Maha Gaia: Midwife of Enlightenment

By Tara Khandro

If we are to relieve ourselves from the causes of our  suffering we must come into a steady, joyful and reverent relationship with the earth. This vehicle and abode for our soul is an amazing piece of creative technology. Our body contains the entire Cosmos.  We are not separate from Maha Gaia. Our bodies are composed of the elements of nature and each of us is an integral component of the interdependent nature of Nature.

Maha Gaia’s body is home to 7 billion human beings. Each of these human beings needs clean water to drink, air to breathe, food to eat and a space to reside. Maha Gaia is a living, breathing Presence that has been transforming and evolving since her inception as a planet. She is now moving through an accelerated consciousness shift, and all 7 billion of her sons and daughters are intimately affected.

The moment we chose to own a piece of Maha Gaia’s flesh, to view the land as a commodity to be traded and sold was the moment modern humanity  fell from Grace. Fear of scarcity thus became the driver of choices.  All over the planet human beings are fighting to the death over ownership of land and water. Others are rapidly constructing structures that obliterate rice, wheat and corn fields without any awareness of how this development impacts upon the resources we need to sustain life, not to mention how this craving affects the next 7 generations. For 5,000 years we have raped Maha Gaia’s land, clear cut Her forests, redirected Her rivers, controlled Her   weather patterns and polluted Her air. This dominating relationship reveals how we relate to the female gender and all attributes of the sacred Feminine.

The results of the assaults on Maha Gaia must be approached from a symptomatic viewpoint in terms of living our daily lives with less environmental impact through conscious choice, education, governing laws, and business practices. Yet the most profound and lasting change of direction happens when we turn inward to honestly view how the hostility towards the sacred Feminine has created the conditions for Maha Gaia to be in an environmental  crises. If we are to come into a steady, joyful, reverent relationship with the earth we must turn within to honestly view how we relate to the earth and all of Her creatures. We must sit with ourselves and discover how we truly feel about mother, our body, silence, integrity, love, non-violence, empathy, females, receptivity, waiting, food, feelings, change, cycles, transformation, heart, creativity, and intuition.

The essence of the Feminine principle is receptivity. This principle has been distorted into the characteristics of submission and dependence within us.  Maha Gaia, as a living, breathing Presence like each of us, also has a dharma, a duty to humankind: To awaken, purify and lead us to fully embody the joyful radiance of our True Nature. Yet if we are not willing to receive Her loving desire for us to be happy then we will continue to suffer the illusion that we are separate from Her and All that Is.

When we seek to acquire, striving for security, we are acting out of ‘my will be done’. We want to be happy and liberated from our suffering, yet our desire to force and control maintains our suffering. Our mind, divorced from body, from the sacred feminine, strategizes and rationalizes preventing us from receiving that which is our true heart’s desire.  Maha Gaia is calling upon Her children to discover how to ask, wait, surrender, listen, receive and then act. If we truly want to experience a life of grace, joy and ease it is imperative that we   re-member our relationship with  Maha Gaia. In this cosmic consciousness transforming era, She is summoning us to surrender to remember that we are One with Her and all living things. In this surrendering we relax to receive the eternal Truth that it is not ‘my will be done’ rather ‘Thy will be done’. 

Prince Siddhartha was a man who knew how to   ask, sit, wait, surrender, listen, receive and act.  Asking can be defined as a sacred Masculine trait as the question is formed in the mind. Action is also Masculine.  The ‘body’ between the head and the feet of action is the realm of the Feminine.  As a young man Siddhartha’s heart called for him to discover the root causes within a human being that continually create a ceaseless cycle of suffering. Siddhartha was an excellent student of the yogis and sayasans of his time because he approached his adventure with the curiosity of a child. Siddhartha was his own guru, taking the teachings into the truth of his own daily experience; into what inside of him created the conditions to cultivate continual suffering.

One day Siddhartha sat underneath a sacred fig tree (a banyan tree) and settled into meditation. He closed his eyes, sank into his body,  and began to dissolve himself into the flow of his breathing.  The technology of meditation is designed to still the mind and to reveal what is hiding in the closed closets of our hearts. It may be an addiction to perfection, a striving for security, the burden of shame or an unrecognized talent. As Siddhartha sank more deeply into his breathing, and emptied his mind the locked doors of his heart flew open and   terror, greed, jealousy, doubt and discontent came rushing towards him.

Siddhartha simply recognized, accepted and allowed these faces of fear to be and steadied himself in the flow of his breathing. He did not feed these illusions by identifying with them or taking a sentimental journey into their story.  He simply saw them as hungry ghosts.  Soon craving, aversion, malice, and hypocrisy arose along with guilt, blame and rejection. These squadrons of fear tempted Siddhartha: “Come to us! We are your true identity! You cannot live without us! It is in us that you will find your true path in the world. It is with us that you will gain much wealth, prestige and power!” Siddhartha responded by anchoring more firmly into the radiant roots of his Being.

Finally, the origin of Siddhartha’s deepest, darkest and oldest fear arose as a demon, Mara. Mara proclaimed: ‘I’m   the seat of enlightenment. Feed me, honor me. All belongs to me. All is mine. My accomplishments are far greater than yours ever will be!” Then all of Mara’s protégés loudly cried, “Yes, I am Mara’s witness!” Then Mara asked Siddhartha:  “Who will speak for you?”

Siddhartha responded by extending his right fingertips to touch the earth. Gaia rose up and roared:  "I bear you witness!" As Gaia roared Siddhartha’s body became aflame with the eternal fire of Shakti and Mara and his legions were completely destroyed, never to appear again. As Venus, the morning star appeared in the sky, Siddhartha embodied his Buddha Nature.

Siddhartha created a steady, joyful and reverent relationship with Maha Gaia through his years of inner training as he performed yoga asanas in Nature and sat upon Her soil. He was nourished by Her fruit and seeds and found protection in Her forests.  When the full impact of his lifetimes of terror assaulted him, he was ready to   cease the battle and return Home. Siddhartha relaxed into receptivity, becoming  a reverent receptacle for  Mother’s wisdom  to continually flow. He only needed to touch Maha Gaia with the willingness to completely receive and She responded with the full force of Her fierce compassion- of Her Love that only wants us to be happy and free.

Om Swastyastu

Tara Khandro

Contact the writer at: lisa@true-human.com

http://www.thewowofnow.tumblr.com/

Skype: DancingWolfe

See also An Interview with Tara Khandro