The fields are still full of stories. Let's bring the conversation back to nature // The power of nature to help us find our right feet and make life easier.
I remember long time back sitting on the bench in the nearby forest and crying. My heart was completely broken at that moment. And I remember I looked up into the branches of very tall trees that were surrounding me. And as I was looking up, I started to be amazed by their beauty and I felt a lot of comfort and support. It was simple, but yet so magical. Branches were swaying from side to side and I found myself in their nest.
It took me many years to come to the point of looking up to the branches again. I started to connect with forest again about 6 months back.
It is hard to find people who are walking similar path, I am so grateful that you are.
Nature has met me half way, and only as I entered my 30s, I had no choice during covid but to lend a hand in saving a local Learning Garden in LA, (both my feet were out at the time.) But while I set out thrashing about with a shovel, not a clue in the world on how to garden, I’d start to notice all these little life metaphors in the garden 🦋 I learned deeply, and coupled with some wisdom from medicine men & women who grew their plants there, it was like a whole different world opened up in me that was dormant.
When my two years were up, I had to go back home to Sydney, and I realised that I had changed, and rather than working on & saving this garden in the middle of urban LA, I realised more or less that the garden had saved me.
This really resonates with my own process at the moment. As someone who always wants to understand things deeply, thinks about things deeply, I was talking to my daughter yesterday. She commented that I don’t always have to get so deep. My partner says the same thing! I replied I don’t really know how else to be. I would consider them both very grounded, practical people. I suppose where I’m going with this is what Sarah said about the sense of having one foot planted very much in contact with earth and the support that provides in then being able to ponder some of the bigger, deeper questions in life. I’m learning this is so necessary from a spiritual perspective, otherwise we completely bypass. We have to connect to Mother Earth and learn what we can from nature to fully incarnate. Thank you again Sarah for this wonderful insight.
Growing up the grasslands and mountains around me held me and gave solace and escape from a home with an alcoholic father and unstable mother . That love for Nature and her creatures has only grown and saves me, daily . Such love even led me find my second career - rewilding gardens so others can find sanctuary in their own spaces .
Sarah… Yet another brilliant contemplation of resting in the depths of our souls calling. How you’ve witnessed at sunset the birds calling their beloved home. How sweet to witness this daily homecoming back to the nest. 🪹
Like the Russian dolls, I think we all have these nests at different levels. The homes we create on a physical/emotional plane is where we rest, sleep, gather, cook, and clean. A place that offers some sense of safety from the elements, where we store our possessions, where we land with our own families. Where the push and pull of life is most readily revealed… the love, tension, boredom, resentments, anger, forgiveness, lethargy, and joy all have a seat at the table here. Whether we like it or not. All reside. Lessons appearing moment to moment.
On another level, we create another nest. Where we encounter the like minded, those that share similar interests. Maybe it’s the musical tribe, the gardening gatherers, the painters’ pod, the writers’ alcove, the gym gurus, the sports enthusiasts. They all offer a place where our worldly interests/preferences are shared, acknowledged, encouraged. There’s a sense of camaraderie and collaboration within perhaps any competition. Yet this home also has secret rooms where jealousy, comparison, and feelings of lesser than or more than also reside.
I think your experience of sitting in nature and mine too when I’ve really resided there, is where our soul is able to truly rest. It is the homecoming to ourselves. We may rest in yet this other nest , where our soul tribe swims into these waters together, but each one of us must float in its stillness alone. We must experience this for ourselves, no one can do it for us.
As you were describing having one foot in the world and one foot in this ephemeral space, I am reminded of Eckhart Tolle’s pointer. We are all human beings. In the simple name of our species, is the teaching. We honor both. We live in the gap. Always in touch with our humanity but always at one with the divine.
Thank you sweet Sarah for your brilliant reminders. Extending so much love to all of you under your tress and me under mine.
I found myself hearing this as three separate voices, a trio taking turns, the center one the tree, the being that most called to me. Thank you for this and for your years of meditations that have walked along side me—a sister tree sitter who needed this reminder to return.
