Dear sisters, I hope you are well. My name is Seyi Adelekun, and this soil meditation originally took place at Idle Women's allotment in Accrington in the UK.
It happened at a special time of the year, as it was the morning after the spring equinox, when the sun casts its rays evenly on both hemispheres of the Earth, making equal lengths of day and night.
It also took place a few days before the worm full moon. As we move into longer and warmer days, the arrival of spring brings the energy of rebirth, growth and new beginnings. It invites us to awaken with new ideas and dreams for our lives, encouraging us to take risks, trust our abilities, explore new horizons and embody our most confident and authentic selves.
Meanwhile, the spiritual energy of the worm moon, which gets its name from the earthworms that wriggle through the thawing soil as the seasons change from frosty winter to soft spring, is a powerful reminder that transformation often happens at the subtle level underneath the surface. Even if it's not seen or recognized these humble creatures play an important role in nurturing the health of the soil and teach us that bringing movement to a situation can create the foundations for new beginnings.
We invite you to join us in connecting with the soil and with other women across the globe, whenever or wherever you find yourself. Perhaps you might like to find a patch of earth, declare it yours for the moment. This could be outside in a green space, a private garden, or if neither are accessible to you, then I invite you to collect some soil and bring it into the comfort of your home.
Find a comfortable position, sitting on a chair or cross legged on the floor, and make sure both feet are in contact with the ground. If you feel safe to do so, close your eyes, lower your gaze, listen and allow yourself to be guided on this journey.
I invite you all, if you're feel comfortable, to maybe close your eyes, get yourself into a comfortable position, and we're gonna bring our attention first to like a body scan, so we're gonna take a big breath in and a deep breath out.
And the purpose of meditation is a reminder, not about trying to dull ourselves or numb ourselves or run away from life, but it's the opposite, to make us more alive and alert and feel awake with the energy and the life that we have inside of us.
And as we breathe in, I'm aware of my whole body, and as I breathe out, I ease my whole body. Breathing in, aware of my whole body and breathing out, ease my whole body. Breathing in, I follow my in-breath all the way deep down into my abdominal, my stomach, as it rises and as I breathe out, I follow my breath out all the way to the tip of my nose as it exits out my nostril.
Just allow yourself to follow your breath, the natural rhythm. Maybe you notice your breath is quite short. Maybe it's long and deep. There's no need for judgment here to change it. Just notice what it is today. Maybe you're recovering from a cold like me and your breath is short, and that's okay. There's there's no way, right way of doing it at the moment, it's just to be in tune with it and allow yourself to witness your body.
I'm going to take a moment to breathe in. Right now, there's nowhere to go. And breathing out. There's nothing to do. At this moment, you get to sit here in this present moment and listen to the sound of the birds.
Maybe you can hear the sound of the river.
What other animals maybe can you hear in the distance?
Now, imagine the sky in this big, cloudy, overcast sky, a sudden portal opens up, and a clear blue sky, you can see it peeking out, and the sun penetrates through.
And suddenly a beam of sunshine shines directly on your crown of your head, warming up your head. And you – ah! – you can feel the golden light just melt the top of your head and your scalp, and can feel the warmth and now this liquid golden sun penetrates through your body. You relax your skin on your face.
You notice any tension in your jaw, maybe your mouth, and you relax there.
You become aware of your neck. You slowly let that melt and soften and relax and this warm, golden heat falls down into your shoulders, down your upper back, relaxing down into your elbows and all the way to your fingertips. And, breathing in, you slowly relax your chest as it rises. And breathing out, as it falls.
This relaxation trickles down your spine as it softens and you can feel your spine lengthen whilst your pelvis slowly grounds deeper into your sitting bone and your hips.
And you start to feel more fluid and softer, less rigid, and you can feel your body dancing and oscillating with your breath, the breeze on your face and this warm, glowing heat goes down now into your thighs. Through the weights of your legs as it softens, releasing any tension all the way down to your knees, your calves, and then connects your feet, as you feel it, contact with the earth below.
Your feet widen, maybe your toes widen, there's a space between them, and you feel the earth supporting you. Mother Earth holding you, always there beneath you, always supporting you with life, with food, with groundingness.
