Excerpted from Mothers of the New Earth: The Emerging Conscious Women Changing the World
One of woman’s primary roles is to live in and create beauty and to try
to lift the culture to a higher level. Beauty is anything that lifts
the consciousness out of the ego. When you see a garden full of vibrant
colored flowers, your heart sings. When you hear beautiful music, it
takes you out of yourself. When you see a beautiful painting, you’re
taken right into it. It lifts you up, and your personality soars into
another plane of existence. When you are reading poetry or prose and
you come to a part that lifts the whole consciousness, you’re
experiencing beauty that is literally magic.
Beauty speaks to the heart. The arts and high culture are so
important for spiritual consciousness. And without spiritual
consciousness, we will not end war or stop the ecological destruction
of our Mother Earth or end hunger and cruelty. We need to lift our
consciousness to a higher level, and one way we all can do that is
through beauty. The artists, musicians, poets, sculptors, playwrights,
storytellers and dancers—all the artists are leaders of spirit and
culture and bring hope for the world.
The mothers, grandmothers, aunts, teachers who introduce their
children to beauty and culture are not only feeding the child’s soul,
but they are serving the whole world. The cultural dimension of life is
more related to the right brain, to intuition, feeling, and spirit.
Women are the guardians of the cultural. And culture is one key to the
economic and political decisions we make in our families, communities,
government and world.
My own mother understood the importance of beauty and culture. My
childhood was full of difficulties, but fortunately, my mother had the
soul of an artist and she kept it from being too dark and boring. When
I was nine years old, we had the most remarkable Christmas. My mother
was fighting cancer, sometimes working as a waitress to keep food on
the table and sometimes flat on her back. The utilities were overdue,
and finally the gas company disconnected us a few days before
Christmas. We had no gas for heat or cooking, but we did have a big
fireplace.
So on Christmas Eve night, my mother put on the Nutcracker Suite and
made a cheery blaze in the fireplace. She wrapped baking potatoes and
corn on the cob in aluminum foil and put them in the coals to bake. All
five of us children grabbed colorful pillows and began to dance to the
happy music, pretending to be ants on the way to a very special picnic.
We had a cozy feast surrounded by the smell of the tree and wood smoke,
and after dinner, we drew pictures of what we would give each other if
we could. We wrapped them in last year’s Christmas paper and put them
under the tree. Then she read us the Christmas story from the Bible so
we would remember what Christmas is really about, the birth of Christ
who came to teach us to love one another. That was one of the most
wonderful Christmases I ever had. Mother used beauty and creativity to
lift us to a high level out of the dark depression of poverty.
When we live in a world of beauty, in that heightened consciousness,
we are living in the Other World in the midst of this world. We feel
the magic and joy of life, and our hearts are more open. Children and
animals feel it and are attracted to it. The most important thing in
the world next to God consciousness is to live in beauty.
I once read about a sensitive boy who went to a church at Christmas
and the flowers and altar were so beautiful that he fainted. And once
when I was at my neighbor’s house, I saw the most beautiful sunset,
deep rose, purple and indigo, and I was lifted into a place of Oneness.
I couldn’t talk and began to cry from the bliss and ecstasy. We have
probably all had those kinds of experiences.
How can we women who see violence and sex in movies and on TV, fast
food restaurants serving up fat for our children, our sons and
daughters going to war, forests ripped out, mountains carved up, and
rivers and oceans filled with oil and pollution help to lift all that
ugliness to a higher level of beauty?
We begin with our own psycho-spiritual transformation and then guide
and influence the children in our lives, as well as the family and the
community. But we don’t have the time or luxury to reduce our energies
to just our own family and community anymore. Lifting our society as a
whole to a new level of culture, consciousness and beauty may be one of
our most important roles.
| Roseanne Sands - | | Roseanne Sands is a writer, speaker and workshop/retreat leader. She
has taught meditation, yoga, and dance movement to adults and children.
She has written two books and was publisher/editor of Emerging
Lifestyles Magazine for three years. She lives in Spruce Pine, North
Carolina, on a small organic farm. Rosanne can be reached at
www.mothersofthenewearth.com. | |
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