In the Garden

 As I was coming back from my meditation, I saw the pond on the Stewdios land.  My reaction was to laugh as I realized what I was trying to do and all I found was the simple reality of my waking world – the land on which I work.  Once again, seeking answers from the outside, seeking clarity where there may be none, working in a language that I don’t really speak that well.  So I go on a journey and find myself back where I began.  The pond may have mysteries that I cannot comprehend so it is not important to spend my time trying to understand that which cannot be understood.  But the expression of that mystery, the pond itself, just is – and all I have to do is sit by the pond.

-        From a tea meditation a couple of years ago

Today I want to share with you an early journal entry a few months after I moved to Portland from Texas.  I had been introduced to the Gene Keys (at that time the only thing we had was the book itself) a year or so prior.  Working on my own before becoming a part of this community, I had made only a little headway into even understanding how to incorporate this into my process.   Since this was before the sequences, et. al., there wasn’t even a hologenetic profile.  We had to go to the Human Design site, Jovian Archive, to get a full chart made.  It was curiosity about where the chart came from that led me to studying Human Design.  I resonated well with HD but I was entering a Gene Key world.   About three months after I moved here, OneDoorLand was embarking on an adventure – creating a multi-media art event centered around GK.  Richard Rudd was coming also which made the event even more precious.  The event, Emanation, was wildly successful even though Rudd was detained at the Canadian border and couldn’t make it (he joined by Skype).   My function at the community, besides living Life as Art, was Land Steward (Stewart in Binah language).   To be caretaker of our beautiful properties.  I was an IT professional by trade and a decades-long resident of Texas so I had no idea what I was doing.   That is the background for this essay I wrote on the relationship of my work and my budding understanding of the Gene Keys.

When I came here two months ago and started to work on this land I was rather at a loss on where to begin.   A major Gene Key event had been scheduled and I started cleaning up the land to spruce up its appearance.  I admit I was a bit intimidated by the unfamiliar plants and climate.  When I started cutting back some of the old growth I was very timid and I left a lot of it intact with just the worst of it cut out.  I guess the idea was to clean it up but leave the appearance of lushness.   You can speculate on what shadows those were.   But what I soon found was that by trying to maintain this appearance of vitality I was not only creating more work for myself but that appearance only worked from a distance.    So that was when I began the real shadow work and started clearing out all of the old stuff – the years of debris and dead wood and other flotsam.   Every day the enormity of the work ahead would overwhelm me. And where do I put all of this stuff?  But perseverance proved its worth.   

I faced the dilemma that Elijah talked about last night – what to cut back, even if healthy, that will help to preserve the whole – how to make those discernments.   Here the nature of working with my hands as well as the inner consciousness work paid off – everyday it seemed that my mind would recede into the background and those decisions were given to the flow.  It became obvious that the old growth had to go so that the new could thrive – and that would lead to authentic lushness as it naturally flowered. 

As the land was cleared, the gifts started to reveal themselves.  These beautiful old moss covered boulders over here, this path over there, this rock wall.   The trimmed trees brought in light to reveal its own beauty.   With this new spaciousness we could then bring it new plants, new gifts.

But the shadow work is in itself seemingly endless.  I found this especially in the invasive plants.  English ivy and Herb Robert, while beautiful in and of themselves, kept the delicate native plants from thriving.   This wonderfully shadow-named Japanese Knotweed which grows on the slope over there can grow two feet in a week, and if allowed to grow blocks the stream down below from our vision.    And the equally sinisterly named Bindweed is evocative of the shadow of Vanity.   You can dig out all of the roots you can find but turn your back and it starts winding itself up the stalks of the beautiful flowers and covering up the natural beauty with its own version.  As the Gene Keys say, Vanity is the first shadow to come and the last to leave.  Eternal vigilance will only mitigate its effect on our lives.

So now we can wait for the rain and sunshine to bring on the Siddhi of Spring and Summer and bring this work to full flowering – as long we keep up work.  And always accepting that the cycle will repeat itself but with our awareness and perseverance it will be a spiral and continue to create a place of awe.

Whatever path you are on, be it Design, Gene Keys, shamanism, or the myriad other avenues, this is the work.  To find your True Self.   But it isn’t something you have to do or add to your life, it is mostly what you can let go of and ultimately reveal what has been there all along.