The Big Welcome

Adapted for The Grass Field Institute for Contemporary Listening

 

We are so honored to welcome you all here to The Grass Field Institute for Contemporary Listening.

 

Take a moment now to let yourself fully arrive.

Feel the touch of the earth beneath you, the air moving around you, the gentle hum of the field. Bring your attention to your body, your breath, the vast listening presence of this place. You have arrived!

 

Welcome.

 

We welcome your wonder and your uncertainty. Your soft attentiveness and your deep questioning. We welcome your open ears and your resonating bodies. We welcome your listening alongside your moments of silence, your doubt alongside your willingness to hear anew.

 

You are welcome here.

 

Your stories are welcome. The land you come from is welcome.
Your histories, your futures, and your present moments are welcome here. The ways in which you are connected – to people, to places, to beings seen and unseen – are honored and welcomed.

 

We welcome your cultural roots, your traditions, your spoken and unspoken languages. The rhythms and vibrations of your being are welcome here, as are the heritages, joys, and sorrows of your ancestors.

 

You are welcome here.

 

We welcome the landscapes that live in your memory. The rivers, forests, seas, and skies that shaped you are part of this welcome. The non-human lives you share your world with – whether present as companions or echoes – are welcome here too.

 

We welcome your practices of care, your ways of moving through the world. Your ways of knowing and not-knowing are welcome. Your efforts to learn, unlearn, and remember are honored here.

 

We welcome your love in all its forms – how you love, who you love, and the ways love transforms you. We welcome the fluidity of your identity, the ways you have evolved, and the ways you continue to grow.

 

You are welcome here.

 

We welcome your healing and your wounds, your strength and your vulnerability. We welcome the questions you carry and the silences you hold. We honor the parts of yourself still unfolding, still seeking, still finding their voice.

 

We welcome you as you listen: to the earth, to the air, to the vibrations of beings sharing this field with you. We welcome you as you listen to yourself, as you listen to each other, as you listen to what cannot be spoken but only felt.

 

We offer gratitude to the field, its grasses and stones, its winds and clouds, the unseen lives it holds. We give thanks to the lands that brought you here, the lands that have nurtured you, and the lands that remember you.

 

You are welcome here, and we give thanks.

 

Thank you for being here, for offering your presence, your attention, your care. We give thanks for all that you bring and all that you will take away. We give thanks for the heard and the unheard, for what is shared and what remains a quiet mystery.

 

Settle in.

 

Welcome.

This Big Welcome follows an expanded and foregoing practice of hosting. Please follow link for other adapted version and references.