The fields are still full of stories. Let's bring the conversation back to nature // A look at how nature neutralizes suffering while inviting our innocence.
The bouquet of your recognition coupled with the courage to vulnerably express casts an inviting scent. Long ago I left the beaten path for the real world landing in the Aleutian’s where nature’s Cathedral enthralled me with her majesty. It is obvious but not easy to ascertain except in these quiet moments where “I” subsides, when the realization that we are indivisible from nature, nonetheless as a frog, a fox, a feathered friend, or a barked tree. It, nature, spirit or love is gently calling us always; join me, I’m right here, right here shshsh… 16 years ago when life splintered I found myself in the mighty Redwoods with an eight year old boy in tow, on the trip down when I randomly burst into tears and he asked are you Ok Dad? Yeah I just have a stomach ache that’s all, the gargantuan Redwoods suffused both our being, still before the monuments to time with an inexpressibly understand that defies words. We knew then we would be all right, and my were those might trees accurate. Before we left at a small store we bought a little Sequoia in a tube for $1.89. It found its way into a little pot, then a larger one and when we moved into our new home it was planted across the street at the edge of 11 acres. It is now 30 feet tall with a trunk that is too big to reach around. She’s been scorched when the field caught fire, and day before yesterday she said come and look at me, and I found the contractors that are erecting apartments had begun encroach on her space with backhoes. We of course met with humans to alert them and she’ll be fine. Hopefully in a few more decades as majestic as her ancestors. She’s alone on the field but not lonely.
All this is to say, everything that is living is connected whether we realize it or not, all of life is energetically unified and it is communicating in ways that is only blunted by our “ignor-ance” or self absorption (I making). This life is to be cherished it is exceedingly rare, and returning to it in our experience with the natural world is in fact a returning to ourselves. Blessings to you Sarah for relentlessly displaying these narratives from your own experience. It’s wonderful indeed. May all beings be happy, may all beings be safe, may all beings experience love. All is one, all is love, love is all. ☮️💜☸️🔵⬜️
I am finding more and more, the more layers I strip away that it is important to separate my “self” from my suffering…I am learning that my spirit or higher self or essence doesn’t suffer but my ego suffers constantly…we can choose to stop watching or focusing on our ego. I think that’s why nature helps. She draws us away from our ego and into and aligned our self. Just some thoughts…
Such a circle of remembrance you create in this space. Thank you!
I live where I live because of the trees. Today listening I hear the familiar warble of her sound as you lean against her strength.
Five years ago I said goodbye and thank you to seven trees on our little acreage. I was surprised how emotional I felt touching each one knowing they had witnessed so much love laughter sadness anger over 20 years of living. I promised them a young family to be to play and watch over. That happened. I asked them that wherever I land next may I be in touch with trees as grand and knowing as they. This is how I found our current home, or they found it for me. I knew as soon as I walked in the back yard, three massive cedar trees, standing protective and cradling of the green. One, her apron grand, revealing her roots hugging the earth. I call her Mama. Just yesterday I lay beneath her, feeling a pulse. I quickly dismissed as imagination. Yet now here I hear it through your connection and bringing remembrance through human connection, the beat continues. The words of Ram Dass in this moment ring true ‘We’re all just walking each other home’
Thank you Sarah, and all who circle here. Today this connection is home.
So beautiful, Sarah… feeling and resonating with your words: especially “humbled” and the (sometimes well disguised) “choice” we make to suffer, the “peaceful” presence of nature “dissolving” what we bring to her and “coming home to our Great Mother” 🌲 ❤️ Thank you 🙏 for sharing your beautiful heart in this beautiful space. 💝
Thank you , Sarah, for describing this resistance I too have felt while sharing in the connection of sitting with nature over the next 30 days. Each morning, I tip toe out to the tree I call “Resilience” and sit by her trunk waiting for some profound wisdom to come through. My, have I learned that nature does not have timelines and watches to attend to like I do. I set my alarm and say “Ok, 30 minutes, l am here resilience , I have to get to work after that, please teach me” and she does not speak. I cannot force or push or set due dates for her like the world does with me. This ancient unhurried frequency into the realm of sacred nature requires a new part of me to emerge. Or maybe it’s not new but more of a remembrance, a presence that patiently waits for us to remember her.
