Earth Element and Spirituality

 

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Earth Element and Spirituality

Our body comprises of the five elements – earth is associated with the muladhar or root chakra. Though the element of earth is part of physical matter around us too, it is best we start to perceive and understand it from the basis of our lives, because most people only really experience their own body and mind. Knowing and experiencing the element of earth from within is part of the Yogic process.

Whenever we eat food, we swallow a part of the earth – meaning we take a part of this planet to sustain our body. Consequently, how we treat our planet is how we treat our own bodies. That’s why it is important to understand the role of the earth element  in our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual well-being. If the earth element is not cooperating with us, we don’t get anywhere. If the body does not support us, none of our aspirations will take us very far. Unless we are completely detached from the physical, it will determine just about everything in our life. 

In India, we refer to earth as ‘Mother Earth’ – we are born of the earth. Our biological mother is also born of the same earth. The real mother is the soil that we carry as our bodies. The very body that we carry right now has been millions of bodies in the past – insect, snake, cow, monkey, and human being. We are not talking about the evolutionary process, but the soil going through every form of life. Soil is not a commodity. It is older, wiser, and far more intelligent and capable than us. It is a far bigger process than we are as a person. 

But now parents don’t allow their children to play in the soil – they are afraid that their children will get dirty – hands, clothes etc – they are more worried about the physical cleaning process! In reality, when children play with soil, they are touching the source of their life. When we mistake soil, which is the source of our life for dirt, the chances of putting our roots down, growing to our full capability and potential, and seeing flower and fruit are remote. Just imagine if a tree thought that my roots are getting dirty, there would be no tree, no flower, no fruit! A tree understands that when it sinks its roots into the earth, this is the source of its life.

But we – the seemingly most intelligent species on the planet – are not able to get this. This is a source of many problems that human beings are experiencing right now. Forget about enlightenment and seeing other dimensions of life, human beings are not even able to be healthy, which every other creature is able to do quite effortlessly. This is because they do not sink their roots into the earth. Somewhere in their minds, it has become dirt. 

To grow spiritually we need to connect regularly with the earth element, when we do this our muladhar chakra gets cleansed and becomes pure, after which all problems related to this chakra are resolved and this helps in our inner progress.