Numerous events in our world, continued stressors at work and in our personal lives are impacting mind, body and spirit. Every week I receive many emails in which people share the high levels of stress they are experiencing in life. Please know this: You are not alone. Let me repeat that: You are not alone. I want to acknowledge this for all of us; to say it out loud. I was with a wonderful patient care group a few weeks ago, and one of the biggest participant take-aways was the realization they were all stressed for very similar reasons and not alone in the journey. Neither are you.
Images can speak powerfully in times such as this. Below are poet Wendell Berry’s words: The Peace of Wild Things. Wendell reminds us to come into the “presence of still water” that is inside our self. It is the quiet space deep under the white-capped waves of life.
Set aside a couple of minutes, take a deep breath, dive under the white-caps, read it through 2 or 3 times.
The Peace of the Wild Things by Wendell Berry
When despair grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting for their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
Breath it in. Breath out. Repeat.
Andrea Tatley 