The Observer: RISE to the challenge in York

Have you ever crossed over the footbridge that connects the library’s lower parking lot with the Bagel Basket's property?

The water under the bridge flows from the library’s retention pond which is fed by catch basins throughout the village. Eventually, the water flows into Barrel’s Mill Pond, the York River and into the sea. I’ve crossed the bridge many times without giving much thought to what flows beneath it.

Not so for a local businesswoman I met recently. Sage Clarke is the owner of RISE Wellness Collective in York Village. She has worked in the Village for years and has a connection not only to the water but to the physical environment around it. Two years ago, she started wading in to clean up the creek behind her business.

It is more than just being a good neighbor or a committed environmentalist. "It is an act of love for nature and the community,” she told me. Her attention to the flowing water is also an expression of her general philosophy of life. Clarke’s business within the collective is “Inner Knowing Wellness,” where she practices Intuitive Energy Work, Reiki, Tarot and Yoga for individual healing.

Clarke introduced me to a RISE colleague with whom she is collaborating on an environmental project. Liz Dupre, a Feng Shui consultant and civil engineer, who also runs a local business that is part of the RISE collective: Liz Dupre FENG SHUI. Feng Shui is an ancient Chinese practice which observes and works with location and the natural environment to harmonize individuals with the spaces they dwell in.

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Feng Shui utilizes the rhythms of nature. It is the art of placing or auspiciously arranging spaces and buildings on sites as well as observing and working with the energy within the land. “Land with stress responds to healing as it transmutes negative energy,” Dupre told me. “Rituals, ceremonies and blessings provide a framework for environmental healing just as Reiki and other therapies can help heal human trauma.”

Energy is a key concept for each of these women, though they come to it from seemingly different perspectives. One is primarily personal and the other largely environmental. During my conversations with each of these entrepreneurs the words “energy” and “healing” came up often.

Clarke’s work involves human health, physical and spiritual wellness; while Dupre’s is centered on elevating the energy of a space to assure health and good fortune of the occupants. Like acupuncture, Feng Shui works with energy patterns to promote vitality and prosperity. Liz Dupre gave me a powerful image of the way she sees this life force or Chi.

“Energy,” she explained to me, “does not disappear.” Einstein said the same thing, I recalled. “It may change form but it can’t be destroyed.”

“If an environment (say a room or a house) has been the scene of negativity or trauma, that energy persists within the space. Similarly,” she said, “when a natural system has been disturbed, trauma will persist… but it can be healed.”

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Water is a significant element in Feng Shui which literally means wind water. “In Feng Shui, water collects Chi,” Dupre said, “it nourishes us and gives us life, so we honor it to give back and to help heal it.” Thus, the centrality of the stream.

Toward that end, Liz Dupre FENG SHUI is holding a public ceremony to help heal the waters and teach those who want to learn how. This event is also in recognition of Earth Day.

Everyone is invited to participate in this sacred waters gathering (Thursday, April 20, beginning at 6 p.m.). Those interested should come to the water behind 266 York Street (RISE).

Participants are asked to bring symbols as their offerings: a shell, a small gemstone, water from any source anywhere in the world, and a flower bud with petals. “Cleaning up and blessing the water is a way of honoring ourselves, the community, the historic land that is our village, the wider world and her waters,” Dupre concluded.

Talking with them, I was reminded of another Einstein insight: “Concerning matter,” he said, “we have been all wrong. What we have called matter is energy, whose vibration has been so lowered as to be perceptible to the senses. There is no matter.”

I came away from my conversations with a lot to think about and to write about in my next column.

Ron McAllister is a sociologist and writer who lives in York.

This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: The Observer: RISE to the challenge in York