Years ago, I became convinced I was getting less intelligent.
I would walk into a room and forget why. Lose all my trains of thought mid-sentence. Derailed. No coming back.
I’d constantly search for words that had wandered off unsupervised. They would come back hours later, long after it was needed and with no apology whatsoever.
I blamed stress.
I blamed being busy.
I blamed getting older.
In reality, it was probably all of those things, mixed with hormonal changes I didn’t fully understand yet.
Female hormones are funny. They’re a bit like a Saskatchewan summer storm. One minute the sky is clear, the sun is shining, and life feels manageable. The next, the wind picks up, the clouds roll in, and you’re wondering if you should have brought a jacket, umbrella and storm cellar.
The weather didn’t become bad.
It changed.
Our hormones do too.
Female hormones are a bit like Saskatchewan weather. If you don’t like what’s happening right now, wait ten minutes.
Most of us think of hormones as reproductive messengers, but they influence far more than our cycles. They affect sleep, memory, focus, mood, energy, and even how connected we feel to the people around us.
One of the most interesting ideas I encountered from a recent podcast interview with Dr. Anna Cabeca. While estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone get most of the attention, hormones like cortisol and oxytocin may have an even bigger impact on how we experience daily life.
Oxytocin is often called the love hormone. It’s associated with connection, belonging, trust, laughter, affection, friendship, pets, nature, and community.
Likewise, oxytocin and cortisol tend to pull in opposite directions.
But the story doesn’t end there. The plot thickens.
As any prairie girl knows, sunshine and thunderstorms often share the same forecast.
When stress becomes chronic, such as in a body dealing with chronic pain, connection often suffers.
Many of us don’t just feel tired. We feel disconnected.
From ourselves.
From others.
From the things that once brought us joy.
Progesterone plays a role too. It supports sleep, cognition, brain health, and nervous system regulation.
Testosterone contributes to motivation, confidence, energy, and focus. Both naturally decline as we age, and both can be influenced by chronic stress.
Side note: I would like to point out that aging naturally isn’t nearly as freaky as whatever is happening with the people trying desperately to avoid it. Also, at what age do we start meeting for Bingo? Because I’m ready.
Progesterone naturally declines in women, typically beginning in the mid-thirties as ovarian function gradually changes.
My body got the memo that the warranty has expired. All systems started responding the way you’d expect at the end of a warranty. (despite the fact that I was built in the 70s and should have been made to last)
Looking back at my own health journey, I spent years trying to solve individual symptoms.
If I could just stop the migraines.
If I could just overcome the fatigue.
If I could just break the insomnia.
What I eventually learned is that the body doesn’t divide itself into neat little boxes the way we often do.
Sleep affects stress.
Stress affects hormones.
Hormones affect mood.
Mood affects relationships.
Relationships affect wellbeing.
Pull one thread and the whole thing unravels.
That’s why healing often requires support from multiple directions.
👏 Good food.
👏 Movement.
👏 Sleep.
👏 Stress management.
👏 Connection.
👏 Time outdoors.
The podcast also reinforced something I’ve known for years: nature has a remarkable way of helping us regulate.
Not because it magically solves our problems, but because it reminds our nervous systems what calm feels like.
Like sitting quietly in warm sunshine after a long winter.
Like hearing nothing but leaves rustle in the breeze.
The Practice
One simple forest therapy practice is this:
Stop
Notice 5 things moving around you (leaves, clouds, grass, insects, birds)
Listen for 3 sounds
Notice 2 scents
Take one slow breath
It’s amazing how quickly the nervous system responds when we give it the chance.
The body benefits from movement, and the mind benefits from stillness.
This is the first post in a hormone series. Next week we’ll look at hormone disruptors: where the biggest offenders are hiding, and what to use instead.
The longer I live with chronic pain, the more convinced I am that modern medicine is excellent at saving lives and often terrible at helping people live them.
That is not an attack on medicine.
I am deeply grateful for surgeons, emergency rooms, diagnostics, imaging, specialists, antibiotics, and every medical professional who dedicates their life to helping people heal. If my arm bone is hanging on by hope and duct tape, I am not reaching for turmeric and positive affirmations. I want a surgeon. Immediately.
My mom shattered her foot in multiple places in a car accident. Her toe was essentially powder. No longer a toe. She needed surgery, pins, screws, and acute medical care. No amount of herbal tea or breath work was going to fix those bones.
Conventional medicine is extraordinary in moments like that.
But chronic illness and chronic pain are often different beasts entirely.
My body failed to coordinate its symptoms in a way convenient for modern medicine.
This is where many patients begin discovering the enormous disconnect between conventional medicine and a more holistic approach to healing.
And by holistic, I do not mean anti-science wellness influencers waving potions around while trying to sell bottled mountain air and enlightenment in the same online bundle.
There is a fine line between integrative medicine and someone trying to sell you powdered optimism for $89.99.
I mean looking at the body as an interconnected system instead of isolated symptoms.
I mean considering nutrition, supplementation, nervous system regulation, sleep, movement, physical therapies, mindfulness, environmental stressors, and individualized treatment options alongside conventional care.
Not instead of medicine. Alongside it.
Because pain doesn’t stay politely inside one department.
The body cannot always be divided into neat specialties simply because the healthcare system is.
One point especially stood out to me. Roberts referenced pain scientist Lorimer Moseley from the University of Adelaide, discussing how conventional medicine often compartmentalizes the body into isolated systems. The gut, the brain, the joints. When chronic pain rarely behaves that neatly.
Pain spills into everything.
Your nervous system changes. Your sleep changes. Your digestion changes. Your stress response changes. Your sense of safety changes.
The nervous system remembers suffering long after scans stop showing it.
For years I was bounced between specialists who all told me some variation of, “Everything looks normal.” 👍 👍
Which was excellent news except for the small detail that I was getting worse.
There’s an exhaustion that comes from hearing “everything looks normal” while actively deteriorating.
Every appointment felt a bit like medical speed dating except nobody wanted a second date with my file.
I was essentially told to go back to physio. This wasn’t really a medical issue anymore.
I believe in physiotherapy. Deeply. It has helped me tremendously. But there comes a point where patients stop needing another treatment and start needing someone to ask bigger questions.
Nothing discourages a person quite like enthusiastically trying a stretch or strengthening exercise that immediately makes things worse.
Every specialist confidently searches for answers inside their own department like medical-themed escape rooms.
Somewhere between “try yoga” and “have you considered drinking more water?” I began expanding my own research.
And I’ve lost count of the books and podcasts that begin with the exact same storyline:
“I was trained in conventional medicine. I trusted the system completely… until I became the patient.”
