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  • Commentary 109: The Rejuvenating Enchantment of Nature

    Greetings, once more, from the Order and Ordinance. We have made it to the final Sacred Day within Lord Nakndes’s Period of Watching for this calendar year, and we have spent this time going over the various angles that Nature provides. We mused about Nature’s whimsy, we admired its beauty, took notice of its warnings, and experienced its wrath. Today, we shall wrap it up with the natural conclusion: the clean and fresh slate after the storm has passed and rebirthing power of Nature. Let us begin.

    The storm has ravaged the lands, it has brought both its ruin and its floods, and while the infrastructure we built atop it may meet an expected wear and tear, the lands are rejuvenated from the rains. The old brush and wilted trees on their final days have been torn down to make space for their prosperity newly sprouted. The rivers of the desert are replenished and the cacti bloom. The blizzard roars and freezes over the lands, but the snow that it drops shall give home to the furred creatures that require the cold. If spring is on the schedule, the snows shall melt and feed the lands as well.

    The old shall lay to rest and the new shall sprout and bloom, as Nature is the rule-maker and shall keep the cycle in flow. It is for this very reason that the attributes of Nature and Reincarnation are in the Lord’s ownership. In all aspects of life, from birth, life, and death, we see this cycle repeat. But for all that can be observed, we know that Nature shall give new recycling to those that respect its power and eradicate those that don’t. We can reflect on our own circumstances. When we see our living generations from old to young, we see our own metaphorical Sacred Tree, where the fruits of the youth fell from a more ancient tree and will one day plant a new generation of trees themselves. We look at the Ancient Tree and now it shall one day rot, but know that new trees shall grow in its place and blossom and bear fruit.

    It’s a very contemplative view of the Natural Force we live by, but it works both as a means to teaching humility to the Creating Force that spawns our vessels and forms the rules of our worlds while acting as a soothing Realmly Truth about the Eternal Reality of Death that expires the Gift of Life that we cherish. And so, as we prepare for the oncoming Period of Watching under the Lord of Life, Kyaien, we have set up a selection of Commentary understanding the Nature of Life so that we may spend the next Period cherishing and celebrating Life.

    And so, on this more brief Commentary about the Rebirth of Nature, I humbly ask you to be one with Nature on this Sacred Day. Take a stroll and inspect the deadwood and know that the felled tree once fathered samplings that will carry on its legacy. Acknowledge that the exuberant flower admired from up close will soon wilt as Nature intends. Listen to the winds, feel the rushing waters of a small creek, and know that they carry the duty of moving and refreshing Nature and should be respected for their raw power. Nature is the Creating Force, the rule-maker, and the medium that other attributes use to enact much of their presence. We are spawned from it and shall always be beholden to it. Have a wonderful Sacred Day and thank you for joining me on this Period-long musing about Nature’s presence.

    —lnX

  • Commentary 108: The Reprisal Strike of Nature

    Greetings, fellow followers and all interested readers, back to the Order and Ordinance. We join here again to continue our various musings and loose discussions regarding the various angles and stages of Lord Nakndes’s Nature. We’ve been marveling at Nature’s beauty and hidden aspects and even looked at its outward warnings. Today, we will move past the thorn and, much like the intuitive Niinkisia, onto pricking it to understand the true power of Nature’s rule; this is quite fitting on such a beautiful but stormy Sacred Day. We shall talk about the wrath of Nature, both in its natural cycles, but also upon those that hold such Hubris that they seek to conquer or best Nature. Let us begin, shall we?

    Nkes, the great Hayle of Lord Nakndes, warns us well enough throughout Niinkisia’s Sacred Lesson about the true role and raw power that Nature hides behind its verdant and meditative beauty. We shall walk the path of Niinkisia together in this one, and purposely prick the thorn of the cherished flower so that we may truly understand the wrath of Nature.  The thorn gives us clear warning, and is intentional in its design, yet we act in our audacity and decide to touch it anyway. Immediate pain, a wince, and blood drawn are the results. Our teacher lightly chides and mocks us for our action, inquiring cheekily if we did so to test the premise. As it turns out, we did, just as Niinkisia had. Nature has, within its spirit, the power to punish the arrogant and the unknowledgeable, as all these Sacred Lessons work in tandem as all the Xyphozons work as a single body of organs.

    We look at human examples, the poisoning of our water systems result in the ecological deaths of needed vegetation or organism chains. Our climate becoming destabilized from our lack of care of this green and providing Earth in exchange for malpractice of growth. The bleaching of our coral reefs, the draining of the Aral Sea, the building of massive world-changing dams that eventually break to the sheer flow of Mother Nature’s tears. We witness the lifeblood of water leave the rivers in the Mojave or the Nile, we see the sands of the Sahara consume the edges into the Savannas, the extreme heat that dries the life in the equilateral deserts, the calamitous floods of the mountains in western Asia, and the ravenous storms that rock the Caribbean and Americas. The plagues spawned that tear human populations into shreds, and the chilling arctic winds that leave their homes and bring stasis to regions they otherwise would not be. In the same light, we see the homes of those cold winds warm and vegetate at the expense of the beasts that need those chills to survive.  This is the wrath of Nature, and its sheer power from the trifling of its Cosmos inflict an immeasurable punishment of mass effect upon that entity that grows passed its own ego. Whether it be human or not, Nature will correct that which seeks to overrun the Creating Force.

