For Spacious Skies

“Oh beautiful for spacious skies… “

 

We shape our environment and are shaped by it. We may share a common humanity at our core (we do!) but the city dweller, desert nomad, island inhabitant, far north native amidst the ice and snow and extremes of lightness and darkness and rain forest dweller all have different influences circulating in their psyche. The outside affects the inside in all sorts of ways. 

 

For example, the afternoon walk we just took in our Palm Desert vacation getaway placed us in open space stretching in all directions, interrupted only by some hills and palm trees and the vast, vast sky that allowed our minds to drift upward and feel the spacious expanse. And thus, our spirits uplifted and grown large, simple by walking on the desert sand. My wife remembered a previous trip in the desert where we camped for four days in such an environment and when we came home, the walls of our house felt so confining and claustrophobic. Of course, we adjusted, as we flexible, malleable humans do, but carried a bit of the expansive spirit back with us when we resumed our familiar life. 

 

Any time a friend, acquaintance or loved one passes away, I find myself going to water. To the ocean at Land’s End or Stowe Lake, just an intuition that the water outside needs to get the water inside flowing to help calm, soothe and comfort. 

 

That’s all. No big insights, but just the simple remembrance of how immense skies, the canopy of trees, the intimacy of a mountain lake, the skyscraping buildings downtown, the inviting green meadows peppered by wildflowers, changes us, if only for a moment. Reminds us of the multiple faces of Spirit and the ways we’re connected to it all.