At first, these doctors often dismiss holistic approaches entirely. Patients mention supplements, meditation, dietary changes, nervous system work, or alternative therapies, and the response is cautious at best and dismissive at worst.
Snake oil. Pseudoscience. Non-compliance.
But then something shifts.
The doctor develops chronic pain. An autoimmune condition. A lingering injury. Burnout. A nervous system disorder.
And suddenly certainty cracks open into curiosity.
Chronic pain turns you into a part-time researcher, part-time philosopher, and full-time reluctant detective.
I have spent an unreasonable amount of my adult life trying to determine whether I am injured, inflamed, overtired, under-rested, dehydrated, stressed, or simply existing incorrectly.
Living with chronic pain means constantly performing the world’s least fun science experiment on yourself.
By year three of unexplained symptoms, I could practically earn honorary medical credits.
To be fair, holistic spaces are not immune to problems either. There is misinformation, exploitation, fearmongering, and an endless supply of expensive miracle cures marketed toward vulnerable people desperate to feel better.
Pain makes people easy to manipulate. Both systems can fail people in different ways.
That’s why I don’t believe the answer is abandoning conventional medicine for holistic healing.
I believe the answer is integration.
An actual partnership.
Healing is bigger than symptom management.
Patients do not need doctors to be omniscient. We need them to be curious.
Surgeons are trained to operate. Doctors are trained to diagnose and prescribe. Specialists are trained to identify patterns within their specialty.
We need practitioners who understand both the power and the limitations of their training. And openly work with other practitioners, conventional and holistic, to find a root cause and treatment plan.
This matters enormously to a patient just trying to survive.
Chronic illness does not always fit neatly inside textbook timelines and diagnostic boxes.
Medicine’s symbol speaks of healing being available. Yet many people with chronic illness spend years moving through appointments feeling like fragmented symptoms instead of whole human beings.
Stacey Roberts described asking chronic pain patients to remember a time before they lived with pain. Then she asks them to imagine themselves in the future doing something that currently hurts. Picking up grandchildren. Bending over. Any repetitive movement, without pain.
And many people simply cannot picture it.
Their bodies have become so conditioned toward pain and protection that even imagining safety feels impossible.
This is your forest therapy practice for this week. Find a quiet place in nature and practice this visualization.
Chronic pain doesn’t only affect muscles and joints. It reshapes expectation. Identity. Fear. Hope.
Roberts discussed using visualization, breathing, mindfulness, and repetition to help retrain the nervous system’s response to pain.
That idea connects to what I’ve experienced through forest therapy and time in nature.
Regulation comes while standing beneath trees while wind moves through their branches overhead. The nervous system seems to recognize something there before the mind does. The movement. The rhythm. The reminder that not everything in the world is bracing for impact.
Healing and pain elimination are not always the same thing.
Chronic pain teaches your nervous system to scan constantly for danger. Nature quietly teaches it another language.
No performance. No productivity. No pressure to fix yourself.
Just space to exist in a body that has spent far too long preparing for the next flare.
I appreciated many of the points Stacey Roberts made in the podcast. But I struggled with the title of her book, The Pain-Free Formula.
Not because I don’t believe improvement is possible. I do.
I absolutely believe there are things we can do to reduce pain, improve quality of life, calm the nervous system, support healing, and function better in our bodies.
But chronic illness eventually teaches many of us something medicine rarely does:
Sometimes the greatest medical harm is making patients feel invisible.
At some point I stopped obsessing over becoming pain free and started focusing on becoming supported.
I decided healing would come in time. And if not, I would still be okay.
Not because I had given up. But because I finally realized I had the tools, support, and guidance I needed to endure whatever my condition threw at me.
Ironically, that mindset shift brought me more peace than years spent desperately chasing the next solution.
Sometimes acceptance is more freeing than the absence of pain we searched for so desperately.
I hope Stacey Roberts never fully understands that distinction.
Because for her to truly understand it, she may have to suffer at a depth I would not wish on anyone.
At the end of the podcast, the host asked how she would redesign the healthcare system for chronic pain patients. Roberts discussed the need for more investment into preventative health, nutrition research, nervous system regulation, and understanding why certain non-pharmaceutical interventions help people heal.
And honestly, I think she raised important questions.
Because if someone improves through movement, nutrition, mindfulness, supplementation, therapy, nervous system regulation, or lifestyle change, why should that healing be dismissed simply because it did not originate from a prescription pad?
People in pain do not need to be fixed before they are worthy of compassion.
I do think our healthcare system needs to evolve.
Not because doctors are evil. Not because science has failed. Not because medicine lacks value.
Listen to your patient; he is telling you the diagnosis.
Listen. Not just for the keywords that trigger familiar treatment pathways. But for the whole story.
For the grief patients carry. For the exhaustion. For the devastation of losing trust in your own body. And for the courage it takes to keep asking for help after years of disappointment.
Healing should never have become a battle between conventional and holistic medicine.
People in pain deserve both.
And if you’ve ever had to redefine what healing or success looks like inside a difficult body, I wrote more about that here as well. You Are a Success Story
A forest therapy reflection on burnout, surrender, and learning to live gently inside your own life.
There was a period of time where my nervous system was running entirely on stress and outrage. I was carrying so much tension I could feel it humming beneath my skin. I wore it like an armour.
I was teaching piano almost full time. Helping my children survive school systems that did not know how to support kids with ADHD. Trying to advocate for a child who had endured years of bullying only to be treated like he was the problem once he finally reacted.
There were meetings. Emails. Phone calls. Policies. Assessments. Endless explanations.
And somewhere in there, I was also managing a farm, a household, meal planning, grocery shopping, appointments, chronic pain, surgeries, inflammation, and a body that kept submitting maintenance requests I could no longer ignore. Sound familiar?
Outer chaos eventually becomes inner weather.
Then there was the car.
Oh, the car.
Marketed as “off-road capable,” apparently as long as your idea of off-roading was driving over a decorative gravel patch at a golf resort once annually.
When our Saskatchewan roads started dismantling it piece by piece, we were informed it wasn’t actually built for daily gravel roads. Then every winter the same part broke because it apparently also wasn’t designed for… winter?
I remember thinking, Well neither am I, but you don’t see me breaking down.
(foreshadowing 😳)
This felt a little too intentional of a design flaw for something sold in Saskatchewan.
At the time, I was angry at everything.
The educational system. The medical system. The government. Corporations. World events. Every injustice. Every failure. Every person who made life harder than it needed to be.
