Walking the Path of Reciprocity with Nature
Field Studies Sanctuary carries many expressions, each one unfolding in rhythm with its own season. Sacred Assembly of Soil & Soul (SASS) is one of those expressions — a gathering born from memory, longing, and a shared willingness to live in deeper relationship with the Earth. This project will arrive piece by piece, with no rush toward a single destination, because the destination is never the point. What matters is the walk itself, and the way the path reveals its beauty as we commit to reciprocity with nature.
To walk this path means unlearning what diminishes life and relearning what restores it. It is an inner journey as much as an outer one. Each of us carries a path within, and each path looks and feels different. Some trails move with ease, opening wide to the horizon. Others wind through thorns and brambles. Every turn, every texture, every shift in terrain offers its own lesson when we walk with presence rather than haste. Even the thorn, when touched with care, teaches us how to listen more deeply to the world around us.
When we forget our own way and tangle ourselves in the lives of others, confusion multiplies. The modern age makes this entanglement almost irresistible, with entire industries built on delivering endless glimpses into the choices and struggles of people far beyond our circle. What enters our eyes, our ears, and our thoughts also enters our lives, even when we believe it belongs only to someone else. The path becomes clearer when we choose instead to return attention to the ground beneath our feet, the breath in our body, the tree outside the window, and the way our own lives move in rhythm with the Earth.
SASS emerges as a response to harm and as an invitation to healing. My children and I know the weight of systems that misuse faith as a weapon, twisting devotion into control. We have lived through those wounds and still carry their echoes. Yet out of that history rises the longing for something different — a place where gathering means celebrating life, honoring freedom, and centering the wholeness of nature. For me, Mama Earth deserves devoted attention every single week. To gather in her honor, to celebrate her presence, to offer our gifts in service to her thriving — this is the essence of walking the path of reciprocity with nature.
This is not about salvation, nor about rehearsing stories of suffering. This is about remembering that we belong. We belong to the soil, to the air, to the waters that move through our bodies, and to the countless creatures who share this home. In SASS, we gather as part of a living sanctuary, no longer separate from it. The more we attend to the flourishing of the Earth, the more we discover how every act of care ripples outward into community, into culture, into the way we carry ourselves in the world.
This blog will serve as a record of that unfolding vision. It will hold the stories of our beginning, the insights along the way, and the steady movement toward a culture rooted in reciprocity with nature. My hope is that these writings offer not only a glimpse into the Sanctuary’s life, but also an opening for you to pause, to reflect, and to remember your own path.
Field Note Prompts
Choose one simple act of reciprocity with the Earth this week — watering a plant, offering compost, tending soil, or walking with reverence. How does this shift the way you move through the rest of your day?
Recall a time when you felt truly in rhythm with the natural world. What details made that moment vivid, and how might you return to that feeling now?
Closing Invitation
This week, step outside and find a place where the ground feels steady beneath you. Pause long enough to notice the details you might otherwise pass by — the texture of soil, the sound of leaves, the rhythm of breath moving in and out of your body. Offer a quiet word of thanks to the Earth, and walk away knowing she carries your gratitude into the unseen weave of life.
