“Creativity inspires authenticity. The greatest artist is in the moment, and simply allows.” ~ Adriene Mishler, Yoga with Adriene
I wake up and walk outside to look over the beautiful horizon, and immediately am moved to write. Poetry that would normally take hours or even days to write back home is now pouring out of my pen and into my journal as if someone is whispering the lines into my ear.
I rise with the expanse that rises alongside me
Marveling at its beauty
While marveling at how little I stop to take in its beauty in the first place
Life is funny like that
You rush through it without realizing what is even there
What you may have lost
What is still open for you to gain
The lack of hustle and bustle can do wonders for clearing your brain and sparking innovation. There’s even scientific research claiming that spending time in nature can indeed inspire creativity. It certainly did for me.
It’s overall good for your health too. Studies have shown that being in nature can improve memory, increase focus, reduce anxiety and depression, and act as an overall de-stressing agent. When I was at Knoll Farm for the Labor Day Namaste Getaway yoga retreat, I’ve never felt so relaxed. I used the words “marvel” and “wonder” more times than I could count; the scenery is just breathtakingly beautiful.
Additionally, the farm would surprise us with little poetic treasures that seemed to spring up throughout the trip. In one example, I found a Robert Frost anthology on a bookshelf and read poems that inspired my own takes of his work. Here’s an example:
Another gem from the farm was when a bee flew onto my backpack…to drop off a dead fly. In the spirit of my last post, where else would I have even noticed such a fascinating (and kind of morbid) gift?
One final example of the many serendipitous moments that happened while on the farm. Erica, one of our trip leaders, opened up a random book right before our morning practice and used it to lead us in meditation. I think it was perfect:
Anything that goes up into the sky will fall down again to the earth, pulled by the force of gravity. These energies of illusion, these decorations and worldly beauties can never reach great heights, but they still do attract you. This is the way these saktis, or energies and elemental miracles, work.
~M.R. Bawa Muhaiyaddeen’s Come to the Secret Garden: Sufi Tales of Wisdom, p. 125
Elemental miracles indeed. Funny how these “worldly beauties” are never treated as such. I’d like to flip the script to do more mindfully appreciate them, how about you?