And underneath all of it was one desperate belief:
If I fight hard enough, maybe I can force the world to become safe.
So I fought.
And every phone call tightened my muscles more. Every conflict wound my nervous system tighter. Every injustice became another brick in the emotional dam I was trying to hold together.
Even now, writing about it, I can feel traces of that tension in my body.
My nerves were tight. My jaw was tight. My shoulders were tight. My thoughts were tight.
My energy felt dark and electric and sharp. Warnings were everywhere:
Do Not Touch: Load Bearing Delusions Ahead.
Eventually, the dam broke.
Not in some poetic, graceful collapse. More like a nervous system mutiny. Everything in my body was operating like an emergency broadcast system.
Everything I had stuffed down flooded upward at once: bad information, bad coping, bad core beliefs, fear, grief, anger, exhaustion.
It was physically excruciating. I’d been on my last straw for like 300 straws, and finally I ran out of straws.
After the initial effects subsided, I remember lying in bed unable to function. A puddle of a human being. All the fight inside me still existed but now it lived in a body that couldn’t move and a brain that couldn’t think.
I didn’t know it at the time but this would become my new beginning.
You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.
One of the greatest gifts forest therapy gave me was this:
Nature does not spend its energy resisting its own seasons.
The forest does not panic because decay exists beside growth.
Yet so many women live as though rest is failure.
We push through pain. Push through exhaustion. Push through grief. Push through our intuition. Push through limits our bodies are desperately trying to communicate.
We fight every battle. Carry every burden. Solve every crisis.
And then we wonder why we are chronically exhausted, inflamed, anxious, disconnected, and burned out.
I see it everywhere.
Women who are always tired. Always hurting. Always “fine.” Always one more obligation away from collapse.
Forest therapy taught me something radical.
Stillness is not laziness. Stillness is regulation.
Outer stillness creates the conditions for inner calm.
Not because the world becomes peaceful. But because you stop feeding every storm.
A Forest Therapy Practice: The Sit Spot
One of the simplest and most powerful forest therapy practices is called a sit spot.
You choose one place outdoors and return to it regularly.
That’s it.
No performance. No hiking goals. No fitness tracker congratulating you for elevated heart rates. No optimizing your experience into a competitive sport.
Your only job is to sit and notice.
(The chickadees remain unimpressed by productivity culture)
How To Practice
Find a place outdoors where you feel safe and comfortable.
A forest trail. A park bench. A tree in your yard.
Then:
Sit quietly for 10–20 minutes.
Notice what moves and what remains still.
Listen farther away than you normally do.
Feel where your body touches the earth or chair.
Allow your nervous system to settle before asking anything of yourself.
You do not need to “achieve” calm.
The forest does not demand that from you.
It simply offers regulation through rhythm, repetition, sensory softness, and presence.
Over time, your body begins remembering something it forgot. It does not have to remain in survival mode forever.
From Fighting Everything To Tending Something
It has taken me years to pare down my list of fights to zero.
Not because I stopped caring.
But because I realized anger was consuming the very life I was trying to protect.
Now, instead of fighting constantly, I create spaces of calm.
I meditate. I practice energy work. I use affirmations. I spend time in the forest like it is medicine because for me, it is.
Despite the chaos that can still exist around me, I guard my energy carefully.
From this space, I choose where I can genuinely be of service.
I try to listen when my body whispers instead of waiting until it screams through symptoms. I create rituals that bring me back to myself when I wander too far into fear or overwhelm. I practice gratitude daily because gratitude softens the nervous system’s constant scanning for danger.
And when concerns arise, I do my best to voice them clearly and compassionately.
Then I let them go.
Not because they do not matter. But because I matter too.
Become a possibilitarian. No matter how dark things seem to be or actually are, raise your sights and see possibilities. Always see them, for they’re always there.
Forest therapy helped me understand this deeply.
Possibility exists everywhere in nature.
A burned forest regenerates. A fallen tree becomes nourishment. A cracked open pinecone releases seeds. Life keeps finding ways forward.
And humans can too.
Not always by forcing harder. Sometimes by softening enough to notice another path entirely.
What Makes A Good Life
There’s a quote from Donald Miller that has stayed with me for years. In it, he imagines sitting with God under a tree outside heaven, remembering the story of his life together.
And what moves me most is this idea:
That God would have favourite parts of our story.
Not just the successful moments. But the moments we grew. The moments we softened. The moments we overcame. The moments we kept loving despite pain.
The moments we learned how to become fully human.
To me, this is what a good life looks like.
Not a perfectly optimized one. Not one where we won every fight. Not one where we proved ourselves endlessly useful.
But one we could sit down and talk about with tenderness.
A life where our soul is no longer thirsty.
A meaningful life is not built through perfection but presence.
People tell me it’s wonderful that I’ve turned my pain into something useful or helpful. And I appreciate the kindness in that.
But honestly, sometimes purpose looks less glamorous than people imagine.
Sometimes it’s simply this:
If you do it wrong, you know how to tell somebody else what to avoid. If I walk into an invisible wall, I’m going to let others know about it. This wall is invisible and solid!
If I can help someone avoid walking into walls or burning themselves to the ground trying to hold up the entire world, then my pain served a purpose.
If I can help another woman understand that rest is not weakness… that stillness is healing… that her nervous system deserves gentleness… that she is allowed to stop fighting every battle…
Then maybe this story matters.
An Invitation To The Forest
So if you are exhausted…
If your body hurts all the time… If your mind never stops spinning… If your nervous system is tight as a fence wire in January…
Come to the forest.
Not to fix yourself. Not to become more productive.
Back in my day, some kids brought hockey cards and sticker collections to school. I brought an alarming range of ligament-based entertainment.
Sometimes hypermobility first appears as a child who seems unusually bendy or clumsy, often both at once. 🙋♀️
The child who sits in a W position on the floor because it feels natural. The one who, without pausing to question it, contorts themselves into strange positions during movie night.
What they may not see is the child constantly running into walls because their body struggles to map itself properly in space. Bruises appearing mysteriously across shins. Ankles rolling on flat ground. Sleeves chewed because pain and overstimulation are difficult to explain at seven years old.
And then there are the “growing pains.”
Except many children with connective tissue disorders experience pain far beyond the occasional ache adults remember from childhood.
Deep bone pain at night. Legs throbbing so intensely sleep becomes impossible. Crying after gym class. Exhaustion after seemingly normal activities.
Many hypermobile children become experts at masking early. They laugh while joints slip. They keep playing while hurting because they assume everyone else feels this too.
Some become the “dramatic” child. Others become the “tough” one.