As I sit with my back against the tree trunk I can feel the frequency and feel myself merge with it. The branches are my arms with the sun warming my leaves. It’s like a hug of unconditional love and I’m home again. Wisdom and rooted calm.
Your nature/tree writings have been very synchronous with my own journey. About a month ago I stayed in the first for a retreat hosted by several forest bathing instructors. I found such healing there - the forest and trees and birds reaching out to hold me, speak to me, nurture me back to my ancient seed of being in their wise ways. It changed me and I’ve brought the practice back home. The other day I went out to the red pines on a lake and found a grandmother pine. With a deep tenderness, I melted into a hug against her welcoming trunk and she hugged me back, as any good mother would absorbing our tears - our hearts beating as one. Thank you for sharing your own stories. They meet me and encourage me in my own growth and healing with the land.
It is dawn, and I hear the birds calling me to come out and sit. After listening to this (and reading all these comments, I feel blessed to really hear them this morning, and am now off to find a tree 🌳 🙏 ❤️
Always held in nature if we allow it. Martina, I too can recall a moment when young and in despair when my emotions were overbearing me and I looked up and saw the stars in the night sky. I felt rescued in that moment and I went home and wrote a poem. I can still only recall a few lines but it began with 'like a blanket it covers the city and watches over those who weep'. Sarah as you spoke those words I recalled standing by the ocean edge this morning and truly feeling that 'there was nothing more to add'. As a young woman in my own company throughout the years in nature I would often be looking and searching for something, perhaps only being filled if it was shared with someone. Now I know and feel deeply that there is nothing to add, to 'Just see, just witness, just be allow myself to be filled with grace, awe and wonder. And wow, isnt that enough xxxx
As I listened to your soothing voice, I began to sway back and forth.
Gentle like the wind, I kept swaying. Your venture to sit beneath a tree and absorb the natural flow of life around you brings me back to a specific memory. Following the death of my closest sibling, my brother, at just 31 years old, I couldn't be around family or friends. I needed the wild.
I drove to the forest when my mother choked out the horrifying news that my brother had taken his own life. I drove to the forest after speaking at his memorial. I went to the wild. And what I did, both at the site of his passing and following his memorial, was sink my hands into the dirt. Cover my hands completely in the earth. Feel the connection of movement and stillness. The deeper I pressed my hands the cooler the earth became, though the sun still warmed my face.
Just like a tree, with roots running deep-- so were my limbs and soul-- sinking deep into the Mother Earth to soothe an indescribable pain and new partner of grief. For a moment, the wind picked up and the tears stopped. I sat in silent soothing surrender to the light and dark of this human experience. To the soil of life. Thank you for sharing your sacred journey, Sarah.
I find myself emptied out of the worldly clammors while sitting at the base of a tree. The Mother clears and cleanses my body, mind, and soul and wispers "be". The absolute hardest thing is the simplest. Very much like you mentioned Sarah to be the tree, sky, etc. Only by emptying my chaotic mind and being the tree am I able to fill up with the peace of Mother Earth. Profound yet simple. Who knew?!?!?
I had such a resounding “YES” in my Spirit when reading each of the Wild Voice posts. I am coming to this later then when it started but it’s been so fulfilling to see and listen and just drink in what this practice has been to so many here. I thought when starting I would go out to our woods and find that familiar old oak tree that always calls out to me when I walk through. He has been on this land for a very long time…I imagine he holds stories of the Hopewell people that were native to this area. I think the land has been waiting on me to walk in open hearted and unscripted because when I walked up to the old oak tree I almost could feel him saying to me that our time together will come soon but not yet and to walk ahead. So I did and not so far away my eyes landed on a very tall tree that had fallen over recently in a wind storm. I followed the urge inside to go over and wrap my body around her fallen body. I just laid there for what seemed like a long time but was probably only a couple minutes, with my ear up against her bark as if listening for a heartbeat.
