes into the open palm of Master Snider…anyone standing outside, carrying no knowledge of Ji do Kwon was blind to the rooting system that has kept this tree alive.
The leaves are that of the colored belts, white, yellow, green, blue an red…they are connected to the limbs made up of first, second and third degree black belts and through each season one or more usually break off, falling to the unpredictable soils below.
If you pass this tree, it’s easy to bring judgment because it might not look as beautiful as the others in the forest…yet if you sit next to it, the stories you’ll hear are guaranteed to change your life forever. The positives put into your aching body rebuild your personal working system so that you can return to the worlds you keep and make it stronger.
Look beneath the earth that’s been hardened during long droughts then flooded by times of something out its control and the roots of this tree far exceed what humans truly see, four men, whose lineage has scurried through clay, bedrock and collected trash since 504 BC still has the ability to infect without being put on display.
Might it be the preying mantis, beetle, slug and other crawling things who physically get the best part of the living tree? Article number eight: Use good judgment before killing living things.
Who are you and what do you want? Never forget…a book filled with any word written is still a living tree.
Steal my art…
arroecollins@clearchannel.com
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