Tag: mental-health
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One wild and precious life
As I sit down to my 2026 desk, it’s hard not to notice the sentimental feelings of new beginnings that come with the new year. I know that these feels will slowly melt away into the ordered schedule of the daily, monthly, yearly routine. However, even if it’s for these first few words that I…
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Quiet moments of presence
Last night, my son surprised me with coming home for Christmas. He has been living in Australia for the past year, and despite my many ‘are you sure you’re not going to come home?’ queries, he managed to truly catch me off guard! There were many tears and lots of hugs and plenty of ‘this…
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Christmas tree lights…
My mom and my brother arrived this past weekend for the Christmas season. There was a lightness in my step, as I left the house to travel up to the airport. However, there was also a sense of needing to ‘get through’ the first week of visits as I am smack dap in the middle…
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The peace within
I am just home from a personal retreat in Donegal, where I spent 3 days dropping down into practice. It was just what I needed: reconnection. Reconnection to a deepening of meditation, to my dear friends and colleagues who joined me, to the land of Donegal and to that part of myself that is never…
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Strong roots
I have been planting trees. Apple and hazelnut trees. All this tree planting feels brand new and I have been doing my very best to make sure that these trees are getting the care that they need. I can not tell you how many times I have been in to the local garden centre asking…
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First frost…
There was a frost last weekend. It was as if to say, ‘OK, Halloween is over- now comes Winter’. Although for me, specifically, it seemed to acknowledge something else. It spoke to a deep learning that was precipitated by a moment in which I froze in the headlights of needing to perform. I know, I…
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To flourish…
A few Novembers ago, I was travelling through Scotland when I heard a BBC radio show called ‘The Susurrations of Trees’. It took my breath away. In particular, Bob Gilbert’s description of the sound of rain on the leaves of a copper beech transfixed me. It completely transformed my relationship with my neighbour’s great big…
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What’s your intention?
There’s a chair that I move around my garden. Sometimes it sits next to the Rowan tree that Graeme planted, other times it sits next to my blackcurrant bush, and this week it has been sitting underneath the tree that has been shedding leaves. The chair acts as a reminder for an intention I have…
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The power of grace and falling leaves
The leaves are starting to turn! They’re also starting to fall. I do love all seasons, but Autumn, or Fall as I like to call it, is truly special. There is a practice that I like to do at this time of year. It is inspired by a post that I once read on my…
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The practice of not knowing
The older I get the less comfortable I am with assumptions and presumptions. I mean, they are not inherently bad, but they can get things wrong and they often lead me astray. In fact, just a few months ago I had assumed that my mother would feel confident in a room full of new people.…
My Silent Place 