She still speaks 🥹. I have gone out to her twice now. Waiting and listening. No giant revelations just an invitation to remain unrushed and let the quiet have its way. Sarah, I am just so grateful you are sharing this journey with us. I didn’t know how much my soul needed this. Love to all. 🫶🏽🌳🫶🏽
When I was a kid, nature wasn't a big part of my life. But there was a space between our garage and the neighbor's garage where I would go and pretend I was a pioneer; a Little House on the Prairie tv show-inspired pioneer. I made a bench out of a wood plank and twigs and found rocks and leaves to use as dishes, and then imagined myself keeping house and living off the land in that small, between-garages space. Now, 40ish years later, I live in the mountains of Colorado, and daily I think it is a miracle that I get to live in a place so beautiful. I still collect rocks and leaves, though I usually end up leaving the stones where I found them. And I think I've carried a bit of Laura Ingall's resourcefulness with me over the years.
i really resonate so deeply with feeling like i will die if i cannot go into storytelling mode, when something is stripped back to basics i find myself scared because stories and making meaning was how i comforted myself as an only child; i used my imagination to play.
i’m inspired by this practice of yours because i have been avoiding hiking because i do not want to face all the negative chatter that constantly swirls into my brain, but this is a motivating me to try, to see, to confront what i am so afraid to sit inside of. thank you sarah.
A truly winsome reflection and spoken so gently. Forgetting and remembering, yes that’s the plan. Note to self remember to pause. The language of what was spoken seems universal to me, despite our reluctance across geographies and cultures, this knowingness deep inside which is never other than perfect imperfection perennially balanced— I have a name for this which I call the Palm of God’s hand. Whatever version of faith, spirituality, or concept one ascribes to, this seems universal to me such as a smile, a wink a nod. While we remain separated by sovereign agendas are we not yet one people beautifully created in such an image. In this offering Sarah I could feel the wide eyed child inside and your heartfelt adaptation to this life which leads all to the sea. Happy belated Easter. Someday may the mystery be revealed in the name of Love!
I remember long time back sitting on the bench in the nearby forest and crying. My heart was completely broken at that moment. And I remember I looked up into the branches of very tall trees that were surrounding me. And as I was looking up, I started to be amazed by their beauty and I felt a lot of comfort and support. It was simple, but yet so magical. Branches were swaying from side to side and I found myself in their nest.
It took me many years to come to the point of looking up to the branches again. I started to connect with forest again about 6 months back.
It is hard to find people who are walking similar path, I am so grateful that you are.
Love,
Martina
Nature has met me half way, and only as I entered my 30s, I had no choice during covid but to lend a hand in saving a local Learning Garden in LA, (both my feet were out at the time.) But while I set out thrashing about with a shovel, not a clue in the world on how to garden, I’d start to notice all these little life metaphors in the garden 🦋 I learned deeply, and coupled with some wisdom from medicine men & women who grew their plants there, it was like a whole different world opened up in me that was dormant.
When my two years were up, I had to go back home to Sydney, and I realised that I had changed, and rather than working on & saving this garden in the middle of urban LA, I realised more or less that the garden had saved me.
This really resonates with my own process at the moment. As someone who always wants to understand things deeply, thinks about things deeply, I was talking to my daughter yesterday. She commented that I don’t always have to get so deep. My partner says the same thing! I replied I don’t really know how else to be. I would consider them both very grounded, practical people. I suppose where I’m going with this is what Sarah said about the sense of having one foot planted very much in contact with earth and the support that provides in then being able to ponder some of the bigger, deeper questions in life. I’m learning this is so necessary from a spiritual perspective, otherwise we completely bypass. We have to connect to Mother Earth and learn what we can from nature to fully incarnate. Thank you again Sarah for this wonderful insight.
Growing up the grasslands and mountains around me held me and gave solace and escape from a home with an alcoholic father and unstable mother . That love for Nature and her creatures has only grown and saves me, daily . Such love even led me find my second career - rewilding gardens so others can find sanctuary in their own spaces .
