From the plants, stones, animals — Earth: Intention is a word that gets loosely thrown around in spiritual circles these days. “Setting our intention to _____.” For me, as long as I can remember, the tone of the day was set by prayers — the intention to walk a path in a sacred manner caring for all life along the way. In the beginning, they were simple prayers and spoken from the heart with a bit of tobacco or cornmeal blown upon the wind. More intricate prayers from prescribed cyclic ceremonies required more memorization work with ancient plays that helped us flow through life and stay in the cycles of the planet.

When I started working in the field of ecopsychology in college, I discovered most people did not know how to pray, so I became a maker of words, guiding people through personal affirmations of empowerment and connection with something bigger than themselves. Then, one day, I was writing a regular column for the Sedona Journal of Emergence, addressing Mother Earth as a prayer maker for her children who struggle to find a united voice.

This is a good way to immerse you all in Mother Earth’s energy, as I have come to know it. I’ve been looking for ways to make it a second-thought ritual, meaning part of a routine, something common to everyone to allow this effort in connection to be easy. Here is one way to use these prayers:

• Rise in the morning and take care of your business.
• Put a pot of tea or coffee on, even water and lemon, whatever is your morning beverage.
• Take your cup and this journal to the window.
• Say the prayer to the great outdoors.
• Toast the beauty of the morning and our Mother Earth.
• Watch for it; something will appear: an animal, a breeze, a reflection off a stone. She will speak to you with a sensation of recognition.