Daily interaction in nature can open an awareness of the ripple effect of every action you do.
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Back in the Medicine Spot.
This photograph