Where Your Feet Are

Watercolor sketch done along Hannigan Pass Trail

4" x 6"

This past weekend I had the joy of hiking with two artist friends up in the Cascade Mountains here in Washington.  All along the trail I was so aware of the fresh mountain scents, the abundant colors of wildflowers, the sounds of roaring mountain streams, and the crunch of hiking boots on rocks.  I was in the moment, right where my feet were.  

We love having times like that in our lives.  We thrive on the abundance we experience when living fully engaged in what we are doing.  Utah artist Cassandra Barney has a quote I endeavor to follow:  "Be where your feet are."  It is not easy to stay in the moment and absorb all you can and be giving all you can to that period of time.  We are either fighting distraction with all our digital media or racing ahead in time planning out our lives.  

Here's some  quotes by naturalist John Muir regarding how being in nature in the moment can be freeing for one's soul:

Walk away quietly in any direction and taste the freedom of the mountaineer. Camp out among the grasses and gentians of glacial meadows, in craggy garden nooks full of nature's darlings. Climb the mountains and get their good tidings, Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves. As age comes on, one source of enjoyment after another is closed, but nature's sources never fail.

Keep close to Nature's heart... and break clear away, once in a while, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean."

 It is so easy to be distracted and somewhere else in our daily life and work.  King David in his Psalm writings has expressed the desire for his soul to be AWAKE, to be alert to God and His creation in Psalm 57:8.  That is what I want ...to be fully alive and in the moment, to be all there in whatever I am doing, and not just to experience that on a mountain trail.  I want every moment of my life, whether mundane and ritual or highly fascinating,  to be full of God-consciousness.  Then will I be able to pay full attention to the life that is going on around me.

Live bravely and beautifully!