I have been thinking of you this week Sarah as the favorite part of my recent days has been sitting at the base of a wise oak tree. What cycles of thought, happenings, noticing, feelings I have experienced and befriended. At first it felt like an hour would be too long. Yet when I let myself sink more deeply into the earth, alongside her own deep roots, I noticed the unfolding of a shift to "BE" with. Like others have shared, I too find the tree suggests a patience, a settling of sorts before she speaks. Most of her sharing is that of the presence of a wise elder right now, and I am beginning to appreciate that. This time has so much more depth and richness to it, and it's ego-less. So I sit, and I allow, and I feel and I smile sometimes at all the happenings around me that I notice. A hawk that flew above onto a branch, a squirrel on its hind legs surprised at my presence, a wild turkey in the distance fanning its masculinity to attract a female. All sorts of things I would otherwise have been too busy to notice. What would it be like if we all met here in this way? I soooo love that we are doing this. Inspired by you, Sarah. A gift that I excitedly continue to give my soul from your generous inspiration and heart. Thank you, thank you, thank you!
Nature reminds me that my depth and underground system is what we have been reawakening. Much she expresses to me is birthing in the darkness and that I cannot rush her. No matter how I plead, her timing is the Great Mother’s. She beckons me to rein in my popcorn popping thoughts and allow them to alchemize into kernels/seeds. She laughs with me as we imagine a popcorn tree. Nature reminds me that I matter, yet so does ALL of creation. How might we work together, as One, she wonders? Slowly she removes my blinders and beckons me to not turn away. Return, return from that which you have come. She accepts all that I am and showers me with wiggle room and grace. Might I do the same when I feel tight, constricted and self absorbed? Her voice, her teachings, wow, she has a lot to share. That’s why some of her roots have been popping to the surface. I call her, Coeur, the French word for 💜. I ask her if I might come along as we travel her root system to the tops of her branches. She has not offered a reply yet. I sense she is asking me to lighten up and shed excess baggage so that I may glide effortlessly alongside her. My gratitude, Sarah, and fellow companions. Lovingly and with aloha.🌱🌴
Ah, how very well nature teaches us, first about ourselves, and then about others. Decades ago, while walking, every day, I would find a skull , one of a deer one of a fox, i even found an uninhabited turtle shel fully in tact. At first, I felt gratitude, taking each one hone and making a special place on a mantle. (of course, people thought I was crazy, who cares), However, after receiving quite an astonishing number of these woodland treasures, I began to want more. SO my walks changes. I was no longer sauntering, allowing an unfolding, I was actively searching, until I recognized greed and desire. I believe that was the day that my woodland haven was pleased, and opened her doors wider. SInce then I have experienced many more of her holy and healing secrets.
It's funny, really. When I go out into the woods I am immediately at home and feel safe. Safer than I ever feel in my home to be honest...and not because my home is unsafe. It's a different type of safe...one that is so totally inclusive it is beyond words.
It's been snowing ALL day today...not sticking thankfully as it's too 'warm' but snowing none the less. My desire to go out into the woods isn't strong enough today to warrant being cold. After having two weeks of spring, truthfully, I'm a little mad at the weather. LOL. How dare it tease me that way.
I have, however, spent long stretches just watching the frozen rain come down, doing my best not to wish for it to stop but just to wish it well.
Here's a fun image for you to ponder that will put a smile on your face...sort of like the frogs do. I have been 'training' several chickadees and nut hatches the past two weeks to take sunflower seeds from my hand and today, two of them hopped on, choose their seed and flew off. It was glorious!!! Let the spring be fully sprung!
Thank you for continuing your challenge. I enjoy seeing your words via your face in addition to hearing your sweet voice.
Thank you, Sarah. My favorite thing about trees is that they are simultaneously powerfully alive and working on a much slower timescale than my harried mind. I also appreciate how you model—and have modeled, for many years now—the way that trying to live in an honest way is an ongoing process in which some grand arrival isn’t the point, which instead has to do with deliberately layering in quiet amidst the sound. Both have their place, and they need each other in a way. I find that my favorite tree and I have a little exchange: I give my speed and sorrow, and it gives its slow calm. Maybe we both leave better from the exchange.
These words, your words, from some years back, have become a mantra for me, before I sleep & when I wake.
'There is a pool of calm water inside you.'
This is the place I go whilst in nature, or in my home, or my bed. There is no suffering there, my thoughts quiet and drink in the nourishment that always exists in my own being. I don't always have a tree to sit under, but nature always resides within me, nurturing me from the calm water. Your generous words continue to nourish this community, my soul, and your own humble heart. Deep bow. 🙏🏼
Sarah, what a wonderful practice and invitation you've set forth. Right now, where I live, Spring is around the corner even though we've just had 6 inches of snow. When the temps rise above 50, I will begin an outdoor sitting practice. Right now my practice is walking/hiking with dogs early in the mrornings, as the sun rises, no matter the weather! Thank you for the motivation, inasght, encouragement and the love you shower to the world. 🤎
Thank you, Sarah. I’m a newcomer to this space, but have been listening to you on Insight Timer for a while. I love what I hear there from you and presents you convey through your voice.
