creating dailyconnectionwithnature nature

Solstice tree dreaming

December 22, 2018

 

Last night’s solstice was a subtle affair. After making mulled wine with Croatian produce (the white wine and honey were gifts; the carob, clementine and pomegranate from the market in Split) I downloaded a nidra journey session from Liminal Roots Botanica, and spent some time reflecting on last year while setting an intention for the coming one. The spirit animal card pulled was The Rabbit, for creative endeavour, for accepting that the journey is never a linear process and learning to recognise the signs in order to be fully engaged and not running on autopilot. That I can relate to. The word I will work with this coming year is intuition. It’s something I’m trying to grow, like a muscle. For reasons I’ve finally managed to illuminate, this is not something that comes easily. I imagine intuition reaching out from a person like the branches of a tree; if allowed to expand when young these branches grow into thick trunks supporting more branches that stretch up and outward, rippling leaves across the sky, able to detect the subtlest weather changes. But trauma, toxic relationships, school and chaotic people have the effect of lopping off these branches. As the tree grows other branches can spread to compensate but the original branch doesn’t grow back. I think as people we’re like this. I know I am. There are ways of being in the world, of connecting and reading people that just don’t make sense to me and I often don’t understand their subtleties. I’ve learned how to compensate with other behaviours; creating art helps, but those branches don’t grow back. Now I’m older and have begun to recognise this I can use empathy to understand others instead of reacting with anger or judgement, but it’s still hard. We push each other’s buttons don’t we? Returning to intuition – I’ve learned to ignore my instincts, to always question intuition, to not feel confident following her, to dither about it all and acknowledging this makes me feel sad because I know it’s the result of not being fully empowered as I’ve grown. And yet, recognising this feels empowering, being aware of who I am and how I will react to situations offers a certain confidence; through knowing myself a deeper understanding forms on how and why people react to each other’s behaviours, these revelations ease my social anxiety. We’re all just people, trying to get through the day with our different wonky trunks and lopped off branches, and sometimes, when I sit with the trees for longer periods I begin to get a more solid sense of how we can fill each other’s gaps in the way they do too; of how people can truly work together so that every individual is nurtured but with enough space to realise their full potential. Last winter I was gifted a poem for connection by an oak tree – it’s up on the blog here. Photo by Andy Garside. #idreamwithtrees

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