Michael and I just returned from a week long adventure in Scotland. We have been wanting to visit the sacred stones of Callanish, located on a remote island called the Isle of Lewis, ever since we learned of them from two different teachers we follow, Robert Edward Grant- a polymath, entrepreneur, and Freddy Silva-a leading researcher on ancient civilizations. They both spoke of these ancient stones as being powerful energy centers. Michael and I have been visiting as many of these type of sacred sights or “vortexes” for a long time, and an opportunity to see Callanish in the Scottish Isles presented itself so we decided to go.

The giant megalithic stones were amazing. It was so incredible to see and feel them. It is believed they were erected into a circle with a cross around 3000 BC and they were built to measure the moon and attune to the ecliptic flow of the constellations. But compared to some other ancient sites that we have visited, we felt something was missing. They excavated something from the center of the circle years ago, and we believe it held an important part of the energy. Grateful to have been able to see what is still standing and I definitely felt a connection to one of the stones in particular and spent a wee bit of time just hugging her.

As for Scotland in general, we were blown away at how down-to-earth the lifestyle is there. People are friendly and laid back. Whether we were staying in the big cities or on the rural isles of the Highlands, people were relaxed and not rushing about.

I immediately felt a shift in energy once we stepped out of the airport and took a breath of the salty sea air. I am not totally sure I can say what the palpable difference is between this relatively small corner of the globe and our neck of the woods here in Denver, but it definitely had a different feel-beyond the obvious climate differences.

Within the first couple hours of our arrival, I started to notice some of the main differences between most Americans and most Scots.

One is that there really seemed to be a lack of pretense or posturing. Everyone was at face value. What you see is what you get. They weren’t fake or overly made up. In fact, generally speaking, I didn’t see a lot of fuss about make-up, and they didn’t seem to have the abundance of puffed-up lips, painted eyebrows, furry eyelashes, and pulled cheeks like we see here in the west. I would say most people went for the natural look or modest make-up approach. Long, natural-colored hair was the average hair style for the ladies-of course there was the occasional green or blue or purple haired folks…which was fun…Scotland definitely has a come-as-you-are attitude. Not a lot of judgement. And yes, we saw ample diversity, contrary to what we were told.

Something else I observed was that they seem to have a thicker skin-figuratively speaking.

They weren’t hyper-sensitive or easily offended. They just let things roll off like water off a duck’s back. Don Miguel Ruiz would be proud because they didn’t seem to take things personally. In fact, I would say Scotland as a whole seems to honor The Four Agreements quite well.

They other big thing I noticed was how unbothered they were by the constant weather changes. Scotland can have all four seasons in one day. And they rolled with it like it was nothing. Walking in the rain without an umbrella or a raincoat was no big deal. It didn’t matter that they were getting wet as they walked the ten minute schlep to the train station. They seemed to rather enjoy the rain on their faces.

And in the countryside, when the rain-clouds rolled in, they suited up in their galloshes to go out and check on their sheep-the rain was a time the sheep would go into a little meditation so they were easy to check on.

Life seemed to be in accordance with Nature.

And that was my big take away-Scotland is still in touch with Mother Earth.

The moon has such an influence on the sea-which surrounds Scotland on three sides, and the weather dictated much of their daily activity.

They adjust their sails according to the weather, they tune into the elements and allow for the natural flow of things. So much of what they do is in accordance with the rhythms of the Universe-this is called the Ritam in Sanskrit-or cosmic flow, and it is where we get our word ‘rhythm’.

Most people in our culture have no idea what phase the moon is in, nor are they aware of the seasonal quarter turns like, Imbolc, Beltane, Lammas, and Samhain. These seasonal mid-points are just as important as the main seasonal turns of Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall. They bring an energy shift that can help us adjust our sails to move through Life a little more readily and steadily.

We are so wrapped up in our technology, our material wealth, our physical identity, our social status, that we have largely forgotten how to connect to Source, Nature, God, and therefore our True Selves.

Now- more than ever- we must find our way back to living closer to and with the Earth. We have such a huge disconnect between each-other, the earth, and with our own hearts that we don’t even know how to feel our feels anymore, or how to trust our intuition. So instead we find ways to numb our discontent, uncertainty, and fears-and that leads us to artificial living. So much of our life is spent filling a void to compensate for our lack of spiritual connection.

In order for us to truly fulfill our soul’s purpose, to become the highest version of ourselves, to know true peace, and to evolve on the wheel of samsara, we must have a way to access our spiritual pipeline. Without a relationship with Spirit, we are nothing more than Artificial Intelligence ourselves.

To be “real”, not artificial, we need to be our authentic self. Our authentic self is fueled by prana-shakti-or our divine spark. Its the soul fire that we all know we have-we feel it, we just can’t see it.

Spirituality requires a leap of faith. We have to believe that there is a force greater than ourselves that moves through us and for us. Spirit is Nature itself, and so the more we can get back to earth centered living and living in accordance with the rhythms and cycles of Mother Nature, the closer we get to our own soul fire.