Mother Nature: The Original Muse

“I have learned my songs from the music of many birds, from the music of many waters.”

The Kalevala, a 19th-century epic poem compiled by Elias Lönnrot from Finnish oral folklore and mythology

A couple days ago I had been busily attending to my duties indoors and hadn’t had much time outside. Taking the garbage out a little before sunset, I stood outside for an extra moment to experience a tree and the sounds it made. That experience sat within me, echoed, and slowly faded. But days later, wanting to recount that moment, I not only brought that experience back to life, I gave it a new purpose, and a new birth so to speak. Reflecting on the sound of the tree, I tried to find the detail of those few minutes using words. I recounted and redressed it.

Walking up the paved way, I heard a rhythmic rustling of leaves. My eyes followed the sound to my neighbor’s tree, and there, golden autumn pages fluttered on the old branches bouncing up and down, the tree jumping in the wind. I stopped. Stared. Listened. The sounds were crisp and defined. The absence of moisture ironically mimicking the soundtrack of rain droplets. Not quite bare but no longer wearing its summer green leaf dress, I soaked in that confident yellow glow across from me, sun shining into the newly opened spaces, a self-assured bareness hovering twenty and more feet up and around. I looked left and right. Back into the tree’s firm stance. One of the last still partially dressed, I could listen to its song more closely that day, in the autumn joy of the spacious horizon.

Soon I’ll be contemplating the Yoga Nidra meditation for the upcoming session. In that process each month, I look around for inspiration. I flip through poetry. I sit in coffee shops where people study and dream. I soak in the words of great thinkers, artists and yogis. I consider the seasons. And I look to nature. I always look to nature—every Yoga Nidra session is heavily influenced by this connection to nature.

Being in nature—being where our bodies formed and evolved—is beyond comforting, it’s healing. There we feel the grand scale of life and our connection to it. The vastness and intelligence of life shines wherever we look in nature. And while I might seek the presence of nature to feel that healing and connection, I think more than anything I go to it to seek inspiration. Nature has been inspiring humans since the beginning. We don’t just sit in nature, we observe it, reflect on it, try to understand it, and try to recreate it as we appreciate its remarkable nuances. Nature inspires our work, our art and if we let it, the way we live.

Having a sacred time in nature, whether in the forest or our own backyards, is necessary for the attunement of our bodies and minds. When we go further and open our hearts to nature, the original muse, we become a vessel for a new level of nature’s creative expression. Whether through a painting, a poem, or a scientific investigation, we add another form of communication to nature’s existence using “the word.” In that process, we open up to nature as a source of inspiration. And that, to me, enhances the power of nature in our lives. The muse is a reminder of life's great mysteries, and more, she’s a force for creative transformation.

In his book “The Healing Energies of Music,” Hal A. Lingerman writes on “The Music of Nature,” saying that

So many simple joys and pleasures are extended from nature: the fragrances of pine trees, the colors and combined shadings of flowers growing side by side, the songs and cries of birds; the cool, damp vitality of soil held in the hands; the shapes and energy of stones; the rippling rhythms of a stream or lake; the eternity in song of an ocean. Notice these simple gifts of God, appreciate them each day in your life. Take full advantage of the joys and gifts in nature, for these will continuously help to balance and harmonize you in all layers of your consciousness.

Certain composers have been especially sensitive to the harmonies and sounding essences of nature. Often these great tone painters have heard the calls of mountain, sea and forest presences, and they have been able to blend with them closely. Such composers channel these calls into notes and melodies of musical instruments.

This reminds me of Native American flute players that seem to translate a landscape into song: a vast forest, a wolf crying out from beyond it, a hawk gliding above it. To me, this is the creative process in which the human soul opens to nature, feels her secrets, and seeks to remember and share those secrets with others. That’s the inspiration of Mother Nature, the Original Muse.