While at a holiday party a cousin said he wanted to go with me hiking. Then asked why do I do it. I had to think about the answer; I know there is an attraction to the "rhythm" of nature, I know there is a bliss felt when pace is slowed down, I know I think and problem solve faster and clearer for the time period after a hike, I know my best ideas for healing/growing the nonprofit business seem to come with effortless ease. So how come I can't articulate all this into a few sentences of a "hiking" mission statement? Here is my quest, and what better way to find an answer but to get into nature and allow is to present itself. I just decided to drop off my son to school and head to the Morton Arboretum. My island of nature amidst 2 major highways and 4 Chicago suburb towns. With all the trees being leaf-less, the nearby sounds of highway penetrate through to deep in the woodland area but it's just a low hum of tires and engines. I think back to when I was deep in Yosemite hiking to Half Dome. There were no highways but with the rolling mountains and redwoods, the wind would create this crescendo sound every once in a while that sounded like a jet was starting its engines. I just took the mechanical sounds encountered in the Arboretum and pushed past to get allow the wildlife to bubble through. Then I became aware of the squirl's gnawing away at acorns, birds speaking, ducks overhead, the ground fall warming up as the sun came out. Even though everything was brown, frozen, hibernating....there was still life all around that just seemed to have slowed down for the season. I felt with every step on the trail, I became connected with the prairie that was waiting to bust out in 90 days. When I slowed down (not my steps but ny questions) this cool feeling in the chest (heart chakra for my yogi's) seemed to resound. I feel the human species is hardwired to express and bath in compassion. There is a built-in reward system created when we experience love and give love. Sounds new age but when we know Hollywood banks on the fact that if/when people see compassion played out on the screen, there is a sense of happiness experience in the viewer. The action has been studied in what is called a mirror neuron. Nerve cells designed to bring out the same emotion in the observer as the one actually doing the action. Think of a large group of rescuers all working to free up a child from some fallen structure. You watch and hope and wait until one rescuer reaches in and pulls out the dirt covered child and cradles him/her in his arms while rushing to the ambulance team. A large wave of relief is felt by all the rescuers and equally felt by the viewers. The vagus nerve is triggered in the neck and chest, a full feeling develops in the same area then tears start in the eyes. All this in the comfort of your own home! Civilization, industry, technology calls us to pay attention to distractions, media, political and religious ideas in efforts to make existing together more regimented where individuals work together for the benefit of coexisting in peace. The problem arises in the idea that we are all individual and the only connect we have to others is the reaction to our actions. We exist as individuals and who we are in society is dependant on what we have. To shine out and be the best is inherently related to being better than someone else. This is such a false pretense to think we are the center of the universe and the world revolves around "me". Getting back to walking the prairie this morning, the universe doesn't exist to serve us, we exist to serve the universe. This gigantic field of energy will continue on regardless of our participation and it seems people who learn to support "it" are so at peace and with seeming prosperity and abundance that follows them. People who detract from "it", always go down in a fireball of pain, suffering and separation.
There are a lot of manmade distractions that beckon our attention with the promise of a more fulfilling life. When one is already weak, tired and sick, it seems easy to fall prey to a short cut to bliss. The problem with short cutting nature is it will always find a way to get payback. Going with the flow of the universe has its abundant rewards but it does take awareness, acceptance and daily practice. Finding time to get back into the harmony of nature "resets" my mind to shake off the false suppositions that tempt me into thinking from the ego. When I can think from an awareness that I am here to serve in this continuum of energy, the answers to all my questions just seem to appear as if they were always there, just hidden by endless stress reactions happening all around me, inviting me to join in the stress. This is why the trails choose me.
