The Importance of Finding Peace with Nature

I was lucky enough to have a grandpa who gardened.  Holding fond memories of walking through the garden hunting for interesting things like Swiss chard and radishes is a big highlight of being 4 years old.  Ultimately I think it made me comfortable with the disorganized side of nature.  Dirt is messy as well as weeds and seeds that the birds have sent on their own journey.  The meandering pathways of an exploratory garden spark intrigue and curiosity.  So where has this part of our personalities gone?  As third spaces disappear around us and we have collectively moved to our backyards if we can afford it, we have become a society of individual expression and control.  In our backyards and places of Home Owners Associations we have become less accustomed to less manicured spaces.  Tracks of homes with the same front yard and the same house color create spaces where the only curiously is the house number.  Monitors of such zones can easily spot and judge things “out of place”.  Has this approach to more affordable housing and comfort created a society of everything in it’s place.  Making our minds less comfortable with the less comfortable?  Where we choose to dabble into nature only as a choice rather than a requirement.  I love tending to the chaos of my plants.  I love ending the day with dirty hands, hands that have touched these little living things to make sure they know I’m sharing this experience with them.  How many times is a child’s hand slapped away for wanting to connect with nature, to ground into the dirt where we belong, to splash in the hose that was left on and to again feel alive through that connection.  Take a moment and evaluate your third spaces and what you deem as quality of life.  Are we allowed to discuss things in public spaces that might express and opinion.  It ok but are you willing to dive into and try to connect with a person who has an opposing view with the desire to seek common ground, rather than sit in an organized and comfortable soapbox for everyone to hear.  A friend of mine is so excellent and diving into the uncomfortable it has inspired me to attempt it as well.  Otherwise we all sit on our well manicured front porches and smile nicely at our neighbor, keep our walls up and safe.  Having created a farm these past fews years I knew in my heart that this wasn’t a space just for me, but something that others needed as well.  So many people are cut off from these third spaces being streamlined into their home, friends homes and businesses that require money in order to enjoy.  A third space allows comfort once you settle in, entrainment of various kinds whether it be a busker singing their heart out, people skating around, kids screaming and laughing, artist painting the sidewalk, etc.  It creates space of inspiration and discomfort because you have to settle into it, not it to you.  Its part of the reason we need weeds and mosquitoes, to remind us that the world we live in should not serve us a plate full of nothing interesting happens here.  As a human race we should not sit only in spaces where we aren’t forced to grow and develop new things.  Growth.  How often do we welcome growth and new ideas in?  One of my sons, who has always had a brain for very complex games, recently created his own game.  As his mom of course I am over the moon but also extremely intrigued and full of the desire for new ideas.  Have I been welcoming new ideas and solutions into my sub-conscience brain?  This is something that should be a regular practice for us all.  I guess my hope in even writing this today is to remind you to grow and expand, not shrink and align.  Consider reconnecting yourself with nature in order to ground into the place you came from and breathe in the uncomfortable part of life that really makes us feel alive.  We need this in order to find each other again as earthlings.  We need this in order to not remain shells of what we once were as a society.  A society that cared rather than just consumed.  We need you to break apart your regular day and find a way to again be curious.  Thanks for reading.