Artists celebrate nature visually, through words, by moving their bodies, and making sounds. Teachers use nature as models for understanding. Warriors for the environment know that protecting nature is our true task at hand.
Beauty, wisdom and healing can come from the natural world, when given close attention.
When we feel stuck or like something is getting in our way, tuning into just one of nature’s many miracles – those which surround us every day – often defying through cracks of cement and around the tallest of wire fences – can teach us about not giving up. Flowers.
View 25 plants that “just won’t give up” in order to “see the light of day once again”.
Also, join me in watching this video below. You may never look at flowers the same way again. They are among other things, artists, teachers, mentors, soldiers, peace activists, and healers.
No matter how clear or cloudy our internal skies are – no matter if the masses below are celebrating, or raging from tragedy – no matter if we notice or not, or whether we deserve it at all – for now, day after day, the sun both praises us with light, and casts our deepest shadows.
The poem below, written by Jeanne Lohman, beautifully illustrates the daily miracle of light and shadow, connection and despair. In a society where we are encouraged to be happy all the time, we often feel failure when we can’t measure up. It is important to remember light and darkness are not opposites. In our despair we can find our deepest connections, and in our closest connections, we can feel despair. This is not wrong. It is being alive. As Steve Almond says in his forward in Tiny Beautiful Things by Cheryl Strayed, “Run to the darkness, sweet peas, and shine”.
The Language of Birds
old woman talking to the birds stops mid-sentence, puts one finger to her lips as if to quiet her tongue, bends her head, listening
the birds fly closer but words are all she has to offer, a poor bargain at best and she knows it
bright orange and black a baltimore oriole on the porch railing, tilts his head as if to enter this conversation, his liquid language an exquisite song to morning
for her part, the old woman sings for day’s light coming over the hills like music praising a difficult world
There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all of time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and it will be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is nor how valuable nor how it compares with other expressions. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open.” – Martha Graham (May 11, 1894 – April 1, 1991)
Considered to be a maverick in the dance world of her time, modern dance choreographer Martha Graham once said, “Each one of us has all of life in us…and it is our choice to decide what we will reveal”.
So often, we allow deprecating judgement of ourselves to stop us in our tracks. We decide we aren’t good enough or entertain endless comparisons of our work with the work of others. This amounts to nothing more than, as Martha says, a “blocking” of a unique expression that we alone carry.
Join me in watching this video tribute to Martha Graham’s life work exploring expression through movement.
More importantly, don’t spare the world your life force, your vitality, your form of expression – no matter what it is. Although we are one in a sea of many, the one we are has something to share and say like NO OTHER out there.
Everyone has experienced the feeling of not knowing what to say to a friend, acquaintance or loved one when they are suffering a loss, or going through a tough time. We worry we won’t find the right sympathetic words to ease the pain, or cheer the spirit of another. We naturally want to let them know we care – and feel sorry for them.
Rarely can a response make something better, what makes something better is connection”. – Brene Brown
Watch this RSA shorts – not only explaining the difference between sympathy and empathy, but also, perhaps, illustrating why Hallmark should launch a new line of cards saying I understand instead of I am sorry.
Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean-
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down-
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don’t know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?
