A little over a month ago, we celebrated our beloved Mother Earth and our oneness with all that dwell here.

As we shift from an extracting economy to one that embraces the sacredness of our planet, a feeling of awe is joined perhaps by a feeling of helplessness. Here is something really useful that we can each do. Google https://secure.avaaz.org/campaign/en/usa deforestation 40/?cDywKsb and sign the petition imploring our leaders to proceed with their plan described there. It’s a plan to ban all products containing palm oil from United States commerce.

Palm oil is in many things we eat and our consumption of it is a major reason for the destruction of the rain forests. This single act will shift the world’s economy in the right direction, because the U.S. is the world’s largest consumer. The European Union is working on a similar bill. Let us embrace our beautiful planet not as a thing or just a resource, but as a living, breathing Mother to us all. It may be that we have only eight years left to change direction before our planet and our species begin to go extinct.

One day in 2018 in the Mojave Desert, when Linda and I were immersed in our training to be shamanic practitioners, we were instructed to go outside and find a flat place for a sand painting, preferably one protected from the weather, especially rain. I went walking along a path in the desert and was startled by a creature, about the size of a chicken, scooting out from the roadside underbrush on my left. He looked up at me turning his head from side to side. I realized I was looking at a roadrunner.

I said to him, “Hello, Mr. Roadrunner, my name is Bill. I’m in your desert to make a sand painting, and I’m looking for a flat place, protected from the weather.” He continued to look at me, turning his head from side to side and staring up at me from whichever eye happened to be directed toward me. All at once, he darted all the way across the road and began going up an embankment on the far side. Halfway up he stopped and turned around and looked at me. I understood that I should follow him. I went up the little hill behind him. At the top he stopped and looked back at me as if to make sure I was following him. He made a sharp left into a secluded, level spot, protected from the elements. It was perfect for my sand painting. He lingered on the edge of the space while I drew the circumference circle to form the border of what would be my painting. I looked up twice and he was still there taking things in. The third time I looked up, he was gone.

This is the single event that stirs my heart most toward the conviction that all the earth is alive, and we are all one. It was even instrumental in helping me over a hurdle early on, when I found it hard to believe that rocks are alive. They are. In the Christian Gospel for Palm Sunday, the Pharisees are trying to get Jesus to quiet the crowds greeting him with great enthusiasm as he enters Jerusalem. He told them, “If these keep silence, the stones will cry out.”

Finally, dear hearts, this is the 100th and final Wise Guyde column. If all goes as planned, the last 55 columns will be gathered into a book, and there will be a book signing in the fall at Four Seasons Books. As many of you know, the first 45 columns have already been published in book form and are available at Four Seasons Books. Thank you for your interest and encouragement these past eight years and my thanks to editor Tabitha, and to Toni before her, for their gracious hospitality in sharing the Chronicle’s space. If you want to stay in touch, and I hope you will, the best way is to subscribe to my Daily Wisdomkeepers at https://www.billobrienconsciousnesscoaching.com/contact. It’s free. As the Buddha says, “Impermanence is life.” It’s time for Wise Guyde to move on, not without a feeling of wistfulness. Namaste, Bill.

Bill O’Brien is a consciousness coach and shamanic practitioner. He and his wife, Linda, lived in Shepherdstown from 2005-2021, before relocating near family in Blue Bell, Pa. He can be reached at billobrienconsciousnesscoach@gmail.com.