Honestly, I was the child trying to survive in a body I did not yet have language for.
What am I even doing bending my neck like that?
The thumb that bends too far backward. The knees that point in unusual directions. The shoulder that clicks when slipping in and out. Being crazy talented in a yoga class my first day.
What people don’t see is that connective tissue is not merely a few loose ligaments behaving badly.
Connective tissue is infrastructure.
It is the architecture holding the body together. The webbing woven through blood vessels, skin, organs, fascia, tendons, heart valves, lungs, digestive systems, pelvic floor, eyes, nerves, and joints. It is scaffolding. Suspension bridge. Packaging tape. Elastic waistband. Shock absorber.
And when connective tissue is faulty, life can begin to feel like living in a house where every screw has loosened itself by half a turn.
Not enough to collapse all at once. Enough that everything creaks. And left unchecked, more and more areas become unstable, then require constant repairs. Eventually some rooms just become unusable.
A Sad Commentary: AKAMy Brush with Organized Sports
My joints approached organized sports with more enthusiasm than stability. More optimism than skill.
In a small town, everybody played volleyball or there simply wasn’t a volleyball team.
So I played volleyball.
I hated it.
Looking back now, I wonder why I stayed in as long as I did. Every practice left my forearms covered in bruises. Big ones, tiny ones, overlapping ones. I looked part Dalmatian. Nobody else seemed to bruise like that, so naturally the conclusion was that I was doing it wrong.
Turns out my connective tissue was doing it wrong. Not me.
I was terrible at volleyball. Not for lack of trying, either. I could picture exactly what my body was supposed to do, but the execution never matched the image in my head. It always felt like there was a lag between my brain and my limbs, like someone had replaced my coordination with an unreliable Wi-Fi signal.
The only part of volleyball practice I excelled at was stretching.
That should maybe have been a clue.
I could also run forever, but the muscle fatigue before, during, and after was brutal. My legs and ribs constantly felt tight and overworked, like my muscles were trying to compensate for a body that refused to stabilize itself properly.
The solution offered to me was always the same: “Practice more.” “You just need to focus, Pam.” “Try harder.” “Don’t give up so easily all the time.”
My P.E. teacher, who was also my coach, and I were not exactly compatible personalities. I suspect I ranked fairly high on his “lazy kid” list. My feelings toward him and his teaching style don’t need to be discussed for the purpose of this post. Perhaps he was doing the best he knew how 🤷♀️.
What hurt most was that I wasn’t used to being bad at things.
I excelled in music. Dance. Academics. If I tried something, I usually became good at it eventually. But anything involving proprioception. Balance, coordination, spatial awareness, reaction time, exposed a kind of weakness I couldn’t outwork.
No matter how hard I tried, my body never responded the way everyone else’s seemed to. I felt like I was being asked to build a stable life with elastic bands where other people were given rope.
After enough years of that experience, something in me quietly stopped trying.
Not everywhere. Just there.
I realized I could put in enormous effort and still end up with roughly the same P.E. grade as the kid half-heartedly wandering laps around the gym. So eventually, I became that kid instead. The one at the back of the class who didn’t seem invested. The one teachers assumed didn’t care whether they passed.
Stemming from humiliation in trying my hardest while looking like a fool and as though I wasn’t trying at all.
It’s an incredibly discouraging place for a young person to live.
Some kids are exhausted. Discouraged. In pain. Disconnected from bodies that refuse to cooperate. In retrospect, my body had all the stability of a shopping cart with one bad wheel.
The whole point of physical education is supposedly to encourage lifelong movement and confidence in your body.
Ironically, I now walk everywhere, go to the gym regularly, and deeply value movement. I suspect that may not be the case for those classmates that achieved gold stars for gym class back in the day.
Children are often graded on visible performance without anyone asking what invisible barriers may exist underneath it. 🍌 🍌 🍌
And maybe that experience is part of why I later felt drawn toward educational support work. Because I remember exactly what it feels like to be misunderstood in a classroom. To be trying harder than anyone realizes while appearing like you are trying the least.
Some kids are not lazy.
Sometimes what looks like apathy is actually years of silent defeat.
So MuchMore Than Loose Joints
My body has taught me that fragility and resilience are not opposites. Sometimes they exist in the very same tissue.
People often imagine connective tissue disorders as orthopedic inconveniences.
A sore knee. An ankle sprain. Being exceptionally bendy.
Playing twister with my now-26-year-old. Not to brag, but I was very good.
But connective tissue does not politely stay in one department.
It influences how blood vessels constrict and relax. Why standing up can feel like gravity suddenly doubled. Why heart rates race while brushing teeth. Why exhaustion arrives not after effort, but before and during it.
It influences the skin. Fragile, stretchy, slow to heal, easily bruised.
It influences digestion. Because the digestive tract also depends on connective tissue and smooth coordination. Meals become negotiations instead of nourishment.
It influences breathing. Because the rib cage, diaphragm, and tiny structures supporting the lungs are all part of the same interconnected story.
It influences pain. Not only through injuries, but through a nervous system constantly adapting to instability. Muscles tighten to compensate. Fascia braces. The body learns vigilance.
Even sleep can become difficult when the body spends the entire night trying to hold itself together. Some people wake up refreshed. My body wakes up looking like I’ve been assembled with spare parts in low lighting. Like sleep happened near me but not directly to me.
There is loneliness in illness that hides in plain sight.
You may look healthy while internally calculating:
Can my hips handle this chair? Will my spine tolerate the drive? How long before the fatigue crashes in? Is today the day I sustain an injury that sets me back a year?
People see the smile at the gatherings. They do not see the cost afterward.
The Forest Never Demands Symmetry
One of the reasons forest therapy can feel so healing for those with any type of disorders is because the forest does not care about perfection.
Trees twist toward light. Branches split and regrow. Moss softens fallen things instead of condemning them.
In the forest, support is collaborative.
Roots intertwine underground. Fungi trade nutrients between struggling trees. Fallen logs become nourishment for future life. Nothing survives entirely alone.
For people living in bodies that require adaptation, slowness, pacing, and care, the forest offers a radically compassionate model of existence.
Nature does not measure worth.
Walking Practice: “Borrowing Stability”
This forest therapy practice can be done slowly while walking a trail, sidewalk, park path, or even your backyard.
As you walk, notice what in the landscape appears stable.
Perhaps it is:
the rootedness of a tree
the reliability of stone
the rhythm of wind
the resolution of moss growing over rough surfaces
Without forcing positivity, simply observe.
Now begin walking more slowly.
As each foot touches the ground, imagine you are borrowing steadiness from the earth beneath you.
