Finding Spirituality

I woke just after dawn, to find the waves crashing against the rugged northern california shore. I was compelled to travel down a path in the woods. I was surrounded by beauty, the awe of the rugged shore, chipping away at the rocks, forming a new earth, the scent of ferns, the strengh of towering red woods.

The smell of salty air has always calmed me. The tranquility of nature confounded me. I love to be in the woods, on the beach, in the ocean diving, kayaking down a quiet stream, kayaking in the waves of the ocean.

I was compelled to sit on a bench and remove my shoes, to feel closer to the earth. I needed to connect to its energy. I closed my eyes and felt the gentle wind on my face, the heat of the sun starting to peak through the forrest, the sounds of a woodpecker in the distance and a frog near by. I could hear the scamper of a squirrel up a nearby seqouia, a bird, welcoming the morning, its song getting closer to me as I just listened.

I felt something watching me and opened my eyes. The bird was no longer singing, but watching me. I looked the bird in the eyes and found some kind of tranquility there, some kind of knowing that everything will always be okay. The bird once again began his song and flew away, but I felt connected to it. I felt connected to the earth, to the bird.

I walked down the path to the ocean, the battered beach was quiet. I listened to the waves crashing, the rough batter against the rocks, thinking to myself that the rough waters were only paving a path to a more beautiful shoreline. I had heard it before, to find strength in the tree who bends with the wind. The tree is battered by the wind and it digs in its roots and bends, allowing itself to grow with the wind, rather than be beaten by it.

It was then that I realized why so many spiritual people need to be outside. Something about finding peace in nature. Noticing that nature learns to conform and grow, it evolves with its surroundings.

Just like the devestation of a fire, the land that heals itself, while scarred, grows again, sometimes more beautiful and bountiful then it once began.

I have always been drawn to the image of a phoenix, mostly as a symbol of rising from the ashes, but it was  a surface thing, I was pleased by the idea of it. Now I know it is much more than that, it is a concept that I need to embrace, a personal philosophy, that no matter what burns me, I will always come out above it, stronger.