Category Archives: Nature

Nature Remains

“the bracing and buoyant equilibrium of concrete outdoor Nature, the only permanent reliance for sanity of book or human life.”

-Walt Whitman

“The trick is, I find, to tone your wants and tastes low down enough, and make much of negatives, and of mere daylight and the skies…  After you have exhausted what there is in business, politics, conviviality, love, and so on — have found that none of these finally satisfy, or permanently wear — what remains? Nature remains; to bring out from their torpid recesses, the affinities of a man or woman with the open air, the trees, fields, the changes of seasons — the sun by day and the stars of heaven by night.”

-Walt Whitman

Being Present to My Life (Questioning My Answers)


“I’m busy;
but not in the way
most people accept.
I’m busy calming my fear
and finding my courage.
I’m busy listening to my kids.
I’m busy getting in touch
with what is real.
I’m busy growing things and
connecting with the natural world.
I’m busy questioning my answers.
I’m busy being present in my life.”
 
— Brooke Hampton

 

A Holy Curiosity

“The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reasons for existing. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries to comprehend a little of this mystery every day. Never lose a holy curiosity.”

Albert Einstein

“In the next twenty centuries…humanity may begin to understand its most baffling mystery—where are we going? The earth is, in fact, traveling many thousands of miles per hour in the direction of the constellation Hercules—to some unknown destination in the cosmos. Man must understand his universe in order to understand his destiny.

Mystery, however, is a very necessary ingredient in our lives…Mystery creates wonder and wonder is the basis for man’s desire to understand. Who knows what mysteries will be solved in our lifetime, and what new riddles will become the challenge of the new generation? Science has not mastered prophesy. We predict too much for the next year yet far too little for the next ten. Responding to challenges is one of democracy’s great strengths. Our successes in space can be sued in the next decade in the solution of many of our planet’s problems.”

Neil Armstrong

As If On a Mist

there are places
places on earth
that are magical
.
that no words can
hope to describe
.
where your soul
empty and drained
is restored
.
where the whispers of angels
shimmer through the trees
as if on a mist
.
perfectly and peacefully
.
and gently floating
on the warm spring breeze
.
drifting weaving
.
falling on my face
filling me with grace
.
-Michael Traveler, from “Places”
 
 

 

A Great Companion

“Stillness is vital to the world of the soul. If as you age you become more still, you will discover that stillness can be a great companion. The fragments of your life will have time to unify, and the places where your soul-shelter is wounded or broken will have time to knit and heal. You will be able to return to yourself. In this stillness, you will engage your soul. Many people miss out on themselves completely as they journey through life. They know others, they know places, they know skills, they know their work, but tragically, they do not know themselves at all. Aging can be a lovely time of ripening when you actually meet yourself, indeed maybe for the first time. There are beautiful lines from T. S. Eliot that say:
‘And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.”
-John O’Donohue
Excerpt from the book, Anam Cara