So this is the first video I have seen of yours. You’re preaching to the choir. Trees are so special. I have a pine tree in my backyard That I try to say good morning to every morning and sit for a while and watch the birds fly in and out of her. I call her Shecky. That short for Shecinah, the Jewish word for the female presence of The Divine.
Looking forward to hearing more of your thoughts that come from your heart.
What a delight to view this video recording.I so loved how you shared your resistance to coming back to sit with Grace. But in meeting that resistance and going anyway you were embraced by her secret charms and wisdom. The quivering in your voice signaled the sublime resonance and the eternal gratitude that only comes from coming home to the mother. I am immersed in Pema Chodron’s teachings at the moment and that sweetness of the daughter returning to the arms of the mother’s embrace is our invitation to come home to joy and wholeness .
So beautiful! Your presence is a gift to us all 💝.
I began writing a novel in here and decided to keep it simple.
Returning to nature- necessary and I allow the busy-ness of living distract or interrupt me from seeking the connection and remembrance of self that I can access in the woods or near the water.
Dear Sarah, thank you so much for this part #2 with wise tree Gracious/Grace. I've discovered a wonderful tree in my own backyard with whom I am sitting daily. Not for an hour (yet), but we've had sweet communion together. She has not shared her name with me - she wants for me to listen deeply, deep enough so I can hear her speak in her own tongue. After watching/listening to you, I wondered: What if our human suffering is partly (mostly?) because we are not connecting enough - in a genuine, practiced, humble and committed way - to the trees, soil, birds, lizards, grasses, flowers, animals, insects, mycelium and other beings? Woven into our lives, day and night. This is how we used to live, of course, if we go back far enough with our ancestors. What if our suffering is because of our separation from our beloved Earth Mother and all her children (not just us/humans)? What if our pain and separation can be healed just by sitting with a tree and listening, our bare feet on the ground, our ears filled with birdsong? Because I, like you, find that my suffering can be so graciously lifted by trees and skies and creatures as long as I surrender... much love to all.
The bouquet of your recognition coupled with the courage to vulnerably express casts an inviting scent. Long ago I left the beaten path for the real world landing in the Aleutian’s where nature’s Cathedral enthralled me with her majesty. It is obvious but not easy to ascertain except in these quiet moments where “I” subsides, when the realization that we are indivisible from nature, nonetheless as a frog, a fox, a feathered friend, or a barked tree. It, nature, spirit or love is gently calling us always; join me, I’m right here, right here shshsh… 16 years ago when life splintered I found myself in the mighty Redwoods with an eight year old boy in tow, on the trip down when I randomly burst into tears and he asked are you Ok Dad? Yeah I just have a stomach ache that’s all, the gargantuan Redwoods suffused both our being, still before the monuments to time with an inexpressibly understand that defies words. We knew then we would be all right, and my were those might trees accurate. Before we left at a small store we bought a little Sequoia in a tube for $1.89. It found its way into a little pot, then a larger one and when we moved into our new home it was planted across the street at the edge of 11 acres. It is now 30 feet tall with a trunk that is too big to reach around. She’s been scorched when the field caught fire, and day before yesterday she said come and look at me, and I found the contractors that are erecting apartments had begun encroach on her space with backhoes. We of course met with humans to alert them and she’ll be fine. Hopefully in a few more decades as majestic as her ancestors. She’s alone on the field but not lonely.
All this is to say, everything that is living is connected whether we realize it or not, all of life is energetically unified and it is communicating in ways that is only blunted by our “ignor-ance” or self absorption (I making). This life is to be cherished it is exceedingly rare, and returning to it in our experience with the natural world is in fact a returning to ourselves. Blessings to you Sarah for relentlessly displaying these narratives from your own experience. It’s wonderful indeed. May all beings be happy, may all beings be safe, may all beings experience love. All is one, all is love, love is all. ☮️💜☸️🔵⬜️
I am finding more and more, the more layers I strip away that it is important to separate my “self” from my suffering…I am learning that my spirit or higher self or essence doesn’t suffer but my ego suffers constantly…we can choose to stop watching or focusing on our ego. I think that’s why nature helps. She draws us away from our ego and into and aligned our self. Just some thoughts…
Such a circle of remembrance you create in this space. Thank you!
I live where I live because of the trees. Today listening I hear the familiar warble of her sound as you lean against her strength.
