Step 2. Connect With Nature!

Y’all! I am a nature girl! I grew up on 23 acres in the deep woods of Pennsylvania. Everyone around us had property, and we spent much of our time outside. I ran those woods on a daily basis without fear and with great abandon. I had favorite spots where I would sit for long periods of time and dream, imagine. I really believed I was a Native American Princess mistakenly left in these woods. There were great places to explore, and I wondered often who walked the land, who had gone before me, and who would come after.

I can still picture plants and trees that grew near my home. Wildflowers were my favorite. Grabbing handfuls and bringing them home to my mother was a treat. We also loved the wildlife like pheasants, turkeys, deer, and even bears! I saw snakes, but wasn’t a fan!

I used to walk about a mile from my bus stop back the old dirt road to our hilly driveway. I loved each of the four seasons and how things changed from year to year. Sled riding down our hills was thrilling! Walking up the driveway when our car couldn’t get up the steep hills prior to four wheel drive was not as thrilling! The fall leaves were exquisite, the barren, icy woods, stunning, and the new growth and life through both spring and summer lifted me every year.

I wouldn’t trade my nature loving upbringing for anything! That is a special place. I was lucky and blessed to be surrounded by nature.

We are created to love nature. I am saddened today by parents and children who are on media and looking at screens, who no longer spend multitudes of time outdoors connecting with what is healing to us. Trees are healing. Did you know that oxygen converts turpentine in pines to ozone which is HEALING to a human body! This is also created at the beach. Are you drawn to one, the other, or both??

I love to travel and touch other native plants where I go. I note colors, sounds, smells, landscape, and even people and animals when I am having a nature escape. Recently, I have really been awakened to my days of girlhood with Jeep rides around a farm, out in the country, and have enjoyed connecting in a deeper way to the Delaware landscape. I still feel like that girl who dreamed and pretended she was a Native.

I challenge you to connect with nature. Take your loved ones and get outdoors. I have been known to put a ban on media and make some boys and girls get outside to play, enjoy, reground with bare feet in the grass or dirt, and to just play in the beauty of it all. This is a NECESSARY part of life and the wellness journey. I challenge you to have synergy and have a meeting at a park, start an outdoor walking group from work, get to know your neighbors and walk outside or sit by a big fire pit.

Let me know the peace that passes understanding as you connect with nature, what you are created to enjoy!

Seriously, put down this gadget, and spend a few minutes outside!

This week on my YouTube Channel is my short talk on the subject “Nature“. If you didn’t get a chance to see my previous video posts, please check them out as well.

As you know, each month I will be adding two segments specifically designed to help me, help you. Please click the YouTube logo below. And don’t forget to SUBSCRIBE to the YouTube channel so you will automatically get video updates as they come out.