Valentines From the Earth
“The mutual practice of giving and receiving is an everyday ritual when we know true love.”
bell hooks, All About Love: New Visions
I grew up living by the shore of Lake Erie and I return there several times each year to visit family and friends. A walk along the familiar pebbly beach of my childhood always yields new treasures and surprising finds.
I don’t actively search for heart-shaped stones, but I do often hold the image of a heart in my mind as I stroll the beach. Whenever I do, the stones present themselves to me. Without fail. The distinctive shape appears from the surrounding sand and rocks much like a bright, shiny penny on a dirty sidewalk would.
There’s joy in each discovery, which is matched only by the joy of giving a heart-stone away.
Nature is generous and her gifts are abundant. I know that there’s a limitless number of heart-shaped stones still waiting to be sighted, so I let them go freely. But before I do, I delight in testing their weight in my hand, feeling the curves and surface textures, and admiring the color variations of each unique find.
A number of mystic traditions consider stones to be “silent beings” that hold worldly wisdom and spiritual knowledge. I’m fascinated by this idea.
I’ll never forget the first heart-shaped stone that I found. I was so excited: “Wow, how cool is this? What are the chances!” Back then, I considered it a rarity – something precious that I wanted to keep.
But later that day I felt compelled to share my beautiful gift from the beach with a loved one whose life was, at that time, in a state of crisis. The brown stone was quite large; it felt bulky in my small grasp. It was much better suited to his broader hand.
“This is for you,” I said, offering the treasure to him, “to give you strength and comfort.”
He closed his hand firmly around mine for several seconds with the warm stone pressed between our palms. An unmistakable energy emitted from the stone as he accepted this simple gift. And there were tears in his eyes as he tucked it inside his jacket. Several times that evening, I noticed him reaching into his pocket for reassurance.
Since then, I’ve given these “silent beings” to more than a dozen friends and family members. Most often, I let them choose their own stone from my small, continuously changing collection. Many people find the selection process easy – one stone immediately speaks out to them.
There’s a quiet power in this practice, this sharing of a gift from the earth. The weight of a stone in the shape of a heart is tangible … true love you can cradle in the palm of your hand.