Five years ago I said goodbye and thank you to seven trees on our little acreage. I was surprised how emotional I felt touching each one knowing they had witnessed so much love laughter sadness anger over 20 years of living. I promised them a young family to be to play and watch over. That happened. I asked them that wherever I land next may I be in touch with trees as grand and knowing as they. This is how I found our current home, or they found it for me. I knew as soon as I walked in the back yard, three massive cedar trees, standing protective and cradling of the green. One, her apron grand, revealing her roots hugging the earth. I call her Mama. Just yesterday I lay beneath her, feeling a pulse. I quickly dismissed as imagination. Yet now here I hear it through your connection and bringing remembrance through human connection, the beat continues. The words of Ram Dass in this moment ring true ‘We’re all just walking each other home’
Thank you Sarah, and all who circle here. Today this connection is home.
So beautiful, Sarah… feeling and resonating with your words: especially “humbled” and the (sometimes well disguised) “choice” we make to suffer, the “peaceful” presence of nature “dissolving” what we bring to her and “coming home to our Great Mother” 🌲 ❤️ Thank you 🙏 for sharing your beautiful heart in this beautiful space. 💝
Thank you , Sarah, for describing this resistance I too have felt while sharing in the connection of sitting with nature over the next 30 days. Each morning, I tip toe out to the tree I call “Resilience” and sit by her trunk waiting for some profound wisdom to come through. My, have I learned that nature does not have timelines and watches to attend to like I do. I set my alarm and say “Ok, 30 minutes, l am here resilience , I have to get to work after that, please teach me” and she does not speak. I cannot force or push or set due dates for her like the world does with me. This ancient unhurried frequency into the realm of sacred nature requires a new part of me to emerge. Or maybe it’s not new but more of a remembrance, a presence that patiently waits for us to remember her.
I have been thinking of you this week Sarah as the favorite part of my recent days has been sitting at the base of a wise oak tree. What cycles of thought, happenings, noticing, feelings I have experienced and befriended. At first it felt like an hour would be too long. Yet when I let myself sink more deeply into the earth, alongside her own deep roots, I noticed the unfolding of a shift to "BE" with. Like others have shared, I too find the tree suggests a patience, a settling of sorts before she speaks. Most of her sharing is that of the presence of a wise elder right now, and I am beginning to appreciate that. This time has so much more depth and richness to it, and it's ego-less. So I sit, and I allow, and I feel and I smile sometimes at all the happenings around me that I notice. A hawk that flew above onto a branch, a squirrel on its hind legs surprised at my presence, a wild turkey in the distance fanning its masculinity to attract a female. All sorts of things I would otherwise have been too busy to notice. What would it be like if we all met here in this way? I soooo love that we are doing this. Inspired by you, Sarah. A gift that I excitedly continue to give my soul from your generous inspiration and heart. Thank you, thank you, thank you!
Nature reminds me that my depth and underground system is what we have been reawakening. Much she expresses to me is birthing in the darkness and that I cannot rush her. No matter how I plead, her timing is the Great Mother’s. She beckons me to rein in my popcorn popping thoughts and allow them to alchemize into kernels/seeds. She laughs with me as we imagine a popcorn tree. Nature reminds me that I matter, yet so does ALL of creation. How might we work together, as One, she wonders? Slowly she removes my blinders and beckons me to not turn away. Return, return from that which you have come. She accepts all that I am and showers me with wiggle room and grace. Might I do the same when I feel tight, constricted and self absorbed? Her voice, her teachings, wow, she has a lot to share. That’s why some of her roots have been popping to the surface. I call her, Coeur, the French word for 💜. I ask her if I might come along as we travel her root system to the tops of her branches. She has not offered a reply yet. I sense she is asking me to lighten up and shed excess baggage so that I may glide effortlessly alongside her. My gratitude, Sarah, and fellow companions. Lovingly and with aloha.🌱🌴
Ah, how very well nature teaches us, first about ourselves, and then about others. Decades ago, while walking, every day, I would find a skull , one of a deer one of a fox, i even found an uninhabited turtle shel fully in tact. At first, I felt gratitude, taking each one hone and making a special place on a mantle. (of course, people thought I was crazy, who cares), However, after receiving quite an astonishing number of these woodland treasures, I began to want more. SO my walks changes. I was no longer sauntering, allowing an unfolding, I was actively searching, until I recognized greed and desire. I believe that was the day that my woodland haven was pleased, and opened her doors wider. SInce then I have experienced many more of her holy and healing secrets.
