“Humanity has not only lost touch with the spiritual nature of water, but is now in danger of losing its very physical substance.” - Theodor Schwenk

Global Picture: Water Shortage
Over 1 billion people lack access to clean drinking water, 2.5 billion lack adequate sanitation, and 500 million people a year die from drinking contaminated water. By contrast, the average American consumes 110 gallons of water per person per day, which is more than fifteen times the consumption of a person in a developing country. (By the way, in Las Vegas the per person water consumption is over 220 gallons per day!) Worldwide, humans use 45 times as much water as we did 300 years ago; this is not only because of population increase, but also the huge growth in agricultural irrigation (which now accounts for seventy percent of water use) and industry (twenty percent of water use). It takes 400,000 liters of water to manufacture one car. The coal industry uses massive amounts of water just to transport coal through pipelines in “slurry.” According to the National Geographic, over pumping aquifers has caused the land under Mexico City to sink two feet, and water pipes to break, further exacerbating the problem. Aquifers in India and China are so low that the grain production will be diminished by as much as twenty percent in the next decade. And even in the western U.S., there are water-stressed areas.

Also contributing to the water shortage are deforestation and topsoil loss. One pound of humus stores two pounds of water. Primeval forest had 137,000 pounds of humus per acre; forested land has essentially no runoff and the rainwater gradually recharges the underground aquifers. Today's farmland has only around 20,000 pounds of humus per acre, and 25 percent of rainwater runs off. Of course, many areas have bare earth, with fifty percent runoff, and paved surfaces absorb no water at all. Deforestation leads to erosion, stripping away the topsoil and silting the creeks and rivers. Trees are 86 percent water and "make their own rain": loss of trees greatly decreases local rainfall. It is encouraging to learn that reforestation can help reverse the problem.

Privatization of Water
The bottled-water industry would prefer for us to pay for our clean drinking water at rates more expensive than oil. This industry sold over 90 billion liters of water last year for a $22 billion profit. They buy up the best water sources they can find, deplete them, and move on. Meanwhile, in South Africa, a World Bank-inspired “cost recovery” program has cut off the access of 10 million residents of black townships to safe water. As a result, 100,000 people in Kwazulu-Natal province got cholera.

In 1998, the World Bank told the Bolivian government that it would not refinance water services in Cochabamba unless the public water utility was sold to the private sector. The government brought in Bechtel, which promptly doubled the price of water, so that it cost more than food. The Coalition in Defense of Water and Life created a movement of workers, peasants, and farmers who called a general strike and transportation stoppage; six people were shot by police, but Bechtel was finally forced out. The Coalition then set up a new public company and delivered water to the poorest communities first. (Bechtel is now suing the government of Bolivia for $25 million.)

Water, freely given by nature, should be a commons, a sacred gift owned by no one. Environmental ethics call for setting limits to consumption, and seeing that all species have a right to their share of natural resources. Whatever we take, we must return to the Earth; and it is the best practice to “live off current income,” whether it is solar income or rainfall. We must make provision for people to access those resources necessary to their survival.

Water and Health
The higher the water content in protoplasm, the more alive and vital it is; at birth your body is about 78 percent water, but by adulthood water constitutes only about 60 percent of your weight, with a gradual decrease into old age. The brain is 85 percent water! We can only think because our brains float in water. It is suggested that the brain sends electrical signals via waterways that connect to every cell. Is it any wonder that drinking water helps us think better?

Pure water is essential for good health. It is the body's natural cleanser, detoxifying all the organs. If our bodies are too acidic or alkaline, water will neutralize them; and water helps to regulate temperature as well. Water prevents constipation and urinary tract infections, reduces arthritic pain, keeps our skin healthy, protects us from gout and kidney stones, assists the liver and kidneys, and much more. A headache may be a distress signal from the body that tissues in the brain are dehydrated.

I was reading about these facts in William Marks’ wonderful book, The Holy Order of Water, one day while sitting in the Asheville V.A. Hospital waiting room as my partner was having a physical exam. Next to me sat an elderly couple; the veteran’s wife had skin like a prune, and she was complaining aloud of a headache. I looked up, smiled, and asked her if she had drunk a glass of water recently. She responded by making a face: “I never drink water, it turns my stomach. I drink Pepsi and coffee. Water is good for making coffee with.” The words of a teacher friend came to my mind. She said that she teaches children, many of whom are absolutely hooked on Pepsi and Coke, about the importance of water by asking them, “Would you pour Pepsi on your houseplants?”