Sarah… Yet another brilliant contemplation of resting in the depths of our souls calling. How you’ve witnessed at sunset the birds calling their beloved home. How sweet to witness this daily homecoming back to the nest. 🪹
Like the Russian dolls, I think we all have these nests at different levels. The homes we create on a physical/emotional plane is where we rest, sleep, gather, cook, and clean. A place that offers some sense of safety from the elements, where we store our possessions, where we land with our own families. Where the push and pull of life is most readily revealed… the love, tension, boredom, resentments, anger, forgiveness, lethargy, and joy all have a seat at the table here. Whether we like it or not. All reside. Lessons appearing moment to moment.
On another level, we create another nest. Where we encounter the like minded, those that share similar interests. Maybe it’s the musical tribe, the gardening gatherers, the painters’ pod, the writers’ alcove, the gym gurus, the sports enthusiasts. They all offer a place where our worldly interests/preferences are shared, acknowledged, encouraged. There’s a sense of camaraderie and collaboration within perhaps any competition. Yet this home also has secret rooms where jealousy, comparison, and feelings of lesser than or more than also reside.
I think your experience of sitting in nature and mine too when I’ve really resided there, is where our soul is able to truly rest. It is the homecoming to ourselves. We may rest in yet this other nest , where our soul tribe swims into these waters together, but each one of us must float in its stillness alone. We must experience this for ourselves, no one can do it for us.
As you were describing having one foot in the world and one foot in this ephemeral space, I am reminded of Eckhart Tolle’s pointer. We are all human beings. In the simple name of our species, is the teaching. We honor both. We live in the gap. Always in touch with our humanity but always at one with the divine.
Thank you sweet Sarah for your brilliant reminders. Extending so much love to all of you under your tress and me under mine.
🌳💗🌳🙏🌳💗🌳
I found myself hearing this as three separate voices, a trio taking turns, the center one the tree, the being that most called to me. Thank you for this and for your years of meditations that have walked along side me—a sister tree sitter who needed this reminder to return.
As I sit with my back against the tree trunk I can feel the frequency and feel myself merge with it. The branches are my arms with the sun warming my leaves. It’s like a hug of unconditional love and I’m home again. Wisdom and rooted calm.
Your nature/tree writings have been very synchronous with my own journey. About a month ago I stayed in the first for a retreat hosted by several forest bathing instructors. I found such healing there - the forest and trees and birds reaching out to hold me, speak to me, nurture me back to my ancient seed of being in their wise ways. It changed me and I’ve brought the practice back home. The other day I went out to the red pines on a lake and found a grandmother pine. With a deep tenderness, I melted into a hug against her welcoming trunk and she hugged me back, as any good mother would absorbing our tears - our hearts beating as one. Thank you for sharing your own stories. They meet me and encourage me in my own growth and healing with the land.
It is dawn, and I hear the birds calling me to come out and sit. After listening to this (and reading all these comments, I feel blessed to really hear them this morning, and am now off to find a tree 🌳 🙏 ❤️
Always held in nature if we allow it. Martina, I too can recall a moment when young and in despair when my emotions were overbearing me and I looked up and saw the stars in the night sky. I felt rescued in that moment and I went home and wrote a poem. I can still only recall a few lines but it began with 'like a blanket it covers the city and watches over those who weep'. Sarah as you spoke those words I recalled standing by the ocean edge this morning and truly feeling that 'there was nothing more to add'. As a young woman in my own company throughout the years in nature I would often be looking and searching for something, perhaps only being filled if it was shared with someone. Now I know and feel deeply that there is nothing to add, to 'Just see, just witness, just be allow myself to be filled with grace, awe and wonder. And wow, isnt that enough xxxx
As I listened to your soothing voice, I began to sway back and forth.
Gentle like the wind, I kept swaying. Your venture to sit beneath a tree and absorb the natural flow of life around you brings me back to a specific memory. Following the death of my closest sibling, my brother, at just 31 years old, I couldn't be around family or friends. I needed the wild.
