Water and Energy

For whatever we lose (like a you or a me),
It's always our self we find in the sea.
---E. E. Cummings



Here on earth, water is life. Water is also symbolic of the way we use energy in our life. By watching water, we can apply the lessons to the way we live. We, ourselves are water based creatures.

Water is flowing and always changing never holding the same shape or form. It exists in several forms including liquid, hard as ice, and an invisible gas. Water is soft but strong, wearing trough the hardest surfaces over time. A person with a "water personality" naturally flows around obstacles and is very fluid in their life. Water people can cut through a problem over time or assume the form that is necessary. We learn from water as well as require it for our existence.

Water flows to the very lowest places and exists in the high places without prejudice for either. Water teaches us to not hoard, which is a sign of lacking something. A person who knows they have access to things of value and has confidence more will come, can easily be a charitable person. A charitable person has faith in their abilities and in their world and knows there will be more. A less spiritually wealthy person desires to hold onto everything they receive, since they never know if there will be more.



This is a story that I am told is an old parable. I am not sure of its source. The story about life is told in water.



RUNNING WATER...
as retold by Evonne the Storyteller

There was a prosperous farmer who owned a small, but sufficient farm that took care of all his needs. A lively little stream ran through his land. This stream irrigated his crops and supplied plenty of clear bubbling water for the household to drink and use. Simply said, life was good.

The people who were in a place to say such things, began forecasting a coming dry season. They expected the water to run low. This made the farmer with the little bubbling stream feel insecure. He imagined that his sweet stream might run completely dry! He walked his lands and watched the stream cross his boarder, run through it, and out to his other neighbors' land's. This made him shake his head "Why should I give them water that is mine?" he thought as he watched the water leaving his property.

The farmer decided to build a dam to keep the water and never let it leave his land. This way, he would be prepared during the time of the shortage. He did not want his neighbor to see his dam, thinking that if he could see the water the neighbor would come to steal it during the night. He built the dam deep in the middle of his property where it would not be noticed.

Over time, the water no longer flowed free, being trapped within the property. The water stopped at the dam, turning green and stagnant. It smelled bad and tasted worse. The once lively water turned everything it touched green and was repugnant. It did not quench the thirst of anyone living there. Below the dam, the farmer's land grew dry and the crops less bountiful. He labored hard to carry water to the crops below everyday and still he did not release the dam continuing with the efforts and his hoarding. The neighbors below the dam also had their land dry up, ruining their businesses. Many of them were forced to move to the city for work and tried to sell the land. No one would buy the land and it quickly turned to weeds which seeded back into the farmer's land. This reduced the quality of the already stressed crops.

Still, things got worse. The nature of water and its increased height caused by the dam made it wear a new spot upstream. Here it escaped the usual stream bed that was now filling with silt. This produced a new flow which diverted the stream above the farmer's land and the water never made it to the dam. The water continued elsewhere around the farmer's land, where it naturally flowed freely and set up another clear bubbling stream bed. The farmer looked sadly at the now hollow hole in the earth that had been his living pond. It was not even a stinking, green pond now.

With nothing left to lose, the farmer took down his dam. Exhaustedly, he removed the silt that had settled from the slowed streams and ponds that the once happy stream had flowed through. Slowly but surly, the stream started to flow back into his lands. Now the stream not only flowed through the farmer's land but was allowed to flow through the lands of many others. These lands happily responded, healing over time and flourished once more.