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Infinite Possibilities
“Invitations are everywhere in the forest.”
M. Amos Clifford
I wanted to explore this theme of forest invitations. What were they like? How do they arise? What effects do they have?
According to Clifford, in Forest Bathing, one job of a guide is to offer invitations to observe and then connect deeply with a specific aspect of nature. Invitations might include studying the forest floor (earth), watching clouds drift across the sky (air), listening to a flowing stream (water), or befriending a tree (fire). Clifford writes that there are “infinite possibilities” for invitations. He adds that each of us can become adept at discovering our own invitations by learning to flow with the unique configuration of who we are and where we are in the forest.
My theory was that if one conducts an hour long sit spot in nature sooner or later one of these invitations would arise spontaneously. I also theorized that the invitation that arose would have a “just right” quality, meaning that it would arise at the right time in response to inner readiness. This in turn would create a kind of gentle and organic psychotherapeutic process—what you observe in nature would address topics and issues for which you were ready to gain insight, to change, and to grow.
To provide the most rigorous test of my theories I stacked the odds against myself. I would conduct an hour long sit spot in the boring mid-afternoon with no benefit from a stirring sunrise or sunset. I would go out on a cold winter day when the forest floor was covered with snow and ice and few critters and birds would be on the move.
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The Call
Where to go for my sit spot? There was a place that had been on my mind for several weeks, a spot alongside a small babbling stream that flowed through a forest of tall hemlocks where my friend Jim had, with prescience, placed an Aldo Leopold bench that he built.
Why was this location calling me? Maybe it was because I had worked on the trail leading to and from the bench and thus had a connection. Maybe it was because the spot was situated in Browning Beaver Meadow (BBM), a nature reserve with a 1.5 mile trail that wove through diverse habitat. Or maybe it was because I had done previous sit spots at BBM that had affected me deeply.
Whatever the reason, I knew enough to heed this call, knew that when an image of a place keeps coming to mind there is a reason to go, sit, listen, and learn.
The Approach
On the drive I prepped for my sit spot. I switched Sirius from a noisy, adrenalin-elevating NFL football game to soothing new age music. I evened out my breathing and relaxed the muscles in my face and neck and shoulders. Most importantly, I began to hold the intention to sit in the forest. This was another one of my theories; intention held in the heart and mind opens the doorway to nature mindfulness.
Arriving at BBM, I drove to the end of the plowed road and paused to study the snow covered way to the parking lot. I didn’t want to get stuck on a Sunday afternoon with nobody around, but the road looked passable for my four-wheel drive vehicle. I edged ahead slowly and made it to the parking lot.
Quickly stuffing my binoculars, camera, notebook, and water bottle in to my backpack I prepared to head out. Oh crap! I realized in my hurry that I forgot to bring gloves. I also realized that the bench would be snow covered and I hadn’t brought anything to sit on.
No turning back now! I grabbed a plastic shopping bag to sit on and figured I would just have to suck it up without gloves. The sun was shining and the temperature was 34 so I should be able to manage.
Setting off down the trail I came to the board walk that we built through a forest wetland. As I stepped along the narrow snow covered boards I felt my attention opening up to the beauty of the forest around me. I crossed a wooden bridge, a threshold I thought, entered the hemlock forest and three minutes later came to the bench by the stream.
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Beginnings
Shopping bag placed on the snow covered bench, I sat down, binoculars around my neck, notebook at the ready, and started my first 10 minute interval by engaging in sensory awareness.
I gazed at the ice covered stream winding through the woods. I looked at the snow covered forest floor littered with deer tracks, the majority following the cleared trail. I guess the deer like an open path too. Some deer prints traced a short cut across the ice. How quickly the deer adapt to the winter conditions.
Around me I saw the tall hemlocks, their delicately drooping boughs covered with fine, dark green, soft needles. Above, through the crown of the green branches spread a cerulean blue sky with puffy white clouds sailing from west to east.
Beneath the ice of the stream, unseen, but constant, I heard the lovely, ever changing sound of the water gurgling over rocks. A gust of wind whispered through the hemlock boughs. Behind me a branch cracked in the cold. The forest was alive with sounds.
The rays of the late January afternoon sun, higher in the sky now, warmed my face. I inhaled the air detecting an essence of freshness like the fragrance of clean clothes just pulled from the dryer.
Wind Songs
Another gust of wind whooshed through the hemlock boughs. Quiet returned. A tree limb cracked behind me. A jet liner hissed high above. I heard a distant roaring sound behind me, a strong blast of wind approaching. I tracked the sound as it bore down finally roaring loudly above me. The hemlock boughs swirled and the maple branches swayed and clacked. As quickly as it came the wind faded away. Silence returned.
I listened to the gusts of wind, sometimes near, sometimes far, sometimes whispering, sometimes roaring and clacking, always rising, falling, and fading away. More tree branches thumped and cracked behind me. Was someone walking through the woods? I turned to look but no, it was just the winter soundscape.