Water cures in the form of hot and cold baths, spas, even the sound of water flowing, have healing properties. In early October, I decided to take a plunge into the chilly Broad River in order to cleanse myself and also to clear away a floating plastic soda-pop bottle on the far bank. Mission accomplished!

When we look at the dendritic pattern of a river and its tributaries and branches, it is like looking at the human circulatory system. We have all observed how water naturally forms vortices, as it flows in streams or even down the bathtub drain. The vortex form has been shown to help purify the water, leading to the creation of a device called a “flow form.” It is fascinating to contemplate how the chakra system is like vortices in the human energy field, which are said to draw in subtle energy, and also help to purify our organ systems. Indeed, as William Marks points out, water is like the chi or life force of the earth, flowing along “ley lines” which are energy lines in the earth, similar to acupuncture meridians in the human body. Looking at a section of Rosy Branch Creek near our home recently, I noticed how the water flowed between two mossy rocks that looked like the body of a goddess; the life force streaming through the body of a woman.

Just as our bodies self-regulate through water, is it not reasonable to suppose that the body of Gaia, our living planet, cleanses and regulates herself through the water that flows through her veins and arteries?

Sacred Water
“Why, then, does water...form the very basis of life in all life’s various manifestations? Because water embraces everything, is in and all through everything; because it rises above the distinctions between plants and animals and human beings; because it is a universal element shared by all; itself undetermined, yet determining; because, like the primal mother it is, it supplies the stuff of life to everything living.” —Theodor Schwenk,
Water: The Element of Life.

Our forebears in all spiritual traditions, from the ancient Sumerians to the early Egyptians and Greeks, and native peoples everywhere, believed that water was sacred. Millions go to the Ganges River in India each year for spiritual cleansing. Says Mircea Eliade, “Immersion in water symbolizes...a total regeneration, a new birth, for immersion means dissolution of forms, a reintegration into the formlessness of pre-existence; and emerging from the water is a repetition of the act of creation in which form was first expressed...Water purifies and regenerates because it nullifies the past, and restores-even if only for a moment-the integrity of the dawn of things.”

Is water alive? Masaru Emoto’s book The Message from Water depicts vividly how our words and intentions can change the very crystalline structure of water. (See www.hado.net for some of these images, created by freezing water samples and using microscopic dark-field photography.) Water that is polluted or passed over a dam, or tap water, has a chaotic, non-crystalline form, whereas spring water forms lovely six-pointed crystals. But water which is blessed and thanked can revert from the blank look of distilled water to lovely, unique crystals. Try blessing and thanking the water you drink!

Hopeful Solutions
Permaculture offers many ways to conserve and restore water: rain storage in the ground via swales dug on contour, with plantings in the swales; rain catchment from metal roofs and stored in cisterns for drinking or irrigation; greywater recycling via creation of gravel beds with aquatic plants whose roots take up nutrients from used kitchen and bathtub water; and perhaps most important, composting toilets which use no water at all.

Internationally, an Oxfam project in Burkina Faso, Africa, helped villagers create 200 micro-catchments or swales, in which trees were grown for fruit, nuts, and fodder. For grain production, long lines of stones were placed along contours of slopes. Thus they increased yields in dry periods, while controlling runoff and erosion in heavy rains. In India, Rajendra Singh has been responsible for empowering farmers from 1,000 villages to create traditional “johads” (30-foot high earthen dams) to catch monsoon water in reservoirs for irrigation and replenishment of groundwater. 4500 dams have been built using local labor and native materials. Irrigation need not use so much water. By using a drip irrigation system, thirty to seventy percent less water can be used, and crop yields are increased while soil salinization is decreased. (National Geographic)

In his book Cradle to Cradle, visionary architect and designer William McDonough describes a process for making upholstery fabric out of completely nontoxic materials with the result that the effluent from the factory was cleaner than the inflowing water.

In conclusion, a final quote:

“Scientists must be made to realize that water is not something to be handled carelessly, like an inanimate object. Water is not merely H2O, but a living organism with its own laws commanding respect from mankind, if the consequences are not to be fatal.”—Viktor Schauberger

Cathy Holt is a permaculture teacher and holistic health practitioner and author of The Circle of Healing: Deepening Our Connections with Self, Others, and Nature. She is currently working for the Asheville Kindness Campaign and can be reached at 828-252-3054.