Hello and welcome to Five Minutes in Nature with me Liz Scott and you find me up on Dartmoor,
The moorland above my home.
I've just spent probably five or ten minutes sitting on an outcrop of rocks,
Just soaking in the scene,
Watching the sheep that roam across the moors,
Reflecting on the coolness and the wind this evening.
It's not cold but there is a coolness in the air which is very refreshing and today's reflection is something I've been pondering for a couple of days and it's based on a quote by a philosopher,
A Greek philosopher who lived two and a half thousand years ago,
Heraclitus,
And you might not have heard of him but I really bet you've heard of one of the quotes that he is attributed to him and that's what I want to share with you and reflect on today.
You see Heraclitus said that the only thing that is constant is change,
The only thing that is constant is change and you know I've been really noticing the change in seasons,
A transition as we move in August now,
Moving towards September,
Moving towards the autumn,
This sense of change,
Change in the environment feels very alive.
The bracken around me is starting to tinge orange,
I've been picking blackberries on my morning walk and putting them on my porridge.
There's a different sense of the light levels now,
There's darkness is coming sooner at night time and I wake up and I'm not waking up early early as the sun begins to rise,
It's very noticeable that the days are starting to shorten and as I was reflecting on this quote by Heraclitus,
The only thing that is constant is change,
It struck me that on one level this is very true,
We live,
We die,
There's nothing stays the same,
Everything is in a state of movement,
We look around us,
The world will change,
Everything that we see now will change form,
Will deteriorate,
Other things will grow,
Things that we will never see will start growing in the future,
There is no doubt that there is change all around us and yet the thing that struck me about this quote is there was something significant missing because it's true that in the level of form,
In what we see,
Taste,
Feel,
Perceive,
Everything is changing,
That is constant but what isn't mentioned in this quote is that which is unchanging,
That which is constant because not everything is changing,
Not everything is in a state of flux and movement and what I've found is that by seeking out,
By bringing my awareness to this space within me that is constant,
That is ever-present,
It is a state of stillness,
Of peacefulness,
It is a source of love and compassion,
Bringing my awareness to that space,
That awareness of being,
I find something that is unchanging,
That is constant,
That is with me all the time.
It feels to me as though we live in a bit of a juxtaposition,
A dichotomy which is on one level everything is changing,
It's undeniable and yet on another level,
At the level of spirit,
At the level of ultimate truth,
At the level of soul,
At the heart level,
At the wisdom level,
The wisdom of universal energy and being,
There is a constant and it is from that constant we are created,
We are born,
Every day we live as though that constant doesn't exist and yet when we bring our awareness to it,
That sense of I am,
That presence,
We realize that there is a constant in our lives and that constant can never be taken from us.
So whilst on one hand I do realize that the only thing that is constant is change,
At a deeper level I realize that there is something that is both constant and unchanging and I'd love to hear your reflections about that.