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Doubts
Pleasant enough sitting in the woods listening to the wind and the flowing water. But not much going on. It was kind of boring here in midwinter. And for some reason even though I was way out in the country there were jetliners flying over continually. After 30 minutes I had already counted six. Must be on the flight path for Newark today I guessed. I grumbled to myself how difficult it was to find a truly quiet place.
I was moving my hands in and out of my coat pocket which helped, but my fingers were slowly losing sensation. The plastic shopping bag offered very little very little insulation against the hard cold wood of the bench. My butt was getting cold. I still had 30 minutes to go. I wasn’t sure I’d make it.
And I began to doubt I would receive a forest invitation. Maybe I did need a guide, some structure, someone to select an invitation.
Oh well, I’ll hang in for the rest of the hour. I could warm my hands up in the car later. Plus, I remembered the crucial “40 minute threshold,” the usual length of quiet time it takes to settle into the forest, for disturbances my intrusion caused to fade away, for my attention to shift to openness, and for nature mindfulness to arise.
The Moment
Behind me I heard a trio of chickadees, the busy little avian forest gossips, chirping and twittering, probably commenting on my presence. I listened as they came closer and then moved on, tiny winter birds perpetually on patrol.
A small branch from high up in a hemlock broke off in the wind, floated down, and landed on the ice in front of me. Moving my gaze along the frozen stream I noticed that the reflection of the sun was steadily tracking across the ice. Three different kinds of motion.
I began to see motion all around me, the sun sliding down and southward, the dark tree shadows lengthening across the snow, the wind swaying and swirling the branches, gusts and gravity pushing snow from a branch releasing a powdery cloud that drifted down to the ground.
I saw past motion—the many hoof prints of the deer that had walked across the snow, the branches that fallen to the forest floor, the bits of bark and twigs and tiny hemlock cones that had fallen to the snow. I saw future motion—the snow ready to melt, turn to water, soak in the ground, or flow to the stream. I saw the trees ready to draw up sap, to unfurl leaves, to sprout new growth.
I felt motion within—breath flowing, chest and abdomen rising and falling with each inhalation and exhalation. I felt my heart beating steadily, even felt my eyelids blink.
Motion all around, within and without; past, present, and future. The lines and boundaries between forest and self dissolved. All in motion: all joined by motion. My sense of individual solidity faded. I felt as light and free and as filled with motion as the swaying branches around me.
Surprisingly, merging into all of this surrounding motion felt comforting. Perhaps the burden of maintaining a sense of separation was lifted. Perhaps there was a primeval comfort in feeling connected to nature motion. And maybe there was something uplifting, even inspiriting about sensing dynamic motion in the still winter woods.
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More Motion
I gazed again at the stream and could just detect the movement of water beneath the ice. Entranced, I listened to the sound of the water burbling and murmuring over the rocks beneath the ice, a melodious ever changing stream song. There was something about the cold water hitting ice that added chiming, crystal tones to the water music
Glancing up I was stunned to spot a single milkweed seed floating gracefully in the air, tan seed and silky white streamers illuminated in the sunlight. The seed hung in the air then slowly drifted down to the forest floor, a breathtakingly beautiful moment, a celebration of motion.
Savoring the flight of the seed I noticed the sun edging lower and the tree shadows lengthening across the snow. My hour was up. I decided to walk the rest of the trail loop around the lake. Maybe by walking quickly I could warm my up my hands. Off I went, crunching through the snow, around the lake, and back to my car.
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Epilogue
In a scientific article this section would be called the “discussion.” And in a way I had conducted an experiment on my theories so now I get to comment.
I confirmed that forest invitations can arise during a sit spot. For me, it took a while, almost 40 minutes. And it seemed that I needed multiple hints—the flitting chickadees, the falling branch, and the moving sun to tune me in to a motion invitation. Once tuned in though, I became immersed and was quickly able to notice all the motion around and within me.
In terms of personal impact, I have found that it often takes a few days to understand the effects of a sit spot. Over the following week I became aware of changes. I felt looser inside, probably in a good and needed way, as if some pockets of holding on and tension had been eased.
And there were several issues that I had been stuck on—an old laptop that loaded painfully slowly, a less than optimally functioning snowblower, some work I was doing that my heart wasn’t into. Not huge life issues, but clearly places where I was stuck. On all three issues I suddenly saw the path forward and was able to move down that path in an n easy way. The motion invitation seemed to be exactly what I needed.
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You can read more about the benefits of time in nature and about forest invitations in my recent book, Nature’s Pathways to Mindfulness available on Amazon and through the publisher, Shanti Arts. Here are the links:
Nature’s Pathways to Mindfulness: Harvey, John: 9781962082266: Amazon.com: Books
Nature’s Pathways to Mindfulness, John Harvey
*****
Reference: Clifford, M. Amos. Your Guide to Forest Bathing. Newburyport, MA, Red Wheel Books, 2021.
2 thoughts on “Infinite Possibilities”
Just what I needed today! Thank you for another thoughtful, inspiring, beautifully written post.
Thanks Marileta. So glad you enjoyed the post and that the timing was good.