I drove to the forest when my mother choked out the horrifying news that my brother had taken his own life. I drove to the forest after speaking at his memorial. I went to the wild. And what I did, both at the site of his passing and following his memorial, was sink my hands into the dirt. Cover my hands completely in the earth. Feel the connection of movement and stillness. The deeper I pressed my hands the cooler the earth became, though the sun still warmed my face.
Just like a tree, with roots running deep-- so were my limbs and soul-- sinking deep into the Mother Earth to soothe an indescribable pain and new partner of grief. For a moment, the wind picked up and the tears stopped. I sat in silent soothing surrender to the light and dark of this human experience. To the soil of life. Thank you for sharing your sacred journey, Sarah.
I find myself emptied out of the worldly clammors while sitting at the base of a tree. The Mother clears and cleanses my body, mind, and soul and wispers "be". The absolute hardest thing is the simplest. Very much like you mentioned Sarah to be the tree, sky, etc. Only by emptying my chaotic mind and being the tree am I able to fill up with the peace of Mother Earth. Profound yet simple. Who knew?!?!?
I had such a resounding “YES” in my Spirit when reading each of the Wild Voice posts. I am coming to this later then when it started but it’s been so fulfilling to see and listen and just drink in what this practice has been to so many here. I thought when starting I would go out to our woods and find that familiar old oak tree that always calls out to me when I walk through. He has been on this land for a very long time…I imagine he holds stories of the Hopewell people that were native to this area. I think the land has been waiting on me to walk in open hearted and unscripted because when I walked up to the old oak tree I almost could feel him saying to me that our time together will come soon but not yet and to walk ahead. So I did and not so far away my eyes landed on a very tall tree that had fallen over recently in a wind storm. I followed the urge inside to go over and wrap my body around her fallen body. I just laid there for what seemed like a long time but was probably only a couple minutes, with my ear up against her bark as if listening for a heartbeat.
She still speaks 🥹. I have gone out to her twice now. Waiting and listening. No giant revelations just an invitation to remain unrushed and let the quiet have its way. Sarah, I am just so grateful you are sharing this journey with us. I didn’t know how much my soul needed this. Love to all. 🫶🏽🌳🫶🏽
When I was a kid, nature wasn't a big part of my life. But there was a space between our garage and the neighbor's garage where I would go and pretend I was a pioneer; a Little House on the Prairie tv show-inspired pioneer. I made a bench out of a wood plank and twigs and found rocks and leaves to use as dishes, and then imagined myself keeping house and living off the land in that small, between-garages space. Now, 40ish years later, I live in the mountains of Colorado, and daily I think it is a miracle that I get to live in a place so beautiful. I still collect rocks and leaves, though I usually end up leaving the stones where I found them. And I think I've carried a bit of Laura Ingall's resourcefulness with me over the years.
i really resonate so deeply with feeling like i will die if i cannot go into storytelling mode, when something is stripped back to basics i find myself scared because stories and making meaning was how i comforted myself as an only child; i used my imagination to play.
i’m inspired by this practice of yours because i have been avoiding hiking because i do not want to face all the negative chatter that constantly swirls into my brain, but this is a motivating me to try, to see, to confront what i am so afraid to sit inside of. thank you sarah.
A truly winsome reflection and spoken so gently. Forgetting and remembering, yes that’s the plan. Note to self remember to pause. The language of what was spoken seems universal to me, despite our reluctance across geographies and cultures, this knowingness deep inside which is never other than perfect imperfection perennially balanced— I have a name for this which I call the Palm of God’s hand. Whatever version of faith, spirituality, or concept one ascribes to, this seems universal to me such as a smile, a wink a nod. While we remain separated by sovereign agendas are we not yet one people beautifully created in such an image. In this offering Sarah I could feel the wide eyed child inside and your heartfelt adaptation to this life which leads all to the sea. Happy belated Easter. Someday may the mystery be revealed in the name of Love!