About Wandering
How I Go to the Woods
Ordinarily, I go to the woods alone, with not a single friend,
for they are all smilers and talkers and therefore unsuitable.
I don’t really want to be witnessed talking to the catbirds
or hugging the old black oak tree.
I have my way of praying, as you no doubt have yours.
Besides, when I am alone I can become invisible.
I can sit on the top of a dune as motionless as an uprise of weeds,
until the foxes run by unconcerned.
I can hear the almost unhearable sound of the roses singing.
If you have ever gone to the woods with me,
I must love you very much.
~ Mary Oliver
Wandering is a way of being with the Land.
It is an opportunity to become more intimate with one’s Self and with the non-human beings in these wild spaces.
It is a practice – something you embody and is accessible to everyone.
Over time you can develop your practice and explore ways others have learned to Wander and discover your own innovations.
Wandering can become a source of deep intuitive and instinctual knowing that can support you on your life’s journey.
It is a practice that invites a deeply intimate relationship with the Land and the community of beings that inhabit it.
And it is a practice of self-discovery and healing the great divides of our times – between our small sense of self and our higher potential Self, self & other, and self and nature.
“Let yourself be undone by the spectacle of storms, bones, birdsong and bird flight, mountain cascades, and the way the light falls upon a delicate spring bloom, a decaying fall leaf, or even a roadkill squirrel. Falling in love with the miracle of the world is a way to crack yourself open, enabling you to fall into the Soul’s terrain.”
- Bill Plotkins, The Journey of Soul Initiation