{"id":877,"date":"2015-12-16T09:40:12","date_gmt":"2015-12-16T14:40:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/?p=877"},"modified":"2016-10-24T09:22:11","modified_gmt":"2016-10-24T13:22:11","slug":"taking-the-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/taking-the-time\/","title":{"rendered":"Taking the Time"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cAnd what is a healthy state? From the perspective of the individual, it is a bodily experience, a perception of the world, and an attitude about being alive that is characterized by openness, attunement, wonder, and willingness in the here and now to say YES to life<\/em>\u201d \u2013 Chellis Glendinning<\/p>\n

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Even after months of living here, the beauty of Costa Rica still takes me by surprise and sweeps me off my feet. Literally.<\/p>\n

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\"IMG_8509\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I\u2019ll walk up the hill from the farm after the day\u2019s work and onto the little deck that the family has built overlooking La Cangreja National Park. I look out at the world and\u2026sink to my knees.<\/p>\n

I fold my feet beneath me slowly, and sit cross-legged. I breathe and breathe and breathe until my legs feel just as warm as the worn wood beneath me. I sit just to watch the world move.<\/p>\n

Being there, watching the mist float in, is an experience like watching flower petals open, or a splash of redbird color fly through the trees at home. It\u2019s captivating. Your senses sharpen. Your shoulders shift away from your ears, and relax. Your mind slows to still.<\/p>\n

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\"IMG_8529\"<\/a><\/p>\n

You can almost feel the forest\u2019s energy vibrating. You can almost see<\/em> it.<\/p>\n

Birds swoop in and out of view. A toucan\u2019s yellow beak catches your eye. An ant crawls across your toe.<\/p>\n

The mist is brushing your face now. The fog has almost entirely engulfed the valley…<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

What is life really, but the series of events that you choose to pay attention to?<\/p>\n

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\"IMG_8533\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Living in the natural world reminds me why it\u2019s so fantastic to be alive. It reminds what a miracle it is. It shocks and inspires me, and is about the only thing that I am willing to sit and wait for.<\/p>\n

I crunch up gravel roads and trace the outlines of the trees that I pass along the way. I try to memorize them, try to examine their crooked limbs and lofty leaves and twisting, elaborate, constrictive vines. I go home and I write about it all.<\/p>\n

What pieces of this earthly existence do you choose to notice? Which rivers you find yourself taking part in? What world does your mind create? What moves<\/em> you?<\/p>\n

Trust.<\/p>\n

Trust.<\/p>\n

Trust.<\/p>\n

The world is unfolding as it should, and you have a role to play in it. You always have a role to play. The question is\u2026will you let life take you where you need to go?<\/p>\n

That is what the forest seems to say, while I sit there watching her.<\/p>\n

I listen.<\/p>\n

This is what the forest has always said to people, I think.<\/p>\n

I get up and go home.<\/p>\n

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\"IMG_8424\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I\u2019ve found peace.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What is life really, but the series of events that you choose to pay attention to? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":461,"featured_media":883,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[19,57,20],"tags":[],"coauthors":[32],"class_list":["post-877","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni","category-esc","category-travel"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/files\/2015\/12\/IMG_8424.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5bk8s-e9","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/877","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/461"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=877"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/877\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":890,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/877\/revisions\/890"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/883"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=877"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=877"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=877"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nicholas.duke.edu\/exploring-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=877"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}