“Every now and again take a good look at something not made with hands—a mountain, a star, the turn of a stream. There will come to you wisdom and patience and solace, and above all, the assurance that you are not alone in this world.”—Sidney Lovett
One of the many silver linings a lot of us are discovering during the Coronavirus pandemic is the opportunity to connect with the quiet, still, nonplussed presence of nature. Many people are learning to meditate. Meditation teaches us to slow down and observe our thoughts, with are often based on untruths and can sling our emotions all cattywampus. Our anxious “monkey minds” can easily swing from branches of our lives in the past to nonexistent ones in an imagined future. Nature teaches us the gift of the present moment. This post originally ran in December, 2016. I added a new photo collage of springtime images, above. The original accompanying collage appears at the end of this post and includes the described winter scenes. All taken with iPhoneography, ©LeisaHammett.com
As our meeting ended, he, a man with whom I have done business with for many years, rose from my kitchen table and gave me a lasting gift. We had discussed financial futures, the stock market, the economy, the recent election. Not only was what he shared a gift to me, it was the way he shared it. He didn’t give me advice regarding my concerns about the incoming administration, he simply shared from his personal experience. One night of fitful sleep, he said, he had recited the following as a mantra until slumber returned:
“Yesterday is history. Tomorrow a mystery. Today is a gift of the present.”
Yes. And, when I am present, I notice the beautiful gift of my surroundings. Throughout the seasons, my petite patio garden offers up a varying feast of visual treats. For three days I’d zipped by these tiny delights as I rushed out to my garage. On the go! I was.
Finally, yesterday, I stopped. The little sprig Maple, a “volunteer” that adopted us, had turned golden. It had finally grown tall enough to be a looker. Some critter had gnawed parts of its sweet leaves. Typical. The Buddha sat in silence while cut back vines continued to encircle. The beach stones spilling from clay pots had taken on a blue hue. My beloved old conch sat stately, a steady reminder of different terrain. A red leaf lay in contrast to a sprawling evergreen, welcoming me at the patio entrance, backdropped by the mulch of a left-over variegated fall colour show. And by surprise, I saw a collection of small pine needles, swept in from the neighboring forest, had formed a figure. A curled leaf her brooch beneath her ponytailed coiff….Nature is, after all, the original artist.
This. This reminder. Nature knows the past is dead. Nature never entertains a frivolous worry about a future unborn. No, it revels in this present moment, offering it a gift to me if I stop to notice.
Stop. Notice.
Today is a gift of the present.
*The Sydney Lovett quote is from a most delightful book of meditations from my friend Angela Howell, Finding the Gift: Daily Meditations for Mindfulness. The meditation from which the quote was pulled is entitled “Nature as a Role Model.”
