Monday, February 14, 2011

Healing in Nature

I spent the weekend recently with a group of dear girlfriends for our annual beach trip.  We rented a perfect little cottage overlooking the ocean to enjoy spending time in nature, and with each other.

I love being at the ocean, but it turns out that I’m the only one of the group who actually loves the mountains even more.  It doesn’t matter if I’m spending days there, or just driving through on my way to somewhere else.  My spirit hasn’t yet found a more sacred home than California’s high mountains.

My family teases me when we drive up there, because at some point I always stick my head out of the window like a happy dog and let the smell and taste of the tall pines and the forest floor fill my senses. 

The sound of the wind whooshing through the treetops washes over me and through me, and for a time nothing else exists.  I am at peace, in reverence of the complete perfection of this life that is beyond adequate words to describe it. 

I don’t get up into the high country as much as I’d like to, but thankfully there are many ways to bring the healing gifts of nature into our lives.  We can always find some aspect of nature’s beauty expressing itself, even in the middle of the concrete of the city.  If we take just a few minutes to stop and notice how the leaves on a tree dance in the sunlight, or how the storm clouds race past in deepening colors, we know the majesty of this precious planet.  We are reminded of the sacred miracle of this life we are born into, and of the deep privilege in our being here.

The powerful healing that we get from being in nature comes, I believe, from its ability to remind us of what is most true.  The divine consciousness that created nature’s infinite splendor reveals that same splendor moving in and through us with every breath we take.  And nature’s amazing beauty in all of its forms reflects the never-ending perfection in all of it.

May you take time to see all the good things, and may this tool be a blessing. . .

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