Hello and welcome to Five Minutes in Nature with me,
Liz Scott,
Walking through a little woodland on the northern edge of Dartmoor.
Beside the River Tor,
You might hear it gushing in the background,
I'm on the third day of my pilgrimage.
This is going to be the final day.
We're going to have to complete the pilgrimage at another date.
If you remember yesterday,
We were thwarted by the weather.
It was too windy and wet to get out.
But we're back on track today and my sister and I have walked from a place called Lidford and we are heading towards Sticklepath and I'm very close now to the end of the journey at Sticklepath and this is a glorious wooded path that we are going through there are beech trees,
I've seen holly trees,
Hazel,
There's oak trees just a wealth of wood and trees all around Everything is this vibrant green.
We've had rain,
So everything looks lush and fresh.
The path is muddy and smells of earth.
It is a wonderful time to be out.
And if you remember yesterday,
I was a little bit in a bit of unsettled thinking about not walking the pilgrimage that day.
And I brought that onto the pilgrimage today,
That sort of sense of being unsettled.
And it's extraordinary how over the course of this day,
And we probably We've been walking for a while now and my mind has gone from being busy to settling to me now feeling pretty much at one in this woodland.
Looking at the green of the moss,
Seeing the squirrels running up the tree,
Hearing the birds in the background,
It feels nigh on perfect.
The churchyard at a place called Sorton.
It was cut into the ground so it was a very subtle one,
It was a grassy labyrinth with a track that had been cut out and you had one way in and one way out and it took you on this very curving journey to the centre of the labyrinth and then you came out the same way.
And it reminded me as I was walking the labyrinth of all these thoughts and habitual thinking and unsettled thoughts that I had had,
And how it felt very much like walking a labyrinth,
Where your purpose is to get to the centre,
And yet by the very nature of what it is to be in a labyrinth,
You end up taking paths that take you further away from that central place,
And for me that central place is coming home,
Coming back to that place of peace,
Of wisdom within me.
So in this labyrinth I'd walk a path,
It would go very close to the centre and then it would take me right to the outside of the labyrinth and I'd come back again and weave back in until eventually I got to the centre.
And my sister said something today as we were walking through a landscape that we recognised from a previous walk.
She said,
You know,
Isn't it interesting how different paths bring you to the same place?
And I kind of felt that the labyrinth and what she said about different paths taking us to the same place really rang true.
For me,
Coming back home is what it's all about.
Coming back to that space within me,
To that settled space within me,
To that sense of who I truly am.
That's like reaching the center of the labyrinth.
That's like every path brings me there eventually.
So I'd love you to reflect on that for yourself.
Do you see that for yourself,
That your thoughts and feelings might seem to take you away from who you truly are?
But they will bring you back.
Allow them,
Let them be,
Let them do their thing and you will find yourself coming closer and closer to home.
The whole point of being human is that we get lost in thoughts and feelings.
We forget who we truly are and then we remember again and we land back in that space.
Every path will bring you back home.
Different paths bring you back home.
We all come back home.
That's what I want to share with you.
You today.
I'm just looking at the river now gushing down beside me.
I'm going to cross a bridge soon and head back to the car to finish this day of the pilgrimage.
Back to normal walking tomorrow from home and we'll complete this pilgrimage sometime in the future.
I'm not sure when but I'm really looking forward to returning to this place again.
It's got a very special feel.
Let me know your reflections on today.
Every path brings you back home.
Different paths bring you back home.
I'd love to know your reflections and don't forget to join me again tomorrow for another five minutes in nature.
