Sunlight in the woods

I spend hours looking at the way the sunlight shines through trees and on paths in the woodland. There is so much light and dark and the variations in the light can make some amazing scenes of beauty.

It’s a bit like life really. Each day and each week and year has varied light, some times things go well and other times they are not so good. Nature can teach us so much about acceptance. The light and shade and the nuances of this are in our lives too. We need to learn to accept these and not expect every day to be full of light.

How often do we complain when things go badly instead of accepting that is just the way our life moves? Day follows night and there will always be darker times in our lives. Accepting these as part of our life’s journey is the most important thing. Do you accept the darker times for what they are?

Finding inner peace

The world of today is chaotic, rushed and with never ending problems for us all. How do you find your inner peace?

I am lucky that I am now retired and do not have to go out to work every day so perhaps finding inner peace should be easy. However I find that this is not so. I have a degenerative health problem which means I am not very mobile so every day life can be frustrating and full of little problems.

But each week I try to go with a friend to our local country park. She walks her dog and I stroll slowly along the path towards the river. This week the cygnets, now almost fully grown were on the lake, swimming with their wings half open to catch the breeze. There were Canada Geese here this week too. Looking back from the lake towards the car park, I noticed the stripes that had been cut into the field were now filled with wild flowers. These formed colourful stripes of yellow and pink. I started to walk back towards the car park. Here the trees formed an arch over the path. No one else was around and I stopped. Listening I could hear the birds, the leaves moving in the breeze and a great sense of peace overwhelmed me. I stood there for some minutes communing with Mother Earth and the natural things around me. The benefit of these few minutes of inner peace stayed with me for some time. I can’t wait to go again, hopefully next week.

How do you find your inner peace?

 

Patience

One of the things I have noticed this last week is the lack of patience. I am just as bad at this as I have been looking at my bucket list to see what I still want to do before I leave this earth. My years are now limited as I am coming up to 73 so understandably I am getting impatient. As you get older each day becomes a bonus.

I suppose that in this world of instant responses via our ever expanding technology, we expect instant responses all the time. However this is not always good as instant replies often say the wrong thing and can upset people. Also we all have many demands on our time and responding to someone straight away is not always possible.

I am one of those people who like to write letters and my emails are often written in the same way.  I like to think about what I write and often ‘sit on’ letters until I am satisfied that they say what I want to say. My blog is the same. I spend many hours thinking about what I am going to write although sometimes the muse takes over and I find I have written other things!

Do you have patience? With people? With animals? With the way things are done?

Nature’s tests

The birds were doing well and the butterflies then along comes the frost, two mornings running! The starlings attacked the bird feeders with relish. I suspect that the frost killed off a lot of their insect food. Our weather is upside down and changes rapidly from one day to the next. How all the animals cope I do not know. I find the change of temperature hard enough and I have central heating but you never know what to wear from one day to the next. The wind was biting cold yesterday but out of it, and in the sun, you could sit and sunbathe. How weird is that.

Which brings me to the point of how we help nature and how we help each other. We don’t wait for the birds to ask for food, we make sure that it is there. But many do wait to give help to others because some people are afraid to ask for help. If you are going shopping and you know an elderly or disabled person who cannot get out easily, do you offer to take them with you or to get them items they need? If you are working in your garden and you know your neighbour cannot do much in their garden and it needs a little bit of tidying, do you offer to help? Or do you complain that the neighbour’s garden is untidy? Do you help those less fortunate? Do you offer help even if it is refused? Lots of food for thought here. Do let me know your thoughts on this.

A bright spot in the garden is the azalea, yellow and cheerful despite the frost. Here it is;