Not fixing yourself. Not overcoming your body. Borrowing support.
You may silently repeat:
Supported. Held. Connected.
If your body hurts while walking, let the practice include that truth instead of resisting it.
Forest therapy is not about pretending discomfort away. It is about allowing yourself to belong exactly as you are.
Pause occasionally and place a hand on a tree trunk, railing, stone wall, or your own chest.
Notice:
What supports you physically?
What supports you emotionally?
What support have you been refusing because you are used to surviving alone?
Continue walking without rushing toward insight.
Sometimes healing begins the moment we stop arguing with our pace.
The Grief No One Talks About
There is grief in becoming intimate with limitation.
Grief when your mind has cheques your connective tissue cannot cash.
Grief when symptoms multiply like unwanted groupies: fatigue, dysautonomia, chronic pain, migraines, digestive problems, instability, inflammation, sensory overwhelm.
Many connective tissue disorders do not travel alone. They tend to arrive in flocks.
Not the polished beauty of wellness culture that insists healing should look photogenic and triumphant. Complete. Universal.
But a quieter beauty.
The beauty of learning to listen deeply to others. The beauty of noticing small joys because large ones became inaccessible. The beauty of becoming tender toward bodies. Your own and others’. The beauty of discovering that a meaningful life was never dependent on being free from pain.
I spent years believing my body’s limitations were character flaws. Turns out that limiting belief was false. Those limitations have helped me become the person I am.
To be rooted is perhaps the most important and least recognized need of the human soul.
Research continues to show time in forests can help regulate the nervous system, reduce stress hormones, lower heart rate, and support emotional well-being. But for those living with connective tissue disorders, the benefits often go deeper than measurable metrics.
Forest therapy gives permission to:
move slowly
rest without guilt
reconnect with sensory pleasure
soften hypervigilance
leave productivity behind temporarily
remember you are more than symptoms
When the nervous system lives in a constant state of adaptation, gentle sensory experiences matter.
The sound of leaves moving overhead. The coolness of shade on inflamed skin. Birdsong interrupting anxious thoughts. The visual softness of green.
None of these cure a connective tissue disorder.
But they can create moments where the body feels less at war with itself.
And moments matter.
Especially when stitched together over time.
A Beautiful Life Can Still Grow Here
Instructions for living a life: Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it. — Mary Oliver
Living with a connective tissue disorder may mean your life unfolds differently than expected.
More pauses. More recalculating. More adaptation.
But different is not lesser.
Some of the most compassionate people are those whose bodies taught them interdependence.
Some of the most observant souls are those forced to slow down enough to notice life carefully.
The forest reminds us that resilience is not hardness.
Resilience is flexibility. Relationship. Return.
And perhaps that is fitting for people made of connective tissue. Those who understand, more than most, that life is ultimately about connection.
Not perfect strength. Not endless endurance.
Connection.
To the earth. To one another. To moments of beauty that still arrive, even here.
Many trails in Saskatchewan are shimmering. Beautifully. Treacherously.
I’m pretty sure they are trying to kill me.
Sparkling snow is magical. Sparkling frost is beautiful.
But sparkling ice on a forest trail?
That’s a different category entirely. “Be gone foul thing!”
When you live with hypermobility, ice is less of a winter decoration and more of a full-contact sport.
For most people, a slip on an icy trail means a flail of the arms, a laugh, and maybe a comment. “Watch out for the icy patch!”.
For someone with hypermobility, that same moment can mean:
a rib that determines it would rather live somewhere other than its intended slot
a shoulder that doth protest too much (because the shoulder blade is sliding down your back)
muscles that grip like overprotective bodyguards
and a new entry in the ever-growing logbook titled “Well… that escalated quickly.”
A small jolt or an awkward catch. And suddenly a split second wobble becomes three months of physiotherapy, muscle protecting and pain with every movement.
Exhaustion from the constant battleFoot bones out Lower back muscle spasm keeping me mostly bed ridden, this was my short escapeA foot up as I pose with siblings to hold me balanced after a physio adjustment Rib out and going to watch a show, hoping I’ll make it. Right thigh stuck in spasm, nervous system in a flare. Depression, why bother trying? No matter how hard I try, I always have painful subluxations.
Winter walking becomes less like a casual stroll and more like a strategic mission.
Our hypermobile bodies clearly have a different set of rules.
Living with hypermobility also means developing a surprisingly intimate relationship with your physiotherapist.
Years ago I realized I owned an entire library of tiny resistance bands in colours that sounded deceptively cheerful.
Coral. Mint. Lavender. Suggesting relaxation and beach vacations.
In reality they represented fifteen very specific exercises. Each designed to convince my shoulder, hip, or rib that staying in place is actually an excellent idea.
In more recent years, overall strengthening through running has become my greatest hope against hope.
Thankfully those resistance bands are now packed away. They were the bane of my existence for years. Strengthen the shoulder, put out the elbow, wrist, and fingers. Strengthen the hip, put out the knee, ankle and toes.
If you live with chronic pain, you also know the strange pleasure of telling people:
“Yes, I injured myself sneezing.”
And then watching them try to politely hide their confusion. 😕
Enigmatic Equations Await
People with chronic pain develop a special kind of mental math.
Before leaving the house, the brain quietly runs a checklist:
How icy is it?
How far is the trail?
What muscles are already staging a coup today?
What are the odds I’ll slip, twist, or do the world’s slowest accidental yoga pose?
Slipping into something a little more comfortable (psychosis)
These calculations happen constantly.
Because when joints are extra flexible, the body relies heavily on muscles to hold everything together.
If those muscles get surprised by a sudden slip on ice, they react like overcaffeinated security guards.
We don’t even have to experience a crash landing. A slight “whoop”. Everything tightens. Followed shortly by, everything hurts. Sometimes for a very long time.
And yet… Staying inside is not the answer.
Inside Out: The Hidden Dangers of Staying Indoors
My soul was not designed for indefinite indoor storage.
After a few days of being cooped up, something starts to happen.
First a restlessness.
Then a longing.
Then a slightly dramatic moment standing at the window staring outside like a Victorian character under quarantine.
Because the body may be complicated. But the soul is surprisingly clear about what it needs.
Trees. Sky. Fresh air. The quiet company of chickadees who seem perpetually delighted with life.
I go to nature to be soothed and healed, and to have my senses put in order.
And when chronic pain is part of your life, your nervous system spends a lot of time: out of order.
Pain keeps the brain alert. Guarded. Scanning.
But the forest gently invites something else.
A slower rhythm. A softer focus.
Don’t let perfect get in the way of good enough.
