Every morning I get up just before the dawn to go outside and turn our solar panels toward the east to begin our day of solar gain. I like the sound of that, “solar gain“.
We live off the grid and our home is solar powered. Some who use solar power put their solar array on an automated tracking system so that the panels turn toward the sun on their own. I chose to manually turn our panels every day throughout the day. This daily act over the past eight years has brought me into a direct relationship with the Sun. Throughout the year I have the opportunity to see where on the horizon the Sun rises and sets and how high up above the horizon it moves.
Using and tending to our renewable energy system is part of my spiritual and religious practice. The practice of daily sun salutations, either yoga or resh, has been replaced by the daily ritual of turning the solar array. Equinoxes and Solstices become more important as we experience the changing affects that the different seasons bring with more power in the summer and less in the winter. By the time the Winter Solstice arrives we find ourselves longing for longer days and are filled with excitement as we watch our power increase with each day as the Sun rises earlier and sets later.
It is my belief that our society has simply stopped paying much, if any, attention to the Sun. We have forgotten all the beauty that surrounds us thanks to the Sun. All the sustenance we receive, the food we eat, the water we drink, the transmutation of solar energy that takes place within our own bodies, and let us not forget the warmth of the day. Most important the sun is critical to the photosynthesizing plants where in the plants transmute the carbon dioxide in the air into the oxygen we need to breath.
It seems as though that our days are so filled with the struggles of the mundane that we simply take for granted that the Sun will rise tomorrow. And it will! For now, thankfully, the one thing we can count on is that the Sun rise is a constant.
However, one of the lessons contained in the Arthurian myths is ‘that that which we stop paying attention to goes away’, like the Pagan Gods. Imagine for just a moment where we would all be if the Sun decided to go away. Its endless light and radiance simply stopped shining upon our beautiful Earth. Imagine, if you will, some catastrophic event that we humans have created that hides the Sun from us yet we know it is still there. Where would we all be without the Sun? Dead! No longer in existence!
In ancient times the people actually gave their attention to the Sun. Worshiped it even. They built temples that honored the changing of the seasons. Some very sensibly built their homes and communities in ways that the Sun would shine on them all day long keeping them warm even during the coldest of seasons. Some of humankind’s earliest technologies were solar powered clocks and calendars. Over time religions of the Sun became religions of the One God and his Son or prophets. We lost reverence for the God the Sun in our sky. Yet while spiritual and religious practice has lost its association with the sun, we still know and understand its power.
Scientists say that enough solar energy reaches the surface of the Earth in one day to provide all of us with enough power for a year. One year for one day for all the electricity we humans consume. This even includes the energy needed to produce the technology necessary to convert solar energy into electricity.
With the energy of the Sun, we can power our lights, our homes and even our cars. In the renewable energy industry there is a saying; “priority should always be given to the Sun“. This is more important today then ever before. With the ever increasing population and the endless consumption of natural resources the time has come for us as a species to turn full circle and look up once again towards the Sun.
Today’s Sun worshipers build and use the temples of technology that honor and worship the Sun. Such temples include solar photovoltaic panels, water heaters, thermal collectors and solar ovens. There is nothing tastier then a sweet potato cooked in a solar oven. A solar oven actually infuses the food with solar particals, otherwise known as photons or energy of light, that when eaten are transmuted into the Sun worshipers body.
It seems to me that we are all currently paying attention to the “wrong” things. We spend our days under artificial light. We cook our food using artificial heat and wave forms. We heat our homes and travel about by consuming non-renewable resources. We have even begun to grow our food using these artificial means. We talk environmentalism as a society but we put profitability and economics ahead of everything else.
Maybe I am being too harsh. Maybe it is not the “wrong” things we are paying attention to at all. But I definitely know what we are not paying attention to, and that is the things of the Sun.
Natural light, the warmth of the day, the taste of natural grown and solar cooked food, the feeling of Sun’s light on our skin as we walk through the grasses, trees and wild flowers. Nature and the stuff of nature are in a constant state of co-creation with the Sun for us to enjoy and participate in its endless beauty. And what we have forgotten most of all is that we are a part of this delicate balance, not apart from it.
As we participate in our daily lives let us all remember the new mantra given to us by today’s Neo-Sun Worshipers; “Priority should always be given to the Sun“. Let us remember that without this great and wonderful power we do not exist. Let us live our lives, daily, accepting and practicing this as truth.
It is time that we all bring our attention back to the Sun.
