Happy Earth Day!
Posted on Apr 21st, 2008
by 
Gaia Team
Gaia Team
I think this is my favorite holiday. :)
Alhough the inspiration for Earth Day is at the very core of why we're here, we're not going to offer a list of recommendations for how you should spend your week, or what you should do (if you are interested in finding an event in your area, the Earth Day Network has literally thousands of options, as well as recommendations for taking action). Instead, we'd love to ask a smaller favor—a favor in the spirit of Gaia.
This is a holiday! It's a time of celebration and observance and reverence and wonder.
It's a time to go outside and wriggle your bare feet in the grass and to stand beneath the open sky and throw your arms wide and to lean against the wind.
It's a time to watch the sun set and to think of the comforting steadyness of this incredible planet as it cycles quietly through space, and the beauty of how we can trust those perfect circles.
It's a time to pause on the sidewalk and watch as those little pieces of grass and spring come pushing through the cracks in the cement, and to be spellbound by the force of new life.
It's a time to appreciate your own animalness and the way the cycles of your own body (from the dailiness of waking and sleeping to the minutes of breathing and heartbeats to the seasonal changes of aging) are so deeply in tune with the planet that holds us.
It's a time to celebrate all these crazy earthly miracles that we so easily take for granted.
So wherever you are, whether it's bright and springlike or raining and grey, whether morning or evening or late in the day, please please please remember to celebrate the sheer wondrousness of the world. Take a lesson from the city pigeons and the prickly pears and the golden dandelions and the ants and anteaters and antelopes, and just BE for a while. Be in life, and in celebration, and in love, and allow, for a time, the whole world love you back. :)
Happy Earth Day, again and again and again.
Hugs and love and so much appreciation,
Siona
& the rest of the Gaia Team
PS. If you've posted a blog entry about the day, or want to recommend a Group or discussion or photo or book, please just leave a note in the comments...
Access: Public
celebration
July 2008
I love earth day! I live in the city now but I grew up on a farm and this day makes me miss all of that!
What a beautiful place it is indeed, this marvellous little planet of blue and white, green and brown, gracefully poised in the middle of nowhere which we call home…spell bindingly awesome indeed, it's infinite beauty, abundance and love…
Happy earth day Siona and team.
And here's to our magnificent earth! :)
sweet! i'm kicking off Earth Week on blog too. here's to Gaia! ;)
~C
Cheers for Mother Earth!
Earth Day 2008 - Earth Day marks the anniversary of the birth of the modern environmental movement in 1970. Donald and I are proud that, as kids, we were part of the culture from which the awareness for the reverence and maintenance of our Earth grew.
Our parents and other adults taught us to recycle, to plant organic gardens - Donald and his father, Don Rubbo Sr., planted the first community garden in Manhattan's Lower West Side in 1968, on the former Meade Paper site at Canal and Varrick - to eat organic foods, wear clothes made from natural fibers, and most important, to understand the connection between the meat we bought from the supermarket and how the animals were raised.
I grew up in the 1960s on the commune of “The Free Family,” houses and land scattered over Northern California: Olema Ranch, BlackBear Ranch, The Red House, Clipper Street House, a loose tribe of people going “back to the land.” Many people were shifting the paradigm by studying acupuncture, herbal medicine, sustainable farming, and engaging in re-examining hierarchical modalities of living.
On April 22, 1970, 20 million people gathered at parks and auditoriums, and in the streets, across America to celebrate the first Earth Day. Many cities were buried under their own smog, polluted rivers caught fire, raw sewage was spilling into our water supplies, huge swaths of wilderness were disappearing and many species of wildlife faced extinction. It was time for a change.
Earth Day Network's international network, founded by the organizers of the first Earth Day in 1970, today reaches over 17,000 organizations in 174 countries, the domestic program engages 5,000 groups and over 25,000 educators coordinating millions of community development and environmental protection activities throughout the year. Earth Day is the only event celebrated simultaneously around the globe by people of all backgrounds, faiths and nationalities.
It is awe-inspiring to see more than a half billion people participate in Earth Day Network campaigns every year to inspire awareness of and appreciation for the Earth's environment, for the common cause of healing our planet and healing ourselves.
Everything you do to restore our world to harmony is a blessing to all, great and small efforts alike.
Thank you.
I like it, and I hate to be nit-picky, but when you were talking about the planet cycling through space, you said something about taking comfort in those perfect circles. In truth, the orbit isn't circular, it's elliptical. Sorry to bother you about it. Have a wonderful day
Oh, thank you all for the notes! And I apologize, Chris, for the poetic license, especially because 'imperfect ellipses' is somehow more beautiful. :) Thanks.
It does sound better your way. I didn't realize you were being creative. Keep it up.
It's a time to appreciate your own animalness and the way the cycles of your own body…
I LOVE how you said that, Siona.
And WOW Donald & Cheryl Lynne
-beautiful story!!!