“Break!!”- Dancing Through the Meadow
Hypermobility changes the way you move through the world.
Especially in winter.
Walking on icy trails becomes a very particular style of locomotion that could best be described as:
“Cautious woodland creature.”
Short steps.
Careful weight shifts.
Occasional pauses to test the ground.
One wrong move and suddenly you find yourself soft launching a new form of dance.
Anyone watching from a distance might assume you were practicing some form of extreme slow-motion flamenco 💃 .
But really, you’re simply trying to avoid becoming an accidental case study in sidewalk face implants.
Oddly enough, this cautious way of walking mirrors a core forest therapy practice. Slow walking.
Forest therapy guides often invite people to slow down enough to truly notice the forest.
Hypermobility just… adds extra motivation.
A Little Winter Guiding Advice
I have learned a few things from my winter days on the trail this year.
Boots with ICE FX technology soles are the way to go. I started using them this year. I had two slips in the first couple weeks of winter. I got the boots and I haven’t had a slip since. They are like winter tires. I still have to be careful but they have saved me.
Hiking poles are this girl’s best friend. I am learning when to use them and when to leave them in the car. Days I can’t see the trail under the snow or when the trail is glistening with ice, they are essential. Days the trail is packed with snow and my balance feels good they can stay back.
Some days you just have to stay home. The boots and poles open your world. There are still times when staying home is the safest and best option. It is not worth the risk of a fall. Or a tweak. Walking in a mall or other large indoor space can meet some of your physical movement needs. As the snow melts, you can extend outdoor Earthing sessions in a safe, seated position until the ice is gone.
Nervous Systems: A Unified Network
There is another layer to chronic pain that people don’t see.
The nervous system becomes watchful.
When pain appears often enough, the brain begins to scan constantly for the next signal. Muscles tighten sooner. Reflexes fire faster. The body becomes protective.
It’s not weakness. It’s survival.
But a nervous system that spends too much time in protection mode eventually forgets how to settle.
This is one of the quiet gifts of time in nature. Not just for enjoyment but for nervous system survival.
As Japanese physician Yoshifumi Miyazaki, one of the pioneers of forest bathing research, observed:
The forest environment allows the nervous system to shift from vigilance to restoration.
For someone managing chronic pain, that shift is not small. It is validating.
Research into forest environments has shown that simply being among trees can lower cortisol, calm heart rate, and shift the nervous system out of constant vigilance.
In other words, the forest gently persuades the body:
You are safe enough to soften.
And for someone living with chronic pain, that reminder can be profoundly healing.
Frosty Therapy: Nature’s Icy Embrace for the Soul
If winter trails feel risky but your spirit still needs the forest, try this gentle practice.
Practice: Borrowing Stability
Find a tree nearby and place one hand against the trunk.
Feel the firmness of the bark under your palm. Trees have been practicing stability for a very long time.
Take three slow breaths.
Notice your feet inside your boots.
Notice the ground supporting you.
Then take three very slow steps. With each step, quietly ask: What does stability feel like right now?
You might be surprised how much calmer the nervous system becomes when movement slows down.
Winter walking with hypermobility includes both beauty and risk. Moments of deep solace among the trees and occasional grievances to file with a body that requires extra grit.
Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror. Just keep going. No feeling is final.
Perhaps winter forest walks teach that same wisdom.
Conscientious step by conscientious step.
The Whispers of Accord
Living with chronic pain sometimes feels like a negotiation between the body and the soul.
The body says: Please be wary.
The soul says: Please go outside.
The forest, thankfully, doesn’t insist on perfect joints or pain-free muscles.
It simply offers a place to breathe.
Scottish nature writer Nan Shepherd wrote about being in the mountains:
The thing to be known grows with the knowing.
Perhaps the same is true of our bodies.
The more we learn their quirks and their quiet wisdom, the more gently we can move through the world. Even when the trail shimmers with ice and every step requires a little forethought.
Because sometimes healing isn’t about conquering the path. Sometimes it’s simply about finding a way to keep walking among the trees.
So yes, SK winter trails sometimes feel like obstacle courses designed specifically for people with hypermobile joints to fail.
And yes, the body occasionally protests the whole arrangement. Of having any movement at all. Yet consider another quote by Nan Shepherd that leads us back to what matters,
It is a grand thing to get leave to live.
Perhaps that is what these mindful winter walks really are.
A quiet permission to keep living fully, even if the steps are slow and deliberate.
Careful steps. Even slightly wobbly steps.
Keep walking when and where you can. Surrender when called for. We are so close Prairies friends! We have almost made it to Spring! We’ve got this.
I am made of words & rivers & winds & wildflowers. I am part grief & part hope & all love.
-Victoria Erickson
From the outside, my life still looks mostly the same.
I still show up. I still smile. I still walk in the woods.
What people don’t see is the calculation behind every choice. The energy budgeting, the quiet bargaining with my body, the grief that comes when the answer is no again. Chronic pain didn’t just change what I can do. It changed how I think, how I hope, and how I understand myself.
I didn’t lose my old self all at once.
She left in pieces. First the bounce in my step, then the spontaneity, then the confidence that tomorrow would feel better. Chronic pain has a way of rearranging your life while pretending nothing has changed. And somehow, you’re expected to adapt quietly and keep smiling like you didn’t just lose someone important.
There is a quiet kind of grief that comes with chronic pain. Those of us who know can see it in the eyes. In the bouncing leg when sitting too long. In the little noises and facial expressions that most people miss.
This is not a grief that comes with casseroles or sympathy cards. Not the kind people know how to name.
It’s the grief of losing someone very important. You.
The body you trusted. The energy you assumed would always return. The way ordinary days felt doable.
Back in the day when your consequences had actions. Now it takes nothing to set that pain- train in motion.
Chronic pain doesn’t just hurt. It rearranges your identity. Like a Mr Potato Head put together by a little one. Totally unfamiliar from what it’s “supposed to be.”
Purpose feels unfamiliar. Hope has to be redefined. Can one even set goals anymore? And from the outside, nothing looks different at all.
You still look like you.
But internally, everything has changed.
That’s why community matters more than advice.
What a fragile, tender gift it is to be invited into another’s wounds.
