Hello and welcome to Five Minutes in Nature with me Liz Scott up on Dartmoor in the sunshine.
There's actually a little bit of blue sky above me.
We've not had to put the lights on in the house during the day.
The rain has stayed away today and it's just so great to get out and to feel the warmth of the sun but it's not that warm at this time of year but there's a little bit of warmth there there's a chill of the breeze and I'm out with a dog.
What more could you want in life?
This is a dog I was talking about yesterday.
We were looking after it and it's going to go back in the next couple of hours to its owner.
We were just curious about whether or not we might be able to look after it for a few days over Christmas and the idea was we just wanted to test out how it got on overnight in our place and we've had a very clear answer we can't because this dear dog,
He's a lovely lovely dog but he's so bright so intelligent and he's not used to all the noises and the sounds where we live which means that in the night he's often up barking and very unsettled so that was useful to to know.
It's like okay this isn't going to work for us to look after him over the few days but we could potentially look after him during the day and walk him and that's that's what we're going to be offering to the owners.
I guess my reflection is having a dog back in the house but having a dog that's very different to the dog that we had has shown me something that I think might be useful to share.
Our old dog if you remember,
Dear old Buzz,
He died earlier in the year.
He was very elderly,
He was deaf in the latter two years of his life.
He just liked to sleep and he liked to be around us but he was a very chilled dog.
He was,
You know,
He would just whatever he was doing in the moment,
He would be absolutely in the moment and I used to look at Buzz and think huh be more dog,
Be more chilled,
Be more like Buzz,
Be in the present moment.
And this dog is a sheep dog you might have heard him,
You might have heard him just sneeze there just a second ago.
He's a sheep dog and he is bright as a button.
He's I think five or six years old so he's still quite a young dog.
He's super intelligent and he looks so intently at me like he's trying to telepathically communicate things but we're just too thick and we don't understand what he's trying to say.
And this dog always seems to be wanting to do the next thing.
If he's in the house he wants to be outside in the garden chasing whatever's out in the garden.
If he's out in the garden he's wanting to be out going out on a walk.
If he's out on a walk it's like he wants to drag me back home.
It's like he's always looking for the next thing.
There's a kind of an impatience and intelligence behind him and an impatience to do the next thing.
And it just reminded me really of how that can be what happens in my life and in the life of the people that I connect with.
This sort of sense of whatever I'm doing at the moment I'm looking towards the next thing.
So if I am having breakfast I'm thinking about what I'm going to be doing after breakfast.
When I'm engaged with whatever I'm doing after breakfast I'm thinking about well I'll go for a walk later.
When I'm walking I'm thinking about what I'm going to make for tea.
When I'm eating tea I'm thinking about what time shall I go to bed.
Does that resonate with you?
This kind of idea that whatever you're doing you're looking towards the next thing.
And I know with this dog I think he's just that he's everything is so new that he's he's hyper alert and he finds it very hard to settle down because he's he doesn't want to miss out on anything.
And for me that's just a good reminder about the amount of energy it takes to live like that.
So usually when I am with a dog and I do help out with different dogs in our village,
Usually when I'm with a dog I'm noticing a dog who's pretty relaxed.
I'm taking them for a walk from their house so nothing is new or irregular.
They know the terrain,
They know the walk and then I put them back into their house again.
When I'm walking with that kind of dog there is a kind of sense of being present,
Being in the moment.
And yet what I've seen with this dear dog is his curiosity and his intelligence and his desire to know more and to be investigating something else.
He always wants to be doing the next thing.
That's just been a great reminder for me in the power of settling down,
The power of being present.
So today is a reminder that it's not always good to be more dog.
Sometimes when you've got a dog like this it's good just to be chilled.
Today is just be present,
Be with what is and be present in the moment with whatever is turning up for you.