I feel so grateful…Tonight, when the sun was setting, the rich orange ball was tucking itself behind our mother…clouds of pink and blue…. like a little family….
-we are so lucky, aren't we ? :)
I'm still enjoying this day Siona et al……2130 hrs & still half hour of good light yet. I love this part of the world esp as we approach solstice. Endless light & sunset/sunrise all within an hr or so….:)
Happy Earth Day tout le monde!:)
twb
Love Earth Day because I believe that the Earth is like a relative to us. If the Earth could speak, I wounder what she would say about this day. ?
mmm… earth day. i love it!
“And forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair”- Kahlil Gibran
so step away from the computer and embrace the planet, feel it, become one with it; lay in the grass, play in the dirt, splash in a stream, breathe the glorious air!
happy earth day everyone! never forget to respect nature!
As always, ther perfect offering to put us in touch with our souls, higher selves, and bare feet. Blessings, appreciations, and love to you….:)
Happy,happy earth day! I like earth day,it's when everybody helps the earth become a even more beautiful place,it's so amazing. xoxoxo @};–)– flowers for everyone 2day! *big smile*
Happy Earth Day, Gaia!
Thank You little Zaadz dandelion…my how you've sprouted and grown! :-D
Love you all, I adore Mother Earth, I'm heading out (again) to saturate myself with Her Love and Wonders and send it all back Out! ~~~<3
Thanks for your delightful earth day message! It came at the perfect time. My children and I went this morning to deposit the coins that we had collected for earth day. It was a wonderful experience dumping a big bag of coins and watching the total grow!
I printed your message and read it to my kids outside. We took time to be in nature and enjoy the beauty of the day. Nice spring day in the Carolinas. My apple, asian pear, plum, cherry and crabapple trees all in bloom. Flowers, flowers everywhere! Frogs croaking for its mating time and birds calling back and forth. Life is everywhere we look. Happy to celebrate with all of you here on gaia!
I enjoyed and underline all the comments above, especially Sam's poetic words, and thanks, Siona and Team for the extra-special personal view of this Day. For me, every day is Earth day. I am totally addicted to this planet, which is why I keep coming back here !!! Each day I look around and say “What a planet !! Wow !!!!”
For me the process of “grounding” always seems to consist of becoming aware of how the planet glows in my heart.
The history recap was awesome, thank you so much. Shows the power of a few dedicated people. Shows the way humanity's consciousness IS rising, IS expanding to include the whole planet and all life-forms (and the rest too) who are the cells – the interconnected, interdependent cells – in her body. Her sacred, beloved body.
Earth Day is kinda like a birthday of someone we love, and we can celebrate that someone and that love all the time, ideally…..
A jewel in the vastness. The birds who woke me up. The source of my flesh and my food. The delight of her flower-smells and her nourishing rain and her beauteous forms and colors. Our Mother, indeed.
Thanks to everyone,
OM Bastet
Dharti Mata, as we call mother earth in Hindi– we celebrate you. And as Siona asked, here's a place to share experiences: Earth Day April 22 2008~What are you doing?
I found Siona’s message early this morning after a night that was quite dark. I’ve spent today thinking, remembering, wondering … and walking outside to watch the miracle of the sap coming up the trees. The fruit trees are blooming; impossible, delicate, fragile wonders of pale pink and white silk that smell like a memory of heaven. Inside my Aspen grove I can feel the sap underneath the pale, winter skin that is turning green.
Thank you for your lovely message Siona, and thank you everyone for the comments that follow. I was glad to be reminded of the Kahil Gibran quote - thank you Stefanie, and I copied down the beautiful words of OM Bastet - “A jewel in the vastness.” So beautiful.
I wax a little sappy about Earth Day on my Blog today, and invite you all to splash some paint around.
Blessed Dharti Mata, we celebrate you this day that has become night, and all of the nights and days that you have gifted us.
Thank you so much Meenakshi - I love names, this one is - perfect. I am going to bed now and hope to sleep, after a day - another day - of gifts.
Thanks Dryad/Edwina!
I also think of the earth meditations that we did in February and march, and how they prepared us for this experience. Coming events cast a long glow in front of them; and the day will not end today!
i love earth day!
I wasn't part of this site on earth day but I do love that day. It actually is now helping more then ever, within the school districts around me some got out of school early to celebrate the day as a true holiday. This holiday should be recognized as a national one, thateveryone gets off for. It would help minimize the traffic for the day helping the planet.
Anyway I love the picture that is at the top of this entry and hope that Earth Day has a better known meaning in the future
:)
Earth Day is letting the world know on how to make the world greener and i absolutly love the fact that there is a holiday in helping the world we live in. I too hope to spread the hope in helping our enviroment. I hope that i can also help make Earth Day as important to other people as it is to me by celebrating. Even if its planting a tree or carpooling for a week. Not to mention gas prices…..
The most lingking reason why other people can't show thier motives reasons in life is that they dont know how is it Good and relevant of them, Infact both us know what is right and what is Good,