My name is Aaron Doughty and I help people expand their consciousness.
I’m going to be sharing with you the power of paradox and showing you how this can
be a powerful hack for totally changing your reality. I’m going to show you exactly how to use it and how it’s transformed my own life. As I went through a spiritual awakening back in 2012 that changed my life. I learned meditation and started to question everything
I “thought” about who I am. That propelled a journey of self-discovery of reading
100’s of books, listening to seminars and going within to look for the answers.
Through that journey I let go of my painful past, dropped labels that didn’t serve,
and became FREE of much of the autopilot beliefs I was operating from.
From that point on, I have felt it is my mission to empower other people to know that they are highly vibrational beings that can become FREE of the past pain and past negative experiences. I believe my life purpose is to raise my vibration and level of consciousness and to help others do it too. I believe that deep down, you are on a journey of raising your vibration and that as you do, it through The Power of Paradox – YouTube it changes the world.
Collision of opposites
By Sara Olding
I believe in the power of paradox.
Years ago, when I had very young children I also lost all four of my grandparents over
the span of just a few years. The collision of opposites during that time forced me to see the power of paradox. There was loss, but also renewal. While they were gone, I became acutely aware of the parts of them that I still wanted my children to know. The way my Grandma Schlater never forgot a birthday, the way my Grandma Weigandt patiently taught me to peel apples and bake apple pie each October – these became habits that
I celebrated and instilled in my own children.
Recently my mother-in-law was diagnosed with cancer and our family life was filled with uncertainty. She is the anchor – easily the kindest and most helpful person I know. As she began her journey to recovery, there were more questions than answers. There was fear and uncertainty – there was chaos that forced a sort of surrendering of plans. Sitting with fear was the only thing that could force courage. Though we couldn’t see it in the raw pain of the moment.
The surrender was necessary to find healing.
We can’t understand the significance of the collision of opposites when we are in the middle of them. There are too many big emotions to manage so we have to practice stepping outside of them. We can only appreciate the significance once we gain a
wider perspective. It requires some reflection to put it all in context.
This collision of opposites is one of the many reasons that I love teaching seniors in high school. Graduation marks the end of something, but also the beginning of so much more. It is the end of the only life they have known, but the start of any life they want.
This collision of opposites is so powerful! These students are just beginning to
discover the power of reflecting on paradoxes.
There are many paradoxes for which I am grateful.
For example, the more I listen and the quieter I get, the more I discover the clarity of my own voice. The more I give, the less I want. The more I learn, the more I realize how little
I actually know. The less attention I pay to things that I know really don’t matter, the more I discover the satisfaction of what actually does.
The contrast, the contradiction- it has become something that I study and celebrate, because when I do I always find meaning. A year ago, my college age daughter left for
a semester abroad. She was homesick but also not ready to come home.
She didn’t want the semester to be over but also wanted the semester to end.
It wasn’t until we sat in the contradiction of it all that we realized the power of the paradox and the utility of wrestling with the opposites. The times in life when we feel the struggle most often foster seasons of great hope and gratitude. Here we are a year later and she is graduating from college and carving out a new chapter. Again – an end and a beginning.
A mix of emotions as she embraces something wonderful ending and the excitement and uncertainty of a whole new start. My advice to her and to my students is that sometimes life isn’t either/or. Infact, most of the time life is both/and. It is up to us to figure out what that means. What a big and beautiful journey that can be if only we let it.
To all of the Sidney Daily News readers who took the time to send letters and cards to
the student writers featured in the VOICES series, thank you so very much! It has been a profound experience for students to discover the power of their own voices as they receive your encouraging feedback.
Sara Olding is a teacher at Sidney High School. She collaborates with Miami University each summer for the Ohio Writing Project. In her free time she enjoys running, reading, hiking and traveling. This summer she is looking forward to going to Redwood National Park to see the giant trees.
Most Redwood Trees Wont Burn in a Wildfire – Search (bing.com)
History of the Giant Redwood Trees – Bing video
Interesting Redwood National Park Facts – YouTube
The Tallest Trees on Earth – 4K Nature Documentary Film
| Redwood National and State Parks – YouTube
Read on for our Top 10 most awesome facts about magnificent redwood trees. For youth, check out our Importance of Redwoods infographic, available in English and Spanish, with 5 Facts about redwoods and 5 ways to help them.
Top 10 Facts About Redwood Trees
1. Tallest Tree on Earth
Coast redwood trees are the tallest trees on the planet. They can grow to 300 feet high
or more, as compared to the tallest pine tree at 268 feet or the tallest tanoak at 162 feet. The tallest recorded redwood tree in the Santa Cruz Mountains is Big Basin Redwoods State Park’s “Mother of the Forest” at 329 feet high which is just 50 feet shy of the tallest tree on earth, the redwood known as “Hyperion” 1.
