Be like a Tree

Today I clambered up into the tree’s lower branches and perched myself in the nook of her great limbs. I had so many things I wanted to talk with her about, but I found my mind quietening as I sat there. I gazed up at the sinewy ariel roots twisting their way up her branches, so beautiful in their ugliness. We sat in comfortable silence together. I started to think again about all the topics I had on my agenda. She kindly stopped me, saying just rest, you’re always busy busy, I see you. Oh yes, she does, she overlooks our house and garden and she can see me scurrying here and scurrying there, like a mad thing. You don’t need to try so hard, she adds. Just listen to the cicadas and watch the clouds going by. I did as she said and felt a sense of calm come over me. Of course, there was nothing to do. I was the one who had set myself the goal of a post a week (more or less). I was the one who felt I had to produce something from our conversations, that they weren’t just between her and me, but that I had to make some grand contribution to the world by reporting them, somehow hoping to fix all the wrongs and make people feel better. How arrogant of me! What if I just sat with no agenda.

It felt good. I watched the clouds against the blue sky of summer. They were delicate, fluffy. They reminded me of marshmallow, pavlova, ice cream. Yum! I felt the breeze against my face, it felt refreshing, blowing from the sea and across the land, slightly salty. I looked up and saw the pattern of her leaves against the sky. It seemed like a jigsaw puzzle, the leaves fitting together so she could maximise her exposure to the life-giving sun. Have you ever noticed that? I’m not sure I had, at least, not for a very long time. Her smaller branches waved gently in the breeze, the light dappled on the bark of her larger limbs beneath. It was peaceful, dare I say, soulful. Filling my soul, my spirit, with light, energy, love. Just rest, she said.

I realised this was her life. This is how she lives. She observes her surrounds, she soaks up the sun which gives her life, and the rain when it comes. She allows herself to be swayed by the breeze, and bend with the wind. She is at once responsive to her environment, but also an active participant. She is a home for birds and the ants that are now crawling up my neck. Her leaves and fallen twigs and branches create litter for more insects, and mulch for the seedlings that spring up under her protective canopy. Who else does she have conversations with? It suddenly seemed likely that there was a whole world out in nature we humans have no inkling of. How wonderful!

All my worries and concerns about the state of the world had dropped away. And there had been many. It’s rough old time out there in the human realm of international politics and fossil-fuelled climate change. I won’t go there, there’s more than enough written about it from all sides. For now, I felt relaxed, peaceful, calm.

I climbed down, feeling grateful to have this generous hearted tree on my back doorstep. The phrase came to mind “Be like a tree”. I remembered the exercise. Even if we don’t have a real tree to connect with, we can pretend to be a tree, with our feet firmly planted on the ground, stretching up, feeling connected with our bodies, bending, swaying, flowing smoothly, breathing in deeply the air around us. Ahh yes, of course, we are nature too. Be like a tree and rest a while.