Advice tends to arrive loudly and unsolicited. (Often with links. 🤭)
What actually helps is something quieter. 🤫
Not people who argue your reality. (😳 “I’m surprised you feel comfortable saying that out loud” 🤣)
Not people who say, “Have you tried…?” like they’ve just cracked the code. (😨 As though the slightest change in your world will not usher in all of your chronic megadons! 🤯 )
Not people who look sideways at your therapy choices. (👋 “Be gone, foul thing” 🙃)
But people who,
Cheer when something finally settles back into place 🙌
Take your call when you have nothing left 🤙
Help recalibrate the distorted lens pain creates 🔎
Invite you in without being offended when you decline 🫴
Don’t judge your sleep, your limits, or your pace 🙂↔️
They understand one sacred truth:
You are the only person who lives in this body.
And when you reach out, they show up.
Trees of Solace: Earth’s Embrace in Times of Grief
Forest therapy doesn’t try to fix you.
Which is refreshing, to be honest.
It doesn’t rush the process or demand improvement. No gold stars. No timelines.
It simply offers a place where you can grieve. Because this life is tough.
Trees don’t ask who you used to be. They have been pretty quiet during a conversation, in my experience.
They don’t compare you to your past. They are really good at living in the now.
They don’t need you to be productive. Their progress is very slow. They respect your pace as well.
They just let you be you. Whatever version of you that may be.
And when you’re grieving your old self, that is the miracle worker you need.
To be idle is a short road to death; to be contemplative is a short road to life.
— Unknown, attributed to early monastic writings
Stillness is not stagnation. In the forest, stillness becomes listening.
The Garden Path: Shedding the Old Self to Bloom Anew
1. Hold a “Letting Go” Walk
Walk slowly and name (quietly or aloud) what you are releasing. Old expectations, former timelines, borrowed definitions of success.
Leave something symbolic behind. A stone, a leaf, a breath, writing in the snow.
Grief likes ceremony. Even small, slightly awkward ones.
2. Practice Observing Instead of Fixing
Sit and observe without correcting your thoughts.
Notice what hurts.
Notice what doesn’t.
Notice what still feels alive.
This is harder than it sounds. Most of us are very committed to fixing ourselves.
Do not ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do that.
— Howard Thurman
3. Let the Landscape Mirror Change
Forests are experts in adaptation.
Storm damage. Regrowth. Fallen trees feeding new life.
Your body is not failing. It is reorganizing.
Messy? Yes.
Meaningless? Not even close.
4. Replace Focusing on the Yield with Yielding
Some days the win is sitting.
Some days it’s noticing birdsong instead of pain for ten whole seconds.
That counts.
It all counts.
Celebrate small victories shamelessly. Pain already takes enough. Don’t let it take joy too.
5. Create a New Self Narrative
The old self doesn’t disappear. It composts.
Strength becomes discernment.
Speed becomes awareness.
Achievement becomes alignment.
And occasionally, dark humour becomes a coping skill. (Highly recommended.)
Because if you can laugh when your body sends mixed signals, you’re still very much alive.
You Are Not Becoming Less
You are becoming different.
And different doesn’t mean diminished.
The forest reminds us that worth is not measured by output, endurance, or even consistency.
It’s measured by belonging. By heart beats. By the current of our perceived experience.
You belong here.
In this body.
On this path.
And when you’re ready, the forest will help you meet the version of yourself that knows how to live well. Within the limits. Without shame.
This January, if you feel low and heavy and unready- please remember that in nature, the new year begins in spring. January is not nature's reset. March is. In a few months' time, temperatures will rise and the days will be long enough to actually do things. Nature is still unwinding. It's okay if you are, too. -srwpoetry
Opacarophile
(n) someone who finds deep comfort, solace and profound peace in sunsets
Not the beginning, when everything still feels like clay. Wet, moldable, brimming with possibility. And not the end, when threads have been tied off and stories are stitched into something you can finally make sense of. I’m here, in the thick of it. In the in between. Healing from chronic pain and somehow learning to live with chronic fatigue, trying to shape what might be next.
Trying to find purpose in pain when the path ahead feels tender and unfinished.
She cleared out all of her old ideas of things, until she could hear her own joy with almost no effort at all.
-Sara Avant Stover, The Way of The Happy Woman
As I have talked about previously on here. I had a hysterectomy after years of fighting hormones that felt like they were clawing their way through my insides. Endometriosis pain stretched across entire seasons of my life.
And then there was my business. It was finally thriving, finally fun. Something my mom built with her hands and heart. But my body whispered then shouted then raged to get me to listen to its unmistakable limits.
Even sitting at the piano. The place that once felt like oxygen became something my body could no longer hold. Notes I used to float through now feel heavy, unsteady, often impossible.
Chronic pain doesn’t just take.
It rearranges.
It remodels.
It forces you into corners you didn’t see coming.
And here I am again, in this messy middle. Sorting out the parts of me that remain. Trying to decide what pieces go where, and to whom, and how much. Because there is only so much of me to go around.
My days are short. My energy is rationed. I can’t just “get up earlier” or “push harder” or “stretch the day.” Those tricks don’t work in this body.
I have learned, painfully, that pushing past limits costs me days, sometimes weeks, of recovery. I don’t slip gently into tired. I crash into a wall of pain with no warning and no buffer. There is no bouncing back.
I don’t have a reserve tank anymore.
I remember when I did.
I remember using an entire day to make snacks and treats for my family, cleaning the house, bathing my littles, tucking them into bed.
I remember being so tired, but feeling full. Like life had weight and meaning and movement. I loved looking at what I had accomplished.
Now?
I can get that same level of bone deep exhaustion from five minutes of washing the dishes.
And that, sadly, is not an exaggeration.
This isn’t “just midlife.”
This is chronic pain. And chronic fatigue. And chronic limitation.
But here’s the truth I’m holding onto-
The messy middle is still a valuable place. A real place. A sacred place of hope. A place worth tending.
And I’ve learned that healing isn’t found in the before or the after.
It’s found right here.
In the slow, intentional steps we take when life has to narrow down.
I have never experienced walking on sand in my winter boots before. Weird!
For me, one of those steps is forest therapy.
Where Forest Therapy Meets Healing Journey
In this season, forest therapy has become one of the few places where my body and my motivation find agreement.
It isn’t hiking. It isn’t performance. It isn’t even about movement.
It’s a return to your own breath. It is nature therapy in its gentlest form.
A soft doorway into emotional healing, grounded presence, and quiet hope.
A reclaiming of the parts of yourself that pain has tried to scatter.
A gentle companionship in the places of life that feel undone.
In the forest, I don’t have to be anything for anyone.
The trees don’t ask me to push. The moss doesn’t question my intentions. The forest simply holds space.
And in that space, I remember that even when life feels broken, I’m not.
I think healing is like that.
Quiet. Nonlinear. Messy.
More felt than understood.
And every time I enter the forest, I feel like I step onto a “ladder of hope.”