    In milder and more Natura cycles, the Force of Nature has  forces that seek its own renewal, and these forces may be seen as destructive to us mortals.  The storms bring ruin to our habitats and to our lives, but they replenish the waters we drink and feed the plants we eat. The wildfires burn indiscriminately across our establishments, but they renew the soils and open the cones and reform the new stage for a new generation of Natural belongings. The high winds spread pollen and rebirth Nature’s verdancy, the diseases cull the numbers that grow beyond their own means. The web of life balances itself through Natural Force; and Nature is the rule-maker of all of these processes.

    So, to purposely prick the thorn, as Niinkisia has done, is to understand the difference between Natural Force and Nature’s Retribution. Lord Nakndes’s beloved Child pricks his finger to seek insight on what Hubris looks and feels like, and he uses that insight to know when to act upon his divine role to usher in Nature’s corrections and to protect that which seeks the thorn. We can follow in his example, and it is the duty of the Ordinance and its followers to do so. We shall work to protect these resources, to save these pollinators, to shield these reefs, and to preserve this verdant gift we all sit on and are subject to. We shall do this not for our own self-preservation, but for the equilibrium of all. The suffering of the innocent caused by the Hubris of the arrogant will set fractures in the Spectrum that the Cosmos will right through Nature’s Wrath. We can avoid these consequences by preventing the pricking of the thorn in the first place—as we can not only infer its power but have now pricked ourselves to decipher its wrath without any doubt. That is one of many goals of the Ordinance, and it is the lesson of “Natural Rebirth” that Hayle Nkes teaches; she is less merciful than the rule-making Lord, after all. Lord Nakndes creates the Nature and establishes its rules, but it is Nkes that appropriates its thorns and teaches of its ultimate power, and it is the Child Niinkisia that demonstrates how we are to act in accordance with Nature’s gifts.

    So on this Sacred Day, we should go beyond observing the power of the storm and the strike of its lightning and understand that Nature shall always rebirth itself, but it shall eradicate that which flows against its creating power. With every awe-striking strike of lighting, we must acknowledge that even a single strike can reduce us to lifeless carbon, and that we know that we are pieces of a greater cosmic web that we must all work to preserve and respect. With that said, have a insightful and introspective rest of your Sacred Day.

    —lnX

  • Commentary 107:  The Minatory Presence of Nature

    Greetings, as usual, from the Order and Ordinance. We rejoin in our space to continue our loose selection of discussions on various perspectives and angles of Nature. We began with unearthing the more whimsical nature of the Lord Herself, and moved to appreciating the hidden meditative aspects of nature. But, as is true of most things, there is always another side to explore. Today, we shall move into the calm before the storm and talk about the warning that Nature gives to those who seek to challenge it. Let us start.

    We’ve talked many times of Sacred Child Niinkisia’s lesson regarding Nature, and how the thorn on the follower he admired held a hidden warning to it. Nkes spoke quite directly about the power of Nature’s wrath, and so as we zoom in on this particular lesson, we can make a few distant observations about the minatory aspects of Nature even before any wrath is applicated. The thorn on the flower itself is the perfect example of this; just from observing the sharp and spinal appearance of the thorns, we can ascertain that they are both sharp and meant to ward away threats. For all the beauty that the flower holds, as Nkes warns, the thorns protect the blossom, and one can reason from appearance alone that function of the thorns is protection.

    We often see the vibrancy of Nature and are taken by its colorful beauty, but even those exuberant colors act as warning for us to respect Nature’s awesome power. Vibrant colors can both be a display of whimsy but also a sign of menacing toxicity. Take, for example, the vibrant pigmentation of the Poison dart frog—holding enticing and intricate color patterns. However, that is indicative of their highly toxic nature, as bodily secretions of alkaloid toxins act as a defense against predators to the species. The same property often applies to various plant life too. The beautiful blossoms may belay a hidden poisonous nature if the plant or flower is consumed; this is especially true of some plants that produce berries or fruits that would otherwise be inedible or poisonous to humankind at the very least. This is where a more sinister aspect of Nature’s protective wrath comes into play. The instinct to seeing vibrant colors or delectable berries or fruit would be to touch or eat them, but as we see from Nkes’s warning, doing so is testing a Nature one does not either truly understand, appreciate, or respect.

    Finally, we shall talk about the ominous warnings that Nature gives us to its wrath, and the perfect example can be seen through severe weather or climate events. The classic “calm before the storm” applies here, where we can physically witness the weather patterns changing, the darkening of the skies with heavy cumulonimbus clouds arriving on the horizon. The barometric pressure dropping, or a cold front rushing in. We can hear thunder and know that that indicates that lighting has already struck; in more frightening cases, we can feel the static energy in the air indicating lighting is about to strike. Other catastrophic warning signs include the receding of the tides so far out from the shoreline after a major earthquake has taken place near a seaside—indicating immediate danger of a tsunami coming inward. Watching the behaviors of animals, who often have unique sensory abilities that humans don’t, is also another ominous aspect of Nature. Animals will often detect a climate event just before it happens—especially in cases of storms or earthquakes, and will act erratically or flee before catastrophe strikes. We can draw from all these cases that Nature gives warnings for nearly every menacing circumstance it affords, and as with Nkes pointing out the thorns to a young Niinkisia, we too should always be in tune with Nature and be observant and respectful of those warnings as well.

    For now, we will conclude this portion of discussion here. I encourage reflection on this aspect of Nature and hopefully a new appreciation for the divine properties of Lord Nakndes’s creations. With that said, please have a wonderful and vigilant Sacred Day, and take a look at the Nature around you and see if you can spot parts of it that apply to this discussion!

    —lnX