Discerning the Next Chapter
“On the rare occasions when we are fortunate enough to meet someone, there is no question of fatigue. Both are refreshed…It is as though a door had opened, and life suddenly takes on new meaning.”
Irene Claremont de Castillejo
I have had the deep good fortune to meet nature at White Rose Farm. I work in the garden, and I am deeply refreshed. Gardening in this way produces food that is vital to our health and wholeness. It also takes time and attention.
As the weather has become more extreme, my need for help and a clear focus for the farm has become urgent: there is more work in the fields and less produce to harvest and sell. Many farmers are building greenhouses and bringing their animals under cover and onto concrete.
I want to focus on helping people meet Nature on a biodynamic farm where we grow spirit-filled food. I want to refine that focus, find the right model to involve others at the farm-- a collaboration, an intentional community, a non-profit or a cooperative venture—the right people to participate and enough support for me and the farm.
I have asked a group of friends to join me to clarify the next right chapter for the farm. I am calling the group the Council of Discernment. We will gather at the farm every Friday at noon for a 20-minute meditation. We will open to Spirit for discernment for 40 days, starting this Friday, December 9. The focus will be to articulate the right vision, to find the right social and financial structure for the farm and to call for enough support for the farm, including the right people to help. If you would like to join the group either remotely or in person, please let me know.
I invite you to join us in joy: join us in prayer. Meet us in any way that seems natural. Share connections, ideas, poems and images; share stories of your visits to the farm. Ask yourself how you can meet nature and be refreshed. Come to the farm and listen deeply to the land and to yourself. Come by yourself or with friends on Fridays--in the morning, afternoon or all day. Do art, movement or journaling—at the farm or at your own home. Help us birth a new chapter at White Rose Farm!
With deep appreciation,
Sally Voris
News and blog
Happy New Year!
Posted by Sally Voris :: Monday, January 2 :: 6:16pm
A strong west wind blows clear, crisp air across the farm, the sun warms the land. My cat has pulled chicken bones out of the compost pot( I forgot to put the lid on it); my dog sits outside looking at my neighbor’s newly-arrived pregnant heifers. Earlier in the week, he chased the cows across the field: I chased him. Now he is tied up until I can get obedience training for him. The chickens are clucking, pecking and still laying about a dozen eggs a day.
I am half-way through a process of discernment to find a clear focus, the right structure and enough support for the next chapter of White Rose Farm. After the extreme weather of last year, I wanted to reflect deeply on what the farm is meant to be.
The discernment process has been rich and telling--a weaving of inner and outer dimensions: dreams, emotions, healing, chance encounters, planned activities, ideas and conversations. I have felt tremendous support from friends far and near.
Over the last two weeks, several people have suggested that the farm may have been used by the native peoples as a sacred site. My father may have disturbed the site when he built the house at Ruggles Road. This raises questions about how we Westerners, relative newcomers, honor and acknowledge places that native people held sacred. How do we or can we, with our different foundation of faith, acknowledge and respect these ancient foundations? I do not know; I do not know how to know—except through an inner discerning—and an opening to new dimensions.
Marko Pogacnik, in his book, Touching the Breath of Gaia, wrote that “Past peoples sought out locations where, by the nature of the landscape, conversation runs freely between the inward space of earth’s centre and the universe of the stars.”
For a specific location, he suggests that we reach our hands deep into the earth, find the ball of perfection and bring it to the surface of the Earth. We used that exercise in our meditation on New Year’s Eve. The ball did not want to surface for me, but I did have a sense of connecting with an inward space. I was reminded of the closing lines from the set of Qigong exercises that Renee led on Friday, a set developed by Master Li Jun Feng:
There is only consciousness, a deep profound stillness
The seamless silence that is both empty and full
I had experienced such seamless silence in the events hosted at Ruggles on December 30 and 31st. Could it be that the farm is meant to be a place where one connects with such silence? A place that is both empty and full? What a magnificent, mysterious possibility as the New Year dawns!
Happy New Year!
Sally