Breathing in, we penetrate even further down now, entering through the soil.
We make a path through the grass, through the roots of the plants, the roots of the trees. The hummus is the first layer of the soil, which is all the organic matter, rich with life and nutrients for us to grow our seeds through the mycelium, which is like the network of like mushroom network that connects all life underground and sends and communicates with every being of this world, all plant life.
And we transcend deeper and deeper through the top soil, this organic matter that's mixed with minerals, and further down to the subsoil, where there's sand and silt and clay, it's getting heavier.
It's getting deeper, it's getting darker now. And here, before we hit the parent rock, which is kind of broken rock of the land underneath the earth, we see in the in the darkness, these balls of life.
They're wrapped around [themselves] and they're worms in their borough. They're deep asleep. They've been hibernating all winter, waiting for the frost to clear and spring to come, and today it's arrived. Worms. When they hibernate, they actually sometimes curl up into themselves and make a big knot. And as you can see them, they're slowly unraveling that knot one bit of a time, and they're opening up, they're Stretching out, they're wriggling through
and as the spring enters this new year, and the soil warms up, they begin tunneling upwards. I want you imagine you're one of these worms now waking up from a deep slumber, and you're ready to come out into the new world. You rise up through the soil, again, through the hummus, through the roots,
and you lift up slowly. Do and as you just about to peek through the surface of the Earth, I'm going to invite you to open your eyes in a second, not yet. And I want you to imagine you've never seen this allotment before. This is your first time. You're going to look at it with new eyes, with curiosity, like a child for the first time being birthed into this world. So as you rise through, you start feeling the soft breeze of the wind on your face again, because feel maybe a bit of a sun, even though it's still through the clouds, touching your skin, you can start feeling the fire again that were gathered around. And in a second, I'm going to ask you to slowly, gently open your eyes, allowing some light to penetrate through your eyelids. And I want you to look around at your surroundings. Maybe what catches your eye first? Maybe it's something in the far distance, maybe something close by, right next to your feet. Take a moment in your own time to come back to this present moment as you've taken a long journey deep underground and back to the surface again. Maybe you see a familiar face.
Okay, I
What is it that maybe you've noticed this time round, open your eyes, that maybe you didn't notice before. Before you close them, you can just think internally. But if you want to share, you're welcome to. Is there anything that you're looking at now that you didn't before? Well, the thing in the distance that, yeah, I've been staring at it as well today being like, Are you a house? Are you the pointy one that looks like a rock? Yeah, it sometimes you we get so used to the things in our lives that we forget that the blessing that we can open our eyes and see the world, that we have the vision of sight, and we get so familiar with the space that we stop taking in information or seeing things. I have the same thing in like my room, I'll look up and I go, has that been up there the whole time? No. And I'm like, someone's put it up there. It. Can't be. It can't be. I've lived in this room for how long, years? No, it's not possible. But yeah, that see, a lot of people say, when they have meditation, they feel like they time travel. Yeah, you know. And I believe it can be a form of time traveling to like, go back into your like, child, stay and see your life. And I think it's a very powerful place that people can go into.
I've done this before in warmer weather, but basically, we're gonna be do some movement with our feet, with no shoes, yes, no socks, barefoot. I know that it might be uncomfortable and it's gonna be very cold, but I invite you to, like, maybe go on this journey with me. There will be a hot, warm water after to bathe your feet in. And we're gonna be doing a nice ritual of cleansing with soap and moisturizing our feet. And we'll come back to the fire and do that here. But there's something very healing about having our bare feet on in the mud, and the energy that we can like get from the soil when we actually touch it. Okay? So we're gonna, like, slowly head down to the patch where I think this spring is gonna be a dye garden, where we're gonna grow plants for dying. So we're gonna go down there, and as we walk down, just like, notice how your feet interact with the ground.
Ah, that's exactly where we're going.
