Hello and welcome to Five Minutes in Nature with me Liz Scott.
It's early morning and I am looking at the horizon seeing if I can see the sun but the sun is rising behind clouds so although the sky is getting lighter,
It's a sort of greyish quality to the light,
I can't actually see the sun rising at the moment.
And the Hawthorn tree,
I'm just looking at the branches above me with its nice compact leaves and small red berries This feels like a real sturdy friend in this landscape.
And as I was walking up today,
I saw a gorsebush flowering.
Now the gorsebushes are thornbushes here on Dartmoor.
They've got green spikes on them.
And the flowers are these beautiful,
Small yellow flowers.
They've actually got a bit of a scent of coconut.
And when you see the contrast of the yellow with the deep green of the thornbush,
Then you kind of feel this incredible sense of and beauty at the way that nature does her thing.
And the thornbush is,
By its nature,
Something you avoid because it's got prickles on it and it scratches you.
So if you're walking on Dartmoor and you have to walk through a load of thornbushes,
Often you come out pretty scratched.
But as I was walking up here I was just reminded of the personality,
I suppose,
Of a thornbush.
If I was to say that somebody was a bit bit thorny by nature.
I might be pointing to them in a negative way but actually what I see as I look at the thornbush and this is what I want to talk about today is it's like looking at the nature of something rather than judging it to be right or wrong.
So the thornbush has got prickles and I know if I get too close I'm going to get scratched and I also know that when the new thorn prickles grow they're beautifully soft and they're a very subtle,
Gentle,
Light green in colour.
So I know that,
I know that about the nature of the thornbush.
I know that when new thorns are growing,
You can get close.
And I also know that when the thorns are already established and mature,
Well,
They're painful and that's just good to know.
And often with people,
I have the habit,
And I know I've heard other people talking as well,
Where we try and judge them.
We look at their characteristics and personalities and we kind of say,
They should be a different way.
And what the thorn bush is just giving me an inkling on is this awareness of the way that people are.
And there is beauty even in amongst the thorns as the little yellow flowers come up and shine.
So for me today,
It's a reminder that people have their own qualities,
Their own characteristics.
And this beautiful hawthorn tree,
Which is twisted and stunted on this Dartmoor landscape,
And I can actually see it's got a little bit of horse hair,
Probably from the tail of a horse stuck in its bark where the horse has been rubbing against it to have a scratch.
This hawthorn tree,
It has its characteristics.
Characteristics.
By nature,
It grows here on Dartmoor alone in the landscape.
It's got red berries,
It's got the green of its leaves.
It is just being itself a hawthorn and the commonality between the two,
The gorse and the hawthorn.
Is the essence and energy of life.
That is what surges through both of them.
And that is what surges through me and through you.
We are all connected to that essence,
That soul energy.
That energy that is beyond our small minds and our small identities and bodies.
That is what connects us all.
And then.
.
.
We come out in this beautiful way of difference,
Shining in the world in our different ways.
The hawthorn doesn't want to be a thornbush.
The thornbush doesn't want to be a hawthorn.
Both are themselves.
And that's what I'm talking about today,
Is being yourself in the world,
Whatever that looks like.
And not judging yourself against others,
But instead being really present to who you truly are.
Let me know your reflections on this.
And of course,
Don't forget to join me again tomorrow for another five minutes in nature.