All this magnificence in height, and yet a typical redwood’s root system is only 6 to 12 feet deep. Redwoods create the strength to withstand powerful winds and floods by extending their roots outwards, up to 100 feet wide from the trunk, and living in groves where their roots can intertwine.
A redwood can’t grow to be the tallest tree on earth alone. It needs the support and protection of other trees in the forest to grow tall—holding carbon and providing plant
and wildlife habitat every inch of the way. That’s why it’s so important to protect and connect forest lands so the trees can thrive together.
2. Redwood Trees Almost as Old as the Dinosaurs.
The earliest redwoods showed up on Earth shortly after the dinosaurs –
before flowers, birds, spiders… and, of course, humans. Redwoods have been around for about 240 million years2, and in California for at least 20 million years, compared to about 200,000 years for “modern” humans3. However, in just the last 150 years, human impacts have drastically reduced the number of these ancient trees through clear-cut logging and development. Only 5% of old-growth redwood forests remain. Today, Sempervirens Fund protects and restores thousands of acres of redwood forests in the Santa Cruz Mountains so they can continue to provide habitat, clean air, and awe for generations to come.
3. They Live for Thousands of Years
Officially, the oldest living coast redwood has been alive for at least 2,200 years, but foresters believe some coast redwoods may be much older4. Their bark helps them survive many hardships that other trees cannot—it can be at least a foot thick and contains lots of tannins, a compound that makes redwoods resistant to insects, fungus and diseases.
Their bark has very little resin which is one of the ways redwoods are fire resilient.
Although a redwoods’ ability for a long lifespan contributed to its Latin name, Sequoia sempervirens—sempervirens means “evergreen” or “everlasting” in Latin—most of the remaining redwoods in the Santa Cruz Mountains are “second-growth”, about 50-150 years old.
When you walk or ride through the Santa Cruz Mountains, you are in a nursery of
young redwoods that, if protected, can live for 2,000 years cleaning carbon from the air, providing habitat for wildlife, and inspiring people for generations to come. That’s how our founders named our nonprofit organization working to protect, expand and care for the local redwood forests “Sempervirens” in 1900. Learn more about Sempervirens Fund’s history protecting redwoods.
4. Redwoods Take Care of Each Other
A redwood’s shallow but widespread roots, help them survive by intertwining with the roots of other trees around them. Intertwined root systems provide stability to these mighty trees during strong winds and floods – quite literally holding one another down. Their shallow roots can also sprout and support new redwood trees far more successfully than from their cone seeds. Redwoods can often be seen growing in circles, known as “fairy rings” or “family circles”, because they sprouted from the roots of a parent tree.
The parent tree helps to nourish the sprouts with water and sugars through its well-established root system while they grow. When the parent trees die, the young redwoods continue to grow in the circle shielding, stabilizing, and nourishing each other through their roots. Redwoods will help each other even if they aren’t “family”. Trees in the ring aren’t always genetically identical or clones of the parent tree.
Some of the redwoods in a ring can also grow from seedlings 5. Redwoods take care of one another supporting each other with nutrients through their interconnected roots including their young, sick and old. We’re also just beginning to learn about how trees like redwoods communicate and work together 6.
It takes a forest to raise a mighty redwood. Redwoods are stronger together.
By protecting and connecting redwood forests in the Santa Cruz Mountains, we can help redwoods thrive together so they can grow tall, clean the most air, and provide habitat and awe for thousands of years.
5. They Make Rain
Like Mt Denali in Alaska the Redwoods can make its own rain.
Denali is the highest mountain peak in North America, with a summit elevation of 20,310 feet above sea level. It is the tallest mountain in the world from base-to-peak on land, measuring 18,000 ft. With a topographic prominence of 20,194 feet and a topographic isolation of 4,621.1 miles, Denali is the third most prominent and third most isolated peak on Earth, after Mount Everest and Aconcagua. Located in the Alaska Range in the interior of the U.S. state of Alaska, Denali is the centerpiece of Denali National Park and Preserve.
The Redwood trees also prefer a moist environment to get all of the water they need for their gigantic size. They have adapted to help form their own habitat. A redwood’s leaves can both absorb moisture from fog right from the air and can also condense fog into drops and rain them down to soak the soil around them7. But that’s not all. From their leaves, redwoods can release terpenes which help condense moisture in the air into clouds that cool the forest8. Redwoods can also transpire moisture back into the air to help keep the forest cool and moist during dry months for themselves and the plants around them. You can read more about the role redwoods play in the water cycle here.