The Ladder of Hope by me
You climb it not in leaps But in breaths. You rise not by strength But by softness. The rungs are made of moments— A bird call, A sunbeam, A place to sit. And every rung you step on Whispers the same truth: You’re still rising.
These are small moment that lift me enough to keep going. Not giant steps. Not perfect healing. Not having everything sorted.
The middle is messy. But it’s also alive. It’s also becoming. It’s also sacred ground.
And maybe, purpose isn’t something we chase.
Perhaps it is something that can grow. Slowly, gently, sturdily. If we let it.
“Hope” is the thing with feathers, that perches in the soul. And sings the tune without the words. And never stops— at all.
-Emily Dickinson
Wherever you find yourself today, whether you’re living your own messy middle or standing at the edge of it, may you find one small rung of hope. One quiet moment. One breath of space.
Chronic pain has rerouted my life more times than I can count. It has taken me down roads I never meant to travel.
It’s like my GPS is stuck on the back roads setting as I travel cross country. Not quite the way I’d planned. A lot bumpier. Requiring a slower pace. And focused attention. It is often lonely. And misunderstood.
Sometimes a path calls for you to walk alone. And still, it is beautiful.
-Angie Weiland- Crosby
There are places where the forest tends us and our own breath begins to feel like a home again.
Let the air touch your face. Let the light filter in.
Climb one rung of your ladder of hope.
Just one. This will look different for each one of us. Rightly so.
We are still rising.
And that matters.
Winter, come rest your soul on autumn’s weary head. Twirl, shimmer, soften, before tucking fall into bed.
Does anyone else feel like summer goes way too fast? I am loving walking everywhere with my grandson. We go to parks, and spray pads and pools. I love time with family from far away.
But it always ends. The days get shorter and the nights get cooler. Did I do everything I was supposed to do on summer days? Did I take full advantage? What if I missed something?
I hear a general consensus among my friends that there is a certain expectation with summer. You have to do all the summer bucket list things. And take pictures and post them (or it didn’t actually happen). You have to get a super nice tan. You have to spend time at the beach.
Camps. Boating. Family time. The list is infinite. But the weekends are finite. And they seem to disappear to things like weddings and reunions. Then a couple inevitably host bad weather. And that’s it. It’s over.
This year I am embracing all of it. Last year I made sure I had things to look forward to in the fall. But this year instead of a checklist I want to have more of a relationship with the changes of the seasons.
I want to use this summer to accomplish whatever is right and good for that day. I don’t want to mourn the loss of each Saturday. I don’t want to complain over what didn’t work out. I want to enjoy. To the fullest means possible. Because, why not?
We are connected to our earth and when we are in right relationship with her we can solve mysteries that perplex our fellowmen. The peace we can access. Our centered, balanced state. I see the change of the seasons as an example of how to be in right relationship.
Sunny summer days are magnificent. Cozy fall evenings are restful. Snowy winter days are dazzling. And hopeful spring mornings are reassuring that the brilliant process will continue on. Right relationship leads me to enjoy and appreciate it all.
I have a story about wanting things to be a certain way. Maybe even a way others would agree is ‘right’. But timing and how we approach our day are greater indicators of hopefulness than continually striving to make it work the way we want.
I have three sons. They all played soccer. We spent so many hours cheering at the sidelines of a soccer field. So. Many. Hours.
Photo by u041cu0430u0440u0438u043du0430 u0428u0438u0448u043au0438u043du0430 on Pexels.com (not my boys)
One evening we sat in our camping chairs, half asleep and less than half paying attention to the game as we chatted with other parents. Our relaxation was suddenly obliterated when with looks of wonder and alarming amazement we saw our son. Our not super athletic son being put in goal.
Mind you this was still small potatoes and it didn’t really matter whether they won or lost but my mama heart wanted to go save him. He looked so small with his great big goalie gloves and that massive net behind.
I prayed for our forwards and our defense. And against their team. Just keep him from being embarrassed. My prayers were working. For minutes now he hadn’t had to do anything. Dang this mama can make miracles happen.
Actually it had been so long since he’d had to do anything that he noticed the goalie shirt he’d had thrown on him in his rush to get on the field, was backwards.
Not a big deal. Except. No. He wouldn’t. Noooo. He would. He did.
He left on his massive goalie gloves and started to turn his shirt around. Luckily play was still at the other end of the field. As the rest of the parents’ eyes were aimed at the other team’s net and they laughingly and happily cheered for their kids, my eyes were fixed with incredulity and twitching with great anticipation as my son, currently in goal, was changing his shirt.
As only a good story could go, the play changed direction and was fast approaching my son who now had the shirt the correct direction but regrettably, no better off due to the fact that it was inside out and currently stuck over his head.
At this point my sweet boy noticeably jumped. For although the shirt was over his whole face he must have been able to sense some of what was about to happen.
The rest of the crowd joined me in looking towards the goal that my son was covering. Some quietly snickered. Some tried to shout helpful suggestions, “Just take the shirt off!” “Not that way, it’s twisted!” “Why are you doing that?” someone pleadingly shrieked (that last one was me). All this happened within seconds as the play was coming upon my dear boy.
And then a breakaway. To my awe and amazement, my not-so-sporty son proceeded to make a save. With a shirt completely covering his face. And then another save. And another. Inevitably he was scored upon.
In all my hours of sitting on the sidelines that was my absolute favourite moment of all time.
But not HIS favourite memory, although he can now see the humour in it.
If he had chosen to keep the shirt as it was, it wouldn’t have been perfect but it would have kept him from getting a shirt stuck over his face while he was in goal. With the possibility of the game changing in his direction.
Is there something in your life that currently seems wrong, that you are being tempted to fixate on, when that is not the goal for this season of your life? Are you hanging on to the way it ‘should have been’? Let go.
Allow the goalie shirt to stay backwards for a time.
You can go ahead and pull it off and hope for a quick change that goes smoothly and is accomplished in good time. But what if you are supposed to be watching the play? What if you are the one to save something? Or someone? What if you need to pay attention to what is in front of you and not what you are wearing?
My hope is that these questions will strike each of you in a spectrum of rays depending on your season and your energy level. Your energy level does not define you, but you do need to pay attention to it.
Enjoy summer days. Doing all the things or none of them. Enjoying all the people or sticking to yourself. Let the expectations stay with whomever created them. Just BE in summer and allow the effects of nature to be stored in you like wells of water that you can draw from in the winter months.
Join me in a forest walk to enhance the treasures you can find in nature. Head over to my contact page to reach out and to book. Take care sweet friends.
SUNBEAM ACRES 