"When the flow of thoughts rushes like a river, I walk outside. I move my body closer to the forest. This place that is quiet, that is humbling in its beauty and its ability to impart a wisdom without uttering a single explanation."

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When we think of racing hearts, we often picture moments of passion or instances of fear. We visualize the excitement that surrounds adventure and equally imagine the times that leave us on the floor, worried, pulsing. Yet, while the quickening beats signal love or fright, they can also be reflective of a battle brewing deeply at the back of our minds. 

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I have on many occasions, prompted or not, been stopped in my tracks by the palpable signs of an anxious brain. Awakening in the middle of the night to thoughts moving at a pace not even my logic can catch up to, pains settling into my stomach and twisting without a sign of what is really wrong. 

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It hurts, it feels like fire that despite my longing cannot be put out by words, by hugs, by reminders that the data that I am pulling doesn’t represent the scene playing out before me. Yet, in these chaotic rebellions of my inner monologue turned danger detective, I have always been able to reach out to the one relationship, the one intimacy that cools the burn --- nature. 

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When the flow of thoughts rushes like a river, I walk outside. I move my body closer to the forest. This place that is quiet, that is humbling in its beauty and its ability to impart a wisdom without uttering a single explanation. It doesn’t have to tell me to calm down or that everything will be alright, it just holds me, signaling that it is bigger, more expansive, more in touch with the reality of things than I am in that moment. 

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It shows up without judgment, simply sharing the leaves in springtime or the stark yet captivating branches of renewal in the winter. I can walk as slowly as I would like, I can think all thoughts or none at all and yet it will continue existing just as it is. 

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I take a step towards a tree, I look at its composition, I admire its neutrality at everything around it and yet its ultimate intersection. There is a breathtaking quality, maybe it’s the seasons that transpire without request, that demonstrate that everything moves on and that just like the green grass turning brown to turn green again, so too will the feelings occupying my mind fade and return. 

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I have many people in my life that I appreciate and yet there is nothing more intimate than this time with myself but not by myself. These strolls to regain my connection to who I am without the doing, who I want to be in the present and not when I get back. When I walk, I am back to being one little person in a big broad world, and to me that sentiment although simple is utterly profound.

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If today or any day you are plagued by that rush of anxious sensations, take moment, take 25 moments to find the nearest nature. It could be your backyard, a park, the forest near your home or the little patch of grass outside your apartment. Wherever things grow, take in this spellbinding knowledge that everything passes and so will this feeling.