The Beauty Of Unfolding - April 24

In today's 5 Minutes In Nature, Liz reflects on the power of being in the flow and allowing life to unfold. She's on a 10-day walk and realises that whilst planning is helpful, there can be a real beauty in allowing life to unfurl at its own pace.

Transcript

Hello and welcome to five minutes in nature with me Liz Scott. This is such a peaceful spot. I'm at the churchyard in Dittisham and Dittisham is a little village on the River Dart and this is where my mum grew up and we're in the churchyard here and we're just laying some flowers myself and my sister on the grave of my uncle and of his mum my grandmother who died when she was just 42 I think so we never knew her as a grandmother as children my mum was still a teenager when her mum died and we've been walking as you know walking from Torcross all the way to Dartmouth and then from Dartmouth up here to Dittisham and we're walking myself my sister and a friend on something called the South Hams Way and it's a hundred miles ten days it's taking us and tomorrow is our final day taking us around the coastline and estuaries and rivers and moorland that makes up the South Hams here in Devon and today's reflection is about the balance between planning and allowing planning and allowing so the route that we walked today was going to be from a place called Torcross and the guidebook suggested that we finish at Dartmouth which was 10 miles away but we've looked at the forecast for tomorrow and we know that it's going to be very rainy tomorrow so between us we thought no we're going to actually add another four miles onto our walk today which will reduce the final day of walking and the final day now is probably only going to be about nine miles of walking but it's going to be wet and rainy so we thought we'll do the extra mileage whilst it's dry and it's been tough that's for sure it's been really tough we're tired our legs are tired and we just keep taking one step at a time but when we were walking along towards Dartmouth and Dartmouth is a bigger community my sister said why don't we buy some bunches of flowers I've got an uncle who still lives here in Ditchisham and he's not very well at the moment and she said maybe we could come to the graveyard and lay some flowers on the grave so that again is this sense of allowing and as she said this I thought yeah that's a really good idea it felt like a real deep nourishing yes I wanted to come here and put some flowers on the grave and we've just been via my uncle's house and he is quite poorly but he was so delighted to see us and the flowers were an excuse to knock on his door and say hello and so this is a real balance as you can see of allowing so allowing things to arise like adding extra mileage onto our day today which then meant we were going through Ditchisham which then meant we allowed time to buy flowers or allowed the creative idea of buying some flowers to come through and we're now in the churchyard not something we hadn't planned and we went to visit my uncle and it all feels so right and so today is a reminder and it's a reminder for you just to maybe think about this for yourself too when is it right to plan and when is it right to allow when is it right to allow intuition or creative ideas to come through and to follow those ideas when is that right in my life so today's reflection is all about that of course we need to plan of course planning the walk was part of what we needed to do but we were also open to things changing we changed the mileage we decided to buy flowers we are always allowing with ourselves as we walk as walk mates to make sure we're supporting each other allowing slowing down speeding up holding open gates stopping when others want to stop it's it's not something you can plan to the nth degree there is an element in life which is allowing allowing the energy to dance through you and following that dance so i'd love to know your reflections on that for you are you a big planner are you someone that allows things to occur in your life i'd love to know how it turns up for you and don't forget i'm here every day with five minutes in nature and i'll be back again tomorrow so do join me then for another five minutes in nature

Reviews

Planning vs allowing for the unexpected-what a wonderful thing to think about. Thank you.

I love this Liz! Let the energy dance through your body! I confess I’m an over-planner and an over-thinker and I appreciate the reminder to let life unfold to allow for those precious moments of serendipity. I’m getting ready for a trip to Italy, followed by several weeks in Blighty - so the note pads are out and my brain-mind is busy. At some point I know I will have to let go and let be 💖🙏

Yes, I am a planner. Thank you for this reminder to allow for creativity and serendipity. 🙏🏻😇

Allowing for things to unfold. Your mention of got me thinking of our mountain bike ride yesterday. We did not have a plan we just started riding up the mountain. In doing so we came across the most amazing areas full of yellow Arrowleaf Basalmroot flowers. We had to stop and take it in. Didn't even know ale a picture just wanted to see and feel it.

Thanks for sharing your journey Liz. ✌️❤️😎

Sounds lovely I would love to do this walk, maybe 5 miles each day would suffice? Where do you stay en route? ❤️🙏🏼