I just want everyone to like, just like, come back into their bodies and feel the beneath your feet as you're like, stepping from side to side, thinking about like the opposites of dark and light, day and night, but also left and right in your body, how you're always in balance, always in oscillation, how your body's always in an equilibrium and harmony without even you being aware that you're always trying, you're always finding the center point, and your body's always working with the ground and kind of in a dance with the ground here, trying to make sense of the strangeness that's going on as we think about this new year, the Lulu New Year, and the spring equinox, and as your feet are submerged in this ground and you're able to connect with the energy the ground, What energy do you want to invite from the Earth into your life, as you have this moment, this very special moment with your feet in the ground, is there energy of support in your life? Maybe you're asking for the energy of patience, maybe with someone, maybe with yourself, maybe some sending, like offering more love to yourself or to a loved one. Maybe peace and safety for someone that you care about, whether it may be in your in yourself, ask the earth to bring that energy forward into your life. Maybe it's confidence to achieve something that you're trying to do. Maybe you're doing your driving lessons trying to get your test. Whatever it is, ask the earth to give it to you. It's listening to you right now. You're sculpting it. You're dancing with it. So take a moment just to prayer to the earth and bring it in.
Does anyone want to share what they asked the earth to bring them, or any what type of energy you don't have to, but if it's open, if you would like to really, like,
like, held,
yeah, ground.
I've got a lot of movement as well, but I feel really supported. And that's that's something that's a nice feeling. I would like to take that forward, to feel grounded and rooted, but with lots of flexibility movement with the strength side, connection.
I think this is a really beautiful moment that you like reminded me of, that everything you do leaves an imprint on this world that you are always leaving imprints your footprints, the people you touch, the people you interact with every the way you move through your life, the way you show up for yourself for others, shows others that how much love you can give to others, how much confidence you can give to yourself. So everything you do lives in imprint, no matter what you're doing. And I think this is a beautiful moment to remember that peace.
Up for yourself. Are you asking for peace for yourself or also for everyone the world? I'm
going to invite people to slowly make their way back up. So as we go up, one person will wash someone else's feet with the black soap, and I've also got some cream as well to moisturize your feet. And then the person whose feet has been washed then washes someone up. The next person's really
bad. Be
it's proven like now in science, even though we knew this before that, like connection with the earth and soil, there's microbes in the soil and the earth that releases serotonin in our brains that makes you happy. So when you're doing gardening, when you've just, like spent time in the mud with your feet, any physical connection with the earth actually releases serotonin and makes you happy, which helps with depression, which helps with your mental health. So that's why a lot of people say that gardening helps people with mental health and like depression or anxiety, and that it helps them through really dark times in their life. So it's really like nice to remember that you can literally just put your hand in a piece of soil for five minutes. Can actually make your day, can actually make you happier, not all the time, but it really does have a effect on your body and your mind. So, yeah, it makes me really happy. I'm like, you know, the same and we were connecting with all the elements. We've got the fire here. We've got the earth now. We've had the wind and the water with our feet and the rain. So it's like, we're really like, in it today. So I'm really grateful and happy to get to share that with you. So we're just gonna, like, reflect on that experience together. I know that we talked about it a bit earlier while we were doing it, but does anyone share how they feel now, after the foot bath experience, stress free. Stress Free. I'm
actually in the moment where I wasn't when I came in.
I feel feeling cold, a little freeze, but you know, to be in touch with the different textures in the ground was really relaxing.
Very relaxing. Yes. Something earlier
about inner child like their child, or feeling playful. I don't know if anyone felt that, or feels that now,
for me, like as an observer or see the inner child like, create your inner child and everyone like that child that wants to have fun and connect the energy. But is it with the adult which has the wisdom of which that comes with the age? But it was like they wanted to enjoy that. But it may give me another thing. Like, we are so used to looking at each, each of the faces that we never like pay attention to someone, like hands or like feet, like, we don't even ask, Are you head or something? Like, you know, if someone has a cut or something, and it makes you feel like you're more than this. The frame is just not this. Like we are the whole human body. And we sometimes like, just ignore the other parts. And we like just so much covered in socks and boots and everything. Like, we don't get to be that wild and be easy
when we say inner child? Like, what does that mean? Because it might mean something different at different times or for each of us. I think for me, it felt like, actually, this is the most important thing I'm doing right now. My feet are in the mud, and I can feel it, and it's squidgy and it's cold and wet, and this is really important. I'm just doing this, and I can't do anything else, you know, like my phone, hold it, work, work, things to do. List gone, you know, planning things gone. I'm in the mud. And that is like,
isn't that what
a child is? Yeah, because when you like, try to interrupt a child who's doing something like they're like, No, I'm in the mud. Get away. I don't want to eat my dinner. I'm in the mud. I
have same feeling. I feel I am free. I doing something. I can't do it front of everyone. I feel free nobody go to dinner. She's doing that, no or stop it. That's all. No. I feel free sorry to say this for some of you, but I feel I'm doing something that's pleased me. I do. I want to release what I have. I feel I release all my responsibility, what I have in my life, every. Think I'm doing this banging, banging, dancing as well. I feel free thank you for this.