It's funny, really. When I go out into the woods I am immediately at home and feel safe. Safer than I ever feel in my home to be honest...and not because my home is unsafe. It's a different type of safe...one that is so totally inclusive it is beyond words.
It's been snowing ALL day today...not sticking thankfully as it's too 'warm' but snowing none the less. My desire to go out into the woods isn't strong enough today to warrant being cold. After having two weeks of spring, truthfully, I'm a little mad at the weather. LOL. How dare it tease me that way.
I have, however, spent long stretches just watching the frozen rain come down, doing my best not to wish for it to stop but just to wish it well.
Here's a fun image for you to ponder that will put a smile on your face...sort of like the frogs do. I have been 'training' several chickadees and nut hatches the past two weeks to take sunflower seeds from my hand and today, two of them hopped on, choose their seed and flew off. It was glorious!!! Let the spring be fully sprung!
Thank you for continuing your challenge. I enjoy seeing your words via your face in addition to hearing your sweet voice.
Your sister forest lover in Montana, Elisabeth
Thank you, Sarah. My favorite thing about trees is that they are simultaneously powerfully alive and working on a much slower timescale than my harried mind. I also appreciate how you model—and have modeled, for many years now—the way that trying to live in an honest way is an ongoing process in which some grand arrival isn’t the point, which instead has to do with deliberately layering in quiet amidst the sound. Both have their place, and they need each other in a way. I find that my favorite tree and I have a little exchange: I give my speed and sorrow, and it gives its slow calm. Maybe we both leave better from the exchange.
These words, your words, from some years back, have become a mantra for me, before I sleep & when I wake.
'There is a pool of calm water inside you.'
This is the place I go whilst in nature, or in my home, or my bed. There is no suffering there, my thoughts quiet and drink in the nourishment that always exists in my own being. I don't always have a tree to sit under, but nature always resides within me, nurturing me from the calm water. Your generous words continue to nourish this community, my soul, and your own humble heart. Deep bow. 🙏🏼
Sarah, what a wonderful practice and invitation you've set forth. Right now, where I live, Spring is around the corner even though we've just had 6 inches of snow. When the temps rise above 50, I will begin an outdoor sitting practice. Right now my practice is walking/hiking with dogs early in the mrornings, as the sun rises, no matter the weather! Thank you for the motivation, inasght, encouragement and the love you shower to the world. 🤎
Thank you, Sarah. I’m a newcomer to this space, but have been listening to you on Insight Timer for a while. I love what I hear there from you and presents you convey through your voice.
So this is the first video I have seen of yours. You’re preaching to the choir. Trees are so special. I have a pine tree in my backyard That I try to say good morning to every morning and sit for a while and watch the birds fly in and out of her. I call her Shecky. That short for Shecinah, the Jewish word for the female presence of The Divine.
Looking forward to hearing more of your thoughts that come from your heart.
Sweet smiling Sarah🌸
What a delight to view this video recording.I so loved how you shared your resistance to coming back to sit with Grace. But in meeting that resistance and going anyway you were embraced by her secret charms and wisdom. The quivering in your voice signaled the sublime resonance and the eternal gratitude that only comes from coming home to the mother. I am immersed in Pema Chodron’s teachings at the moment and that sweetness of the daughter returning to the arms of the mother’s embrace is our invitation to come home to joy and wholeness .
So beautiful! Your presence is a gift to us all 💝.
🙏Thank you🙏
Love this Sarah, thank you.
I began writing a novel in here and decided to keep it simple.
Returning to nature- necessary and I allow the busy-ness of living distract or interrupt me from seeking the connection and remembrance of self that I can access in the woods or near the water.
Thank you for the reminder.
Dear Sarah, thank you so much for this part #2 with wise tree Gracious/Grace. I've discovered a wonderful tree in my own backyard with whom I am sitting daily. Not for an hour (yet), but we've had sweet communion together. She has not shared her name with me - she wants for me to listen deeply, deep enough so I can hear her speak in her own tongue. After watching/listening to you, I wondered: What if our human suffering is partly (mostly?) because we are not connecting enough - in a genuine, practiced, humble and committed way - to the trees, soil, birds, lizards, grasses, flowers, animals, insects, mycelium and other beings? Woven into our lives, day and night. This is how we used to live, of course, if we go back far enough with our ancestors. What if our suffering is because of our separation from our beloved Earth Mother and all her children (not just us/humans)? What if our pain and separation can be healed just by sitting with a tree and listening, our bare feet on the ground, our ears filled with birdsong? Because I, like you, find that my suffering can be so graciously lifted by trees and skies and creatures as long as I surrender... much love to all.