Sunday, June 4, 2017

Listen to the Wind

I was in search of an answer, so I cast my question out into the universe. While taking a walk later that day, the answer came, a mystifying "Listen to the wind." What? Listen to the wind? What did it mean to listen to the wind? Perplexed by this mysterious message, I researched it online and found it was the first phrase in a Native American proverb: "Listen to the wind, it talks. Listen to the silence, it speaks. Listen to your heart, it knows." With each subsequent walk, I started out by saying the proverb and then I intentionally silenced the incessant and often unhelpful chatter in my head. I allowed the wind to talk to me. At about the same time, I started finding heart-shaped stones in my path. I felt as if the Native American proverb's wise words were being directed at me. I was becoming quiet so the silence could speak to me. I was listening to the wind so it could talk to me. I was finding heart stones so I could know what was deep in my own heart. Listening to the wind has become a regular activity ever since that day when I received the message to do so. I haven't talked about it much with others, so it came as a surprise when, recently, our 85-year-old neighbor said she likes to listen to the wind. We were deep in conversation about the magnificent eruption of spring, from the fragrances of the season to the song of the birds to the beauty of the early spring wildflowers blooming in the woods next to her home. As one well attuned to nature's subtleties, my neighbor knows to listen to the wind. It does talk, if we make the time to become calm, silence our internal chatter and put our hearts in a place of attention and intention. Then, and only then, will we hear the wisdom of the wind. Listen. It talks.