Hello and welcome to Five Minutes in Nature with me Liz Scott.
It's a really grey,
Murky old day.
I'm walking up my lane towards the moors and I call it my lane,
It's a public lane.
It's mucky with water and mushed up leaves.
Earlier on when I was walking there was ice on the puddles but the rain has come in now.
It's a fine,
Misty rain.
Everything feels cold and damp and I thought I'd just pause before I got onto the moorland where it's likely to be a blast of wind so I talk to you before it gets too windy and wet.
And today is all about ritual and being reflective and I'm talking about it in relation to what I'm moving on to with my business.
As you know I'm very much drawn to working with old women and next year my plan is to organise some women's groups,
Online women's groups,
And just experiment and explore what it's like to work with a small group of women who are supportive of each other and together we are on a journey as older,
Wiser women.
For me the area around intuition and wisdom is really important so I only want a small group and people are sending me emails of interest and I'm sending them information.
I'd like it to be a small group and for the group to be you know a good fit for this experiment that I've got running in the new year.
And it occurred to me as I was sending out emails and sending out information and reflecting on the women that I really wanted this to have some form of ritual about it.
And what I mean by ritual is giving space for the sacred in the communication and in my reflections of these women.
In the past I've run courses and groups and conferences and sent out invitations to people and it's been quite transactional.
Sort of I invite people to come on to something and I felt that my wisdom and intuition was guiding me to make this more of a meditative sacred invitation.
And so what I did is I lit a candle,
I pulled down a pot which I filled over the years with different stones,
Different stones I've picked up from beaches,
Pebbles,
Stones I've maybe found on the moorland,
In the streams,
Just stones which have caught my eye and I felt drawn to pick them up.
And as I sent an email of invitation to those women that had expressed an interest I pulled out the stone and put it beside the candle.
It just felt as though it was important to honour each woman that I was sending an invitation to.
And as I move forward I'm really curious because this isn't how I normally work and yet it feels as though there's something important for me to see here about honouring,
About the sacredness,
About the ritual nature,
The reflection of inviting people into a space where we might all work together.
And I just wondered if that's something that you've done yourself,
Whether you find that you also are inspired to slow down when you're inviting people maybe to join a group or to come along to a conference you're organising,
Whatever it might be.
Do you have a ritual around it and if so what is it?
What is your ritual?
I would love to know.
For me lighting the candle,
Picking those stones,
Just spending some time reflecting on each woman as I sent them an invitation,
It felt really special.
It felt like I was honouring.
It felt like I wasn't just after a yes and a tick in a spreadsheet.
This felt much richer and a deeper form of connection.
And I'd be really curious to know if this resonates for you or if you do something similar.
