An August tree teaching about change. In a full month as my only child was getting ready to leave, and move to their new home in Scotland and start at university. Days and days spent organising and packing and gearing up for saying our goodbyes. These are big changes, for me as a mother, and for them as a child reaching independence. Now they are going to be making their way out in the word in their new home and new life.
Together we have been journeying through big changes as you will know if you have seen my Transformation piece and the accompanying wild wisdom soul story.
It was with this in the background that I was struck one day by something very particular that the trees had to say about change. It wasn’t until after we had said our final goodbyes that I had chance to get out for some time alone in the woods.
Sunshine and clouds chased across the sky. The trees danced patterns on the ground playing with sun and shade. Having walked awhile, me and my beloved little dog Bella sat down to rest. Gazing about I had the urge to look up.
Above my head the branches were swaying and leaves fluttering. They created a frame to the sky. In the blue heavens clouds of all shapes were sailing across. What really struck me was not only was the sky moving but also my frame of reference, the trees were moving too. Nothing was static. Both the picture and the frame were changing moment to moment.
(Curiously and rather synchronistically you can hear in the background a child calling out to its mother over and over in the background.)
Where ever we stand, no matter what or where our viewpoint or circumstances, all is change. No thing is fixed.
Our challenges in life lie not in what changes we experience, but in how we move through them in our thoughts and feelings about them. Of course, this is often easier said than done! But, when I am in flux, it is the trees that bring me back home.
If you are going through change of some kind go out in the woods and look up to the sky. watch the clouds sail across the sky. See your frame of reference, the tree canopy you are looking through, in its ever moving state. See change in action. This gives you a chance to see change without being emotionally attached to it. This is the gift of this tree teaching.
August begins with Lughnasadh or Lammas, harvest of the first fruits. It’s also the time of a flush of second growth for many trees such as the oak. So, whatever change you are going through may new growth come and your harvest, as you journey through, be a good one.
Blessings Amanda Claire x
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