Living Among the Glories

We are what we eat, the old saying goes, and this is true, in that what we feed our bodies affects who we become as physical beings. Similarly, who we become spiritually and emotionally is influenced by what we feed our souls. As does nature.

As a people, we evolved living in nature. We wandered the plains, tended plants and animals that shared the world with us, woke to majestic sunrises and watched in awe as the heavenly bodies crossed the skies. How did this all come to pass, we wondered. We flourished, breathing deep of the rhythms of the earth.

In our lives today, however, our connection with nature is more tenuous than it has ever been. Still, the natural world is there for us in all its dazzle and quiet beauty; and we depend upon it, we thrive upon it. “I go to nature to be soothed and healed,” John Burroughs said, “and to have my senses put in order.” And Hans Christian Andersen said that “Just living is not enough… one must have sunshine, freedom, and a little flower.”

What We Can Do:

We go for a walk and come back re-energized, refreshed. Even looking out a window to sky and trees beyond the glass can be restorative. Scientists have found that hospital patients with a garden view healed more quickly than those without, and that students overlooking a green landscape performed better on tests than those in classrooms with no windows, or ones with views of concrete. There is something about the serenity of green, of dappled sunlight and branches moving in the breeze. Our souls are hungry and nature nourishes us; we are troubled and it provides comfort.

My writing desk is situated so that I can see my garden. It doesn’t face the garden, but I can turn my head and glance outside, see what clouds are moving across the sky, what juncos or sparrows are gathering at the feeder. Recently, when undergoing a renovation, I moved my study to the basement. My desk faced a wall and I had only one small window at my back. As a result, my writing suffered. As did my mood. So I took my legal pad and pen and worked in longhand upstairs, went back down only to transfer what I’d written to my computer. I was able to breathe easily again, to write more freely.

Henry David Thoreau said that “it is the marriage of the soul with nature that makes the intellect fruitful, and gives birth to the imagination.” So let us not forget the natural world in living our creative lives. Our surroundings matter, the milieu in which we conduct our lives. What we take in through our senses, the beauty of the earth. “Nature is not a place to visit,” Gary Snyder wrote. “It is home.”

–from The Fire Inside: A Companion for the Creative Life by Lucy Adkins and Becky Breed  

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