Reflections on Life,
Identity & Change

Luckily for us, nature offers a powerful antidote to the stressors of modern life. As we’ll see, walking in the outdoors is profoundly stress-relieving for all kinds of reasons.

Despite the profound challenges that childhood trauma presents, there is hope for healing and for growth.

“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation,” wrote American writer Henry David Thoreau.

While our minds feed off complexity, heart wisdom is simple.

What words would you whisper into a child’s ear each day if you wanted them to send them out into the world with a compass to steer by?

Difficult relationships in our lives often follow a certain kind of pattern. That pattern repeats itself - and will keep repeating itself - as long as we remain unaware of the underlying pain that drives it.

Is it the achievement of the goal that pushes us forward or the curiosity to learn what we don’t already know?

Watch young children at play sometime. Really watch them. If you do, you’ll notice something remarkable. They don’t think about the future or the past. They don’t think about the way their behaviour might appear to others. They are completely and utterly lost in the moment. They are 100% here with what they are feeling and doing.

Allegorical tales like this one are designed to provoke. They are designed to get us asking the kinds of questions that, if taken seriously, may transform the way we live and feel about our lives.

When we are very young our survival depends utterly on how well we are able to shape ourselves to the demands of the world. We learn quickly that our family, school and culture has clearly defined expectations of us, and that fulfilling these expectations often requires that we ignore – and if necessary, exile – the voice of our true Self. By midlife, though, things often begin to change…

“Sometimes the truth depends upon a walk around the lake.”

The right question, asked by the right person at the right time, has the power to jolt us awake to the ways we have been asleep in our lives.

A poem inspired by the ground-making work of forest ecologist Suzanne Simard and mycologist Paul Stamets.

Excerpt from a recent post in Alain de Botton’s School of Life.

When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in.

Time spent in wild places doesn’t just right-size the ego in relation to the universe. It also teaches us deep truths about change.

Sound walking advice from Adrian this week.

There will never be a perfect time to do something that stretches you.

You’re not supposed to get it right out of the gate.

What if the weight we have felt over the past 18 months has somehow helped lock things within us into a more stable position?

What if our contributions to the world are made rich not in spite, but because of our challenges?

The chambered Nautilus illustrates the principle of life being in an unfolding state of constant transformation.

Pondering ‘sincerity’ at the sculpture gallery at the Borghese Gallery in Rome.

Young people often labor under the false impression that we had a fixed heading in sight for our personal and professional lives when we were their age, and that we sailed straight for it without once deviating. We need to explain what following a chosen course in life is really like.