Overwhelm, overthinking, and over-reactivity were regulars in my life not that long ago. I had been working on a purposeful business in San Francisco that I loved. It was work that had me collaborating with humanitarian organizations in a way that brought a lot of meaning to my life. I was so enthusiastic about what I was doing that, in a sneaky sort of way, the more I worked, the more energized I felt—or so I thought.
Most of my work was done in front of my computer. On many days I didn’t see any nature beyond the pictures on my laptop’s wallpaper. Without even realizing it, I slipped into the grim statistic of the “average” person who spends 90 to 95% of their time indoors.
At some point, overworking and neglecting self-care caught up with me: When the last drop fell, I collapsed. I was so wiped out that I couldn’t put myself together to work for a few months.
During my time off, my intuition guided me to volunteer on a small organic farm nearby. Up until that point, I had spent a lot of time around forests, mountains, and oceans, but I knew nothing about farming. But it didn’t take long for my love of nature to reawaken and deepen on the farm.
On the field, I found just as many moments of wonder and awe as I did crops. I was mesmerized by the way the cool fog rolled through the pronounced valley, the sparkling droplets of dew formed on new life, and the red-tailed hawk gazed down on me from power lines above.
As I grounded in this real world, this outdoor world, my inner calm came back. And with it, my clarity—and my commitment to not stray so far from the land ever again.
It wasn’t until I let myself be loved by the nature around me—or rather until I let myself appreciate the fact that I was always being loved by it—that I really started to experience deeper healing. The experience enriched my life in such a way that I soon ran out of words to describe it. Inevitably, I landed on “sacred.”