The Spirit of Nature

By Victoria Wilson-Jones, M.S., Clinical C.Ht.

My garden calls to me. Time to have my hands deep in the soil, the warmth of the sun on my skin and the feeling of the breeze whispering to me. Spirit manifests in all life forms. The call of the sacred can be found in many places speaking quietly in their own languages. When I attend this call, answering with my presence, I am taken into a new level of peace joy and communion.

No matter how stuck, depleted and isolated we feel the Source has given us nature to help us heal and reconnect. Just being in nature for twenty minutes will move a person into an alpha brain wave state, that wonderful space between waking and sleep where prayer and meditation transforms us. Wendell Berry speaks to the healing force of nature so beautifully in his poem, “The Peace of Wild Things”. May it remind us all of how generous Spirit is, placing us in the midst of the beauty and healing force of nature.

The Peace of Wild Things
by Wendell Berry

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.