The woods at Hemlock Bluffs

Not terribly long ago, the father of our newborn twins told me that I needed to leave the house and not come back until I had shaken my mood.

He told me I needed to do something for myself.

Having twins took a toll on us both, particularly in the early days.  I found myself locked in a cycle of feeling I couldn’t do enough to care for home and family, though I had little energy to do anything.  The result was I wasn’t taking care of myself.

Heeding his words, I got in the car and started driving.

When I first left the house, I had no idea where I would go.  No quasi-culture coffee shop or solo decadent lunch would soothe the mayhem I felt.  My shamanic antennae told me that I needed to leave my familiar, to find stillness, thus peace.

Not far down the road, though, it came to me:  I needed to find a powerful Nature deva to speak to me at a deep level. I needed a primal Earth spirit who could reach me.

I live in a smallish town dotted with the odd juxtaposition of goats and gas stations, grocery stores and tobacco barns.  In fact, Fuquay Varina boasts an ancient mineral spring that the 1800s elite believed had healing properties.  Her spirit I knew well, but I needed something more provocative, less familiar.  As soon as I clarified that intent, I knew that I would find my wild spirit smack in the oddest place–the middle of suburbia.

Butterfly with blue on wings at Hemlock Bluffs Nature Park in Cary North Carolina, USA.

Reconnecting with nature

Strangely, Hemlock Bluffs Nature Preserve lies surrounded by the town of Cary, described in 2001 byNational Geographic as “super suburbia.”  No one would believe such a relic of the Pleistocene Era exists along the busy roads, safely tucked behind shopping centers.  I’d been there before, and as soon as the thought came to me, knew that was where I would find kindred.

The bluffs are absolutely beautiful.

The plant life reflects secret strangeness, as the hardwoods rooted there are leftovers from the last ice age.  Much of the flora and fauna on the bluffs only grow in the Appalachian Mountains, some two hundred miles away.  The whole area could be a shady, fern-covered ridge plucked from some idyllic mountainscape and set down in this busy Central North Carolina town.  Even the temperature is slightly cooler along the lush slope than in the town proper.  In the acoustic bowl of the landscape and babbling Swift Creek the traffic trundling by is silenced.  Going to the bluffs is stepping outside the normal awareness of the physical senses, most definitely beyond the energetic ones.

The rocks that form the bluffs are 500-600 million-year-old quartz blocks, which stretch their ancient fingers under most of the town.  The charged hands cradling the area bring it more than its share of annual lightning strikes.  Without doubt the unique ley and unusual geology of the bluff generate a transcendent etheric field.  I easily find stillness anywhere, anytime, and connect with the resident Nature spirits.  However, the disruption of the expected sounds at the bluffs would signal transition into another realm or world for anyone.

With the sounds of the mundane world banished, I greeted the Nature spirits and listened into their world.  From the quiet, distinct pulse of the bluffs, the voice of the quartz deva began speaking.

“Open your heart,” I heard several times.  As the words moved through me, I was wrapped in the safe security of the bluff.  I felt warm among the shading hemlocks and cool breeze.

After a few minutes, the gentle heat that stirred my life force stilled and I opened my eyes.  Out of the corner of my eye I saw tiny movement.  On my shoulder rested a wee, green inch worm.

As soon as I perceived him, he began to talk.  “There are two components to a survivalistic mentality.  You have mastered only one of them,” he said.  “The first is bare physical survival, itself.  This one you do well.  The other is decoding the passion that comes along with survival–allowing the senses to speak what they need you to know about why you are surviving.”

Indeed.

In order to fill a need it’s imperative first to know what the need is.

Since becoming a mother, my ability to discern my needs let alone have awareness of them at all, had plummeted.  Rather, there had been a building, uncomfortable sensation, the source of which I constantly sought externally as something to tackle, to fix—a state compounded by having added two new members with their own needs to the household.

All the information I needed about my unrest was within me, speaking clearly to me all the time.  By bringing myself closer to that primal process in Nature, I could finally honor it.

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North Carolina writer and author S. Kelley Harrell

North Carolina Author S. Kelley Harrell

S. Kelley Harrell is a neoshaman and author in North Carolina. She has been on a shamanic path for twenty-two years, and for twelve years has served her local community and an international client base. Her book, Gift of the Dreamtime: Awakening to the Divinity of Trauma, chronicles her pivotal step into the role of modern shaman.  Her column Intentional Insights – Q&A From Within addresses reader inquiries on paranormal experiences, dreams, and spirit interaction.  Kelley writes for several publications, including the Global Goddess Oracle and Soul Intent Arts, LLC, and she is vigorously involved with the worlds in and around her.  Mother to twins, she enjoys time with her family and Nature.