Yeah, I feel like that, like there's a lot that's connecting. Like, for me, when I'm in nature, I connect to my inner child, because I'm so present. I get to be playful. I get to be adventurous again. Like the world gives me so much responsibility to do this, to show be a certain way, even like walking down the street, you have to behave in a certain way. And there's a moment here because you know each other as well that you didn't have. There was no judgment. You could just be who you wanted. And the cold makes you not think about anything else, but what's going on with your feet right there and in the moment? And I think that's a really beautiful thing of like being free to just be exactly where you want be yourself.
But it's like you spend a lot of time trying not, but try not to be cold or keep your body temperature. So like to go, Oh, I'm getting cold. Oh, but I'm okay. You know, like, it's quite liberating to go, I can do that and I'm okay, but even if it's a bit like, nervous making or scary, but also I just felt real delight and permission, because everyone did it, like, because you all did it, and no one was being like, no, or I'm just gonna dip my toe. Everyone was just in. And it's like, if you're in, I'm in, let's all get in. And then that's a real pleasure to feel like. I really love that about you all, that you all go all in, and then because of that, we can all do it. Do you know what I mean as well? I think that's so rare. Yeah, and joining this group of women has been so magical, watching you at the RHS as well, but then also watching you today, how it's what you're saying that you go, that you do go in, all in, and there's no Oh, I wonder what they think about me, or I hope that they are they don't judge me. And I feel like that never happens for a group of women. I've never experienced that in a group of women,
especially, women, you know, in our community, as you have, you don't have to, you do? You know this is, that's what I feel, that I am, I'm doing something that's special and rare, some, as you say, and as and that stuff from today to tell my girls, if you want to go playing,
mood, go, I told that to Rachel. We was in the mall. No, in a normal situation, no, my daughter loves to do that. No, but I like, you know now it's like, okay, like you say though, okay, okay, it's okay.
Did you say that with the boys? Now,
my thing is, I always let them give them permission to play in mud and get my cars are mud everywhere, because we like that. But I think it's nice for them to see me doing that today, because I don't normally join in. So I like that the What you doing, what you're doing, give me two minutes having a bit of fun. I'm glad that they got to see that today. But also, I think since Ramadan started, I've I don't know, I feel like something's happened up here in terms of just, I don't know. I feel like I don't have to explain it, but I don't know if my mind's taking a rest, or if it's just because I'm not eating what I'm normally eating, it's just karma. But usually I'd say to myself, Oh my God, you can't do something about it. Or you're too quiet, or your mind's too quiet. Go do something. Go find something to do. So all kind of last couple of weeks, I've been working on staying with that, and I feel like this. I didn't think it was possible, but even further grounded me. So I feel very much like, Yeah, I'm just a stage where I'm just being which is not done for years and years and years and years and years. So it's very unusual. It's a little bit uncomfortable, but it's
I thought at first that you will be like, I don't know. I don't think I'm gonna do this. And then you all went for it. And I was like, yes, you kind of just went fill in. And it was like, so nice to see you all. Sometimes you think like, oh, I can't do that. And then the support of community just goes, of course, you can, you can do that. You can do more. Like you were, like, making me you're dancing suddenly. And I was like, okay, but also just, like, amazing. Like, how I think someone said, How does it feel like now to have shoes? And someone said, Oh, natural. And it's kind of nice to, like, reset the mind and be like, actually, this is actually what comes naturally. And the shoes is something that we've learned to be with, and we can just reframe our minds to remember that like that is something that we've been told to distance from and can disconnect, but it brings us so much joy.