Hello and welcome to five minutes in nature with me Liz Scott and you join me as darkness is falling up here on Dartmoor.
It's not raining which has been so unusual.
We've had day after day of rain and it's such a delight not to have rain and not to be getting wet as I speak to you.
As darkness is falling it's a sort of a grey light at the moment.
I can see a couple of Dartmoor ponies grazing on the hillside.
There's a grey,
There's a bay.
I can see,
Oh there's another grey pony just beside me actually not far away and there are lots of sheep dotted around the place.
And today I want to talk about three things I think would be really helpful and there's a story I'm going to use to illustrate them.
A lot of the time I talk to you about thought,
I talk to you about wisdom and I talk about insight and I want to share a story where all of those three things,
Thought,
Wisdom and insight are playing a role just so that you can see them in everyday action.
So my husband is helping out with a digital forum which means that people in our village are able to communicate with each other and usually it's used if a parcel has been misdelivered or if somebody needs a bit of help getting some shopping or if there's somebody in the village that someone's a bit suspicious of they might put something up on this village forum so everybody can see.
And my husband has recently taken over just keeping an eye on it because there's a real sense that they want to keep this forum,
You know,
Free of things like politics and lots of advertising and nastiness.
Well the other day somebody lost their dog and we've got lots of dogs in the village and it isn't unusual that a dog goes missing.
So she put something up on the forum and said just to let you know my black spaniel ran off in this direction if anybody sees him or catches sight of him let me know because I want to make sure he gets home safely.
So she'd put up a message absolutely the right thing is the sort of thing that you would put on this forum.
And then came a comment after it.
Somebody else in the village said something along the lines of I really think it's irresponsible that dog owners allow their dogs to run off.
Now my husband saw this comment which is I really think it's not right that dog owners let their dogs run off or it's irresponsible.
He saw that comment and he thought oh that could that's really not in the spirit of what we're wanting to do in this particular forum.
And his initial thought was one of a bit of frustration and anger.
That's thought coming up.
And then a little bit of wisdom nudged him.
Do you remember I talk about inner compass well his wisdom his inner compass nudged him.
And rather than get back to the person who'd made the comment he thought I'm just going to check it out with a couple of other people first.
So his initial thought came in thought this is an unreasonable comment.
I'm going to tell this person it's inappropriate and that's not in the spirit of this particular forum.
That was his initial thought.
And then wisdom said why don't you just check that out with a couple of people.
So he did.
And the people he checked it out with said oh no that wasn't somebody being nasty.
That was somebody being ironic.
And they're being ironic because it's well known that their dog often goes missing.
And what he was saying is with a sort of tone of irony and humor is like I kind of understand your pain but you needed to be in on the joke to realize that that was what he was saying.
So when he said I think it's really irresponsible that dog owners let their dogs run free in the village he was actually pointing the finger at himself.
My husband then went oh I see.
I'm so glad I asked you.
I actually understand now that that wasn't a nasty comment.
That was a humorous comment.
And from that different viewpoint of understanding the context my husband had an insight.
And an insight is where you see something fundamentally different.
Nothing has changed but you understand it and in that understanding you see through the thought and the story that you had originally constructed around it.
So he saw through it and when he went oh I see that that is an insight.
So I hope that's a really simple illustration of thought wisdom and insight just in a very simple everyday example.
Somebody posts a comment my husband has a thought which is it doesn't sound right I need to get and tell this person that's not appropriate.
Then my husband has a sense of wisdom let me check this out with some other people before I take action.
And that wisdom leads him to getting fresh information which has him realize that this comment which he originally thought was nasty is actually humorous.
And with that when he sees through that he has an insight.
So thought wisdom and insight happens in everyday ordinary moments and that's a really good illustration of all three of them taking place together.
I'm going to be back again tomorrow with five minutes in nature so do join me again then.
