Heroes Not Zombies

One of my favourite walks is to the Bracklinn Falls just outside of Callendar in Scotland. At the top of the hill there is this old, rather neglected bench with a view stretching miles across the countryside. There’s something wild about this bench isn’t there? It isn’t neat, polished or even painted but I find it all the more appealing for that. Actually, I took this photo many years ago so I wouldn’t be surprised if the bench wasn’t even there any more. After all, nothing lasts forever, does it?

To get to this bench you have to walk through a forest. Well, the path runs along the edge of a forest, but it’s such an appealing forest that I can never resist stepping off the path and making my way through the trees instead.

The forest floor here is amazing. I laid down on my stomach and took a few photos, partly to get the view from the ground, but also to feel that whole body connection to the organism of the forest. Forests aren’t just a bunch of trees after all. Recent discoveries about tree communication has completely changed what we know about them. The term “Wood Wide Web” has been coined to capture this idea of a highly networked community of living organisms, constantly exchanging materials, energy and information between them. It’s really wonderful to immerse yourself in an environment like this.

Once you leave the forest behind, the path crosses a patch of open land and suddenly the horizons are the far ones, not the ones just in front of your nose. That feels almost like breathing to me. Inhaling and exhaling. Turning my attention from what is close to what is far. Feeling the closeness and connectedness of the forest, then feeling the expanse and openness of the distant hills and the countryside laid out at your feet.

Once you pass the bench, the path enters another forest which immediately feels different from the previous one. The path begins to snake downhill amongst the trees and I am surrounded by something else – the roaring of the waterfall. You can’t see it from the start of the path. In fact, you can’t see it until you are all the way down through the forest, but with each step the noise gets louder and louder. You know it’s coming, but, somehow, it’s still a surprise when you see it.

I can spend ages there.

Everywhere you look you can see how the water has smoothed the surfaces of the rocks and shaped them into exquisite forms. The rocks wouldn’t be the way they are without the water, and the water wouldn’t be like this without the rocks. It’s an intense, lively, creative relationship. Like most waterfalls, this one is best when it’s been raining. The noise is louder, the speed of the water is greater, the volumes are turned up to max, and you can just feel the power.

It feels like a Life Force. It feels like the energy is throbbing through the whole forest, coursing through your body. It makes you feel intensely ALIVE.

I’ve read many times about the importance of being present, of paying attention to the here and now. It’s a good teaching. In the forest, in the gaps, at the side of a waterfall, it all falls into place. Nature creates an attentiveness and repays your attention with LIFE.

There’s a word for this kind of attention and I think it’s IMMERSION.

It’s good to be immersed in Life.