Hello and welcome to Five Minutes in Nature with me,
Liz Scott.
I'm on the northern side of Dartmoor,
Sitting below something called Widgery Cross.
It's a granite cross made out of granite blocks of stone.
It's probably about 150 years old.
I'll need to check my facts,
But it was erected to mark the jubilee anniversary of the reign of Queen Victoria.
And I've been walking today on the northern side Dartmoor walking one of three days along the Archangel Way and it's a route that follows different churches and it carries on towards a place called Sorton on towards Chagford which is the end of the route which we'll complete in about three days time.
And today's reflection is about something that my sister and I decided to do.
We've called it our pilgrimage cauldron.
We're on a pilgrimage.
We want to have time and space to reflect and to be present and to walk and not to talk too much.
So we've created what we've called our pilgrimage cauldron.
And every time something emerges,
Maybe a little worry or anxiety or something that we've been playing on our minds,
That we put it into the cauldron.
So for example,
For me,
I've had quite a lot of thinking about the final stages of getting my book published.
It's meant lots of hours in front of the computer doing bits of work that I don't really enjoy.
So I've put that into the cauldron.
I don't really want to think about that.
We put things into the cauldron like getting older,
My aging mum and the care and the increasing care that she's going to need in the future.
We don't want to talk about that.
We just put it in the cauldron.
Been very much about when things conjure up and they feel quite strong in my mind,
Unsettling thoughts,
I just put them in the cauldron.
It's quite nice knowing I can just give myself a break for a few days of thinking about them.
My request is that you maybe think about this yourself.
Have you got a place you can put your concerns and worries?
You don't have to park them forever,
But a place that you can put them,
Where you can Allow yourself time to stop thinking about them,
Where you can give yourself permission to not have them swirling around in your head.
We've called ours the Pilgrimage Cauldron.
It could be a place that you know that is in nature.
You might have a stone,
For example,
That you put your hand on and you give that stone your concerns,
Anxieties,
Or worries.
Or a tree that might be able to support you and put your concerns,
Anxieties,
Or worries.
Sometimes people find it really helpful to write things down.
So you could write them down and then put them to one side,
Knowing that you can think about them again in the future,
But right at the moment,
Give yourself permission just to settle and to experience that deep peace of mind that comes when your mind settles,
When you're not thinking about lots and lots of things.
I'd love to know what your version of the pilgrimage cauldron is.
Let me know what you have conjured up for yourself,
Or maybe what practice you already have in life.
And don't forget,
This is a time,
As you listen to this,
It's a time of nourishment,
It's a time of spiritual reflection,
It's a time of recharging for yourself.
Give yourself this time just to be,
And allow yourself to feel what it is like to experience that wonderful,
Nurturing,
Wise,
Loving energy that is the source and essence of who you truly are.
And don't forget of course to join me again tomorrow for another 5 minutes in nature.
