16 Nov Six lessons on the intersection of emotional wellbeing and outdoor adventures
You won’t be surprised to know that I’m a keen student and teacher of all things health and wellbeing, happiness and thriving.
You might be surprised to know that I’m also a keen bushwalker, hiker, camper and (micro) adventurer.
And more and more, in recent years, I’ve come to think that these two domains in my life are, or should be inter-connected.
That is, getting outdoors and going on adventures is good for my / our wellbeing and happiness …
via We Are Explorers by Emily Scott
Sometimes I go to the sea to see its expanse. To feel it expanding my own mind. I get that same feeling looking across mountain ranges or a widening desert, or even a city skyline. When expansive visuals expand my mind. Like things are diluted, in a bloody good way, like when you finally find perspective. Like the expansiveness of the world expands your mind and in turn, your body. Things relax, like I don’t know I’m clenching, and I just let go, it’s like my body and mind somehow soften and melt. Just like how the horizon does across the sea or desert or mountains.
Lesson one, go to the sea, to see its expanse and feel yourself unclench.
I’ve always liked touching the surface of things, and I’m good at it. Touching the surface of snow, of flat water, of new hobbies, of relating with people.
Delving in I do sometimes too but never hang around in there for too long. I’m trying to change this. I did a free diving course to try to sit at the bottom of depth for a little longer.
But what I really need is to sit with myself a little longer, and explore the depths of my own ocean.
Lesson two, sit with self to find depth.
I’ve never felt much courage, perhaps because I haven’t felt fear, out there that is. In here, in the day-to-day mundanity of life, that’s a whole other thing. Social anxiety, nervousness, low self-esteem, constant second guessing, with an ego that screams ‘what about me?’.
Day to day in the wild of me, in my world, requires a whole lot of courage.
Learning that the wild is within and going there requires a hell of a lot more of this courage than going to wild places, but going to wild spaces helped elicit going into my own wildness…
… keep reading the full & original article HERE