Connection

"Learn how to see...realize that everything connects to everything else." - Leonardo Da Vinci

Connecting with nature is a big theme of this blog. I don't have a list of topics or ideas that I check off, or a progression that I am explicitly following as I write each time. Broad themes and small details have a habit of placing themselves in my way and won't let me step around them until I have addressed them, connected with them, and told the story they want told. I am not looking for them, they are looking for me. And they tend to wait for me in the morning fog, in the sand of the beach, in the trees and in the sky. You know, the places outside where I go to disconnect from things for a while.

Nature provides an endless supply of themes and ideas to be explored. Really. Endless. Because it is living, changing, growing and dying, it is never the same thing twice, yet it is timeless and universal at the same time. Do you know what is also just like that? People. Beautiful, fascinating, flawed people. I also like to connect with them. But I am learning that many are not able to connect with others, even as it is the thing that they most desperately need. Why? What are they afraid of?

People are like plants. They stand silent, doing what they are supposed to do, providing the things that they were designed to provide; food, offspring, flowers, industry, shelter, protection, oxygen. Yet, when a plant is connected to the warmth ofsunshine, it turns its face towards the light, opens widely, and grows. People do the same thing. When they connect with another human being, truly connect, they open and smile and grow. That's the thing about connection, it isn't required to live, but it is vital to what makes living good.

I have connected with nature and I am never disappointed with how it makes me flourish. I have connected with people, and had the same exact experience. What does it take to connect? A smile. A kind word. A kiss. It can be for just a moment, or it can last a lifetime. If the thread that joins people is honest, and simple and about love, it doesn't matter how long that thread is. It will feed and water and grow. That's what connection is about, in nature or human nature. So, please, don’t be afraid to connect. Just go outside...of yourself.