Hello and welcome to five minutes in nature with me Liz Scott.
Here I am up on the moorlands of Dartmoor just taking a very relaxing stroll.
As I look out in front of me I'm on the the lower slopes of the moor.
You can probably hear the sheep in the background.
It's been a nice cooler kind of day and I'm just looking out over a wooded copse.
I can see the the dark green of the gorse bushes and clumps which are set off amongst the lighter greenness of the grass that is cropped by the sheep and the ponies and the cows that roam across this moorland.
Today I went to an event that I found really inspiring actually.
The event was put on by a friend of mine and she managed to pull together an event that had different exhibitors from arts and crafts so people that made pottery and different textiles and there was woolen expertise that you could experience and pottery.
It was just a wonderful wealth of different crafts and arts.
Artists were there too.
As well as that there were wellness practitioners,
People that offered things like yoga or reiki or spiritual healing.
This event when I went there and I've been to events like this before and I love supporting events but often I go to an event like this and it just feels a little bit flat.
It feels that nobody's really turning up and yet today there was this incredible buzz.
Lots of people lots of people milling around and I met people and I chatted with people.
One of the things that I realized as I stopped and chatted to people and we had conversations was the sense of nourishment and wellness that was very apparent in this place.
It reminded me of another event I went to yesterday.
I went to see my friend singing.
She sings in a choir and there are different choirs in the area that they all got together.
There was nearly 250 of them in total at Buckfast Abbey and they were singing and the sound they made and the laughter and the smiles and the sheer enjoyment as they sang just blew me away.
Sometimes I think I can be guilty of thinking it takes a lot to encourage people back into wellness and I think what I'm beginning to realize is that there is so much to be said for the everyday and ordinary.
It's great that we put on events where we have wellness practitioners and they are fabulous individuals who devote so much time to supporting others and yet sometimes we forget that actually meeting up with people,
Chatting with people,
Singing,
Being together,
Sharing laughter,
Sharing conversation,
That which is so ordinary and everyday to us as human beings can be extremely powerful in its own right.
Wellbeing doesn't need to be something an added extra that we stick on to the end of our day.
Wellbeing is about allowing people to forget their thinking,
To sink back into what is natural,
That space of compassion and love and connection and then from that space just being present to other people.
When our masks fall,
When the mask of our thinking falls about who we should be and how we should project ourselves into the world,
When that mask falls what is left is a sense of what really unites us.
So today is all about a recognition that if you are seeking a sense of connection and well-being and wellness or if you know somebody who's maybe lonely and is in need of that sense of belonging then don't overthink it.
Maybe it's as simple as just taking that person out for a cup of coffee or going and seeing people play music or sing or going to the theatre or enjoying a bit of art or trying some arts and crafts or just going somewhere where there are people who are not lost in their sadness but are actually lost in their wellness.
Find those spaces where people are lost in their wellness and go and plug into those and my sense is that is where true community can blossom.
