It is really something to experience a tapestry of landscapes by the way a river runs through them… bringing water-giving life everywhere it flows.
We are on a sacred journey following the Colorado River from its birthplace high in the Rocky Mountains all the way to where it no longer runs into the Sea of Cortez in Mexico. As we travel from place to place, we feel the great weaving of landscapes made possible by this incredible tapestry of living communities.
In this blog post, I want to share some of the magnificence that can be found when two great rivers meet each other. Yesterday we made the trek through miles of canyon trails to the confluence of the Green River with the Colorado. This took place in Canyonlands National Park.
A list of tribes who consider the landscape of Canyonlands to be sacred
To say this place is sacred may be a huge understatement. We could feel the profound energies of a dual-canyon system carved out across the span of five million years. It has been a gathering place for ceremony and council as long as humans have inhabited the region.
A physical model of the landscape showing how two “Great Weavers” sculpt the landscape together
We were greeted by the most spectacular display of wildflowers. Locals tell us it hasn’t been like this for at least twenty years. After a record snowpack up in the mountains and an abundant year of rains in the deserts, the land was alive with brilliant colors.
Our journey has a purpose. We are awakening the dream to regenerate the entire Colorado River Basin. This has brought us into community dialogues throughout headwater towns in the western slope of the Rockies. Now we are in the phase that goes through spiritual depths in the desert below.
We will arrive to the indigenous peoples and their water-loving allies in Baja California at the end of this week. Our trip is weaving people into dialogue — yet we are a poor comparison with the real weaving that has taken place in these landscapes for millions of years. Just look at what these great weaving rivers have sculpted into being…
The Great Confluence As Place of Wise Counsel
We arrived to the confluence of the Green River and Colorado River. It was so powerful to feel the energies of this sacred place. I was struck that any attempt to #RegenerateTheColorado should include this special convergence of life-giving waters.
Holding the dream of regeneration helped fill the hike with purpose. How might humanity wake up to the sacredness of these landscapes? What might it take to get so many to stop thinking of these waters as nothing more than a commodity to be bought and sold?
The confluence of Green and Colorado Rivers
Just imagine if no one was allowed to make decisions about how to manage the Colorado River until they held ceremony at this site that indigenous peoples have visited for thousands of years.
In the midst of so many debates about how to “use” the waters of the Colorado River in economically efficient ways, something VERY important has been forgotten entirely. These lands are sacred. They only have life because the waters flow from the mountains to the sea — crossing many deserts and holding a vibrant tapestry for millions of years.
To remember the sacred is to restore a connection as old as the land itself. Humanity arrived into living tapestries of rock, water, wind, and fire. We will return to our Great Mother as these elements when each of us takes our dying breath. And it is the same for holy waters such as those stored in mountain snowpack and released to return into the sea.
If you feel moved to get involved (or if you’d like to donate to this effort), please join us here.
Onward, fellow humans.
Joe Brewer is co-founder of the Design School for Regenerating Earth and author of The Design Pathway for Regenerating Earth. He will be accompanied by Penny Heiple and Benji Ross on this sacred journey in service to the Colorado Basin.
