Hello and welcome to Five Minutes in Nature and my invitation for you to join me daily in January as we allow nature to inspire us.
Today I have come to a holly tree,
A small holly tree.
Some of the holly trees that we have near us grow like fully grown trees,
10,
20,
30 foot high.
But this is a little holly tree and it almost looks as though it's been beautifully topiaried to stand about six foot tall beside me,
Showing off its greenery.
Now the holly,
As you probably know,
Is an evergreen.
It's got small prickly sharp leaves but if you look at the green of its leaves they are truly beautiful,
A deep glossy green,
A shininess of green and they stay this colour all year round.
And of course in winter when all the other trees have lost their leaves,
When the flowers have died away and the plants have fallen back to the ground and the earth,
There's something inspiring to see the rock-solid enduring greenness of the holly and evergreens that are resolute as they stand in the landscape.
And as I reflected today with a holly tree I realised that there are times in life when we might feel ourselves standing and navigating through a landscape of life that feels sad or empty or colourless or dead.
Around us we might see a landscape and experience circumstances in our life that just feel flat and sad.
And like the holly tree I want to remind you of something that never leaves you,
Ever.
In the same way that the rich glossy greenness of the holly's colouring never leaves it,
So there is a part of you that is resilient and strong and wise and ever-present and that doesn't leave you.
What I'd like you to do today is to turn your mind inward,
Turn your awareness inward and imagine a landscape where you are a holly tree.
I want you to imagine you can feel what it is to be green,
To have that greenness infuse you and be you and be present to you and be part of you.
That greenness in you is your resilience.
It is the part of you that never goes away.
Your resilience and your resourcefulness and your wisdom and the peace and tranquility of who you truly are is like the greenness of the holly tree.
It is part of you and even in the saddest and loneliest and darkest of times the greenness of the holly doesn't disappear and your wisdom and resilience and connection to the world doesn't disappear.
It is what you are truly made of.
So I want you to imagine this beautiful solitary holly tree that has shown you and given you time to reflect for yourself and has reminded you and reminded me of what it is to be present to who we truly are and in the same way that the holly tree is green throughout the year and it never loses that greenery so we never lose the truth of who we are.
We never lose our resilience and we never lose the essence of our true nature.
So thank the holly tree with me.
