When was the last time you let yourself be lost? Being lost is like walking on the edge of a cliff: you live a combination of amazement with fear of something dangerous happening.
That’s what happens when we wander. Is a way to roam and without purpose. It gets our senses moving, perceiving, so we can catch every little thing happening in our environment: it may be figuring out what sounds are closest or farthest to us, to see how lights and shadows play with each other as we walk down our path. Perhaps all that is unknown makes us tremble, sure, but it can also help us widen our vision to receive all that is being offered to us. Breathing deeply through each step can help us focus much more clearly on the present moment.
No one describes better what wandering is like writer, historian, and activist: Rebecca Solnit (know more about on her
website). Just read her beautiful quote:
“Getting lost was not a matter of geography so much as identity, a passionate desire, even an urgent need, to become no one and anyone, to shake off the shackles that remind you who you are, who others think you are.”
Rebecca Solnit, A Field Guide to Getting Lost
Let it sink in:
A passionate desire…an urgent need...
to shake off the shackles that remind you who you are.
Maybe, being present without a purpose, walking in solitude, reveals more about ourselves than about the space we inhabit.
We invite you to
… walk
… get lost
… reclaim the street
… approach the unknown
… find clarity in nature
… just breath
… become aware of the immensity of our search when we see that living in the moment is what makes the difference: we feel the splendorous journey in every fiber of our beings.
Something catches your eye.
You observe attentively.
What resonates with you?
We invite you to take a walk, wander. And, when you feel it right, read in that spot this beautiful poem by Mary Sarton.
Canticle 6 by May Sarton (poet)
Alone one is never lonely: the spirit adventures, waking
In a quiet garden, in a cool house, abiding single there;
The spirit adventures in sleep, the sweet thirst-slaking
When only the moon’s reflection touches the wild hair.
There is no place more intimate than the spirit alone:
It finds a lovely certainty in the evening and the morning.
It is only where two have come together bone against bone
That those alonenesses take place, when, without warning
The sky opens over their heads to an infinite hole in space;
It is only turning at night to a lover that one learns
He is set apart like a star forever and that sleeping face
(For whom the heart has cried, for whom the frail hand burns)
Is swung out in the night alone, so luminous and still,
The waking spirit attends, the loving spirit gazes
Without communion, without touch, and comes to know at last
Out of a silence only and never when the body blazes
That love is present, that always burns alone, however steadfast.
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We at LUAN want you to get lost and discover new stories. Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered: our Wonder & Wander Toolkit will provide the basics for you to start wondering: ideas, exercises, and poems are only some of the tips you will find to inspire you.
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Photo by Muhammad Haikal Sjukri
