Cycles of Nature

A few weeks ago I went to the country to work on my book for a long weekend. I stayed at a lovely Airbnb where all I could hear were the birds and the river. I grew up in an area not far from this place and it was good to get back to my roots. 

As a child, I would spend a lot of time in the woods and revisiting that experience was like teleporting back to being a kid. The forest looked and smelled the same, moss and fungi covered stumps of trees, brambles and thorns to navigate, critters scurrying here and there. 

What was surprising to see were all of the enormous downed trees, pulled out by their roots. I can only imagine that this destruction was from Hurricane Irene or Sandy six or seven years ago. It got me thinking about how the earth is constantly changing, destruction and renewal. The past year there have been so many devastating natural disasters: floods, fires, mudslides and most recently the volcano eruption and earthquakes in Hawaii.

I’ve never thought much about volcanoes, as the only portrayal I’ve ever seen was a movie altered version of it. Seeing a video on Facebook of the slow ooze of the magma crossing a road and engulfing a car is enough to give me nightmares. 
 
Back in Nicaragua, one of our crazy adventures was to climb up an active volcano, Cerra Negro (Black Hill), and ride a board down it from the top. The ride down was fun, even if I ended up with a mouthful of ash. The highlight for me was the view during the climb up. It was a rare perspective to see the flow of lava from the past eruptions. Life was destroyed up until the point where the lava stopped flowing.

Mother Nature clearly understands the need for renewal. I think we can learn a lot from her. It doesn’t have to be quite as dramatic, but letting go of the old stagnant energy in our lives is necessary for new growth. Many of my clients often talk about feeling stuck. The stagnant energy of clutter is like cement, holding us in place. We need to break it down so we can free ourselves and move on to the next stage of our lives. Holding onto our past doesn’t prevent us from growing older. It actually makes time pass us by.

In next week's post, I’ll be sharing another profound experience from Nicaragua when we visited a community that was displaced due to a volcanic eruption.

In the meantime, tell me, what area of your home is due for renewal?