6. Redwood Trees Ecosystems – Search (bing.com)
Entire ecosystems can live within redwood branches high off the ground. Because redwoods can grow so large and old, their shed leaves collect together with dust and
water on their branches and eventually become soil mats that create mini-ecosystems 9. Hundreds of plants including ferns, moss, lichen, huckleberries, and even other full-sized trees have been found living in the canopies of redwoods10. These plants provide food for wildlife living in the redwood’s soil mats including insects and amphibians11. While many more species of birds and small mammals such as bats and squirrels nest and find food growing on redwoods, some species like wandering salamanders live their entire lives in the canopy of a single redwood tree12.
photo by daveynin
7. Wild Animals Thrive Here
The redwood forests of the Santa Cruz Mountains are near the end of the
largest temperate rainforest in the world which stretches up the north Pacific Coast13
and supports hundreds of species of wildlife14. Wild, endangered creatures like mountain lions, Coho salmon and marbled murrelet depend on our local redwood forests to survive. Wildlife need large, connected areas of diverse habitat to get the food, water, shelter, and potential mates to thrive. Although some species like the Strobeen’s parnassian butterfly have already disappeared from the Santa Cruz Mountains due to habitat loss15, other species like endangered coho salmon are making a comeback thanks to habitat protection and restoration efforts. Protecting and connecting habitat for wildlife is especially critical for their survival as our communities continue to grow into natural places that once provided them refuge. When we protect habitat for threatened and endangered species, often the most sensitive or specialized creatures, all wildlife in and near the habitat benefit.
8. Redwoods are Climate Change Heroes.
While all trees are crucial to maintaining a stable, human-friendly climate, redwoods are climate change heroes. Studies show that coast redwoods capture more carbon dioxide (CO2) from our cars, trucks and power plants than any other tree on Earth16. Thanks to their large size, long lifespan, and rot-resistant wood, redwood trees can pull and hold at least three times more carbon from the air, thereby cleaning more air and helping to keep temperatures from rising, than the average tree17. In fact, redwoods can be so large that new studies measuring them more effectively with the use of lasers and computer modeling to better estimate their size show that redwoods may be 30% larger than previously thought thereby holding even more carbon18. More research is being done to see how redwood trees can help to decrease the effects of climate change. In the meantime, protecting the redwood forests we have now is crucial particularly as the effects of climate change itself including higher temperatures, drought, and much hotter and more frequent wildfires threaten them. As the climate changes, the redwood forests in the Santa Cruz Mountains are one of very few places that can provide a refuge for local plants and animals to survive 19, because the area has many microclimates, is cooled by coastal summertime fog and is still largely unpaved. Read more about Redwoods and Climate Change.
9. Last Natural Habitat
Coast redwood’s only natural habitat is right here on the Pacific Coast from Big Sur
to southern Oregon20. Once redwoods had a much wider range across the Northern Hemisphere, including western North America and the coasts of Europe and Asia21.
The coastal fog in this area has helped supply enough water to support the redwood giants through all of the seasons22 for the last 20 million years23. Although coast redwoods have been established by people in other places of the world like New Zealand24, the oldest and tallest coast redwoods are in their natural habitat25 where they have rain, fog, and forests of neighboring redwoods, fungi, and creatures like banana slugs helping to support them. Protecting their last remaining natural habitat is crucial so redwoods can reach their full potential as the tallest trees on the planet and our awe-inspiring climate change heroes.
10. Only 5% of Redwoods are Left
Only 5% of the original old-growth coast redwood forests that flourished on the Pacific Coast are left. Because redwoods are extremely resistant to insects, fire and rot, they are treasured for building and 95% of them have been cut down since the 1850s26.
The survival of several redwood buildings from the 1906 fire in San Francisco launched
a flurry of demand for redwood lumber in the rebuilding of the city and elsewhere27.
By 1900, logging spurred a group of concerned people to form Sempervirens Club, now known as Sempervirens Fund, and start the redwood conservation movement which has successfully preserved thousands of acres of redwood forest.
However, there is much more land still at risk.
In 2011, the International Union for Conservation of Nature listed redwoods as endangered28. Today, we have a rare chance to re-establish the once-vast and vibrant local redwood forest into a magnificent, life-giving world between Silicon Valley and the Pacific Ocean. Although many old-growth redwoods have been cut down, younger second-growth redwoods have resprouted since then, some even of the same genetic stock of their massive predecessors.
By protecting redwood forests and helping to restore ideal conditions through careful stewardship, old-growth redwood forests can grow again. With a little help from us to get started, the redwood forest can recover from the massive logging and fragmentation that took place during the last 150 years29. Once protected and restored, the redwood forest will take care of itself – providing plant and wildlife habitat, clean air, and inspiration for thousands and even millions of years to come.
The Power of Paradox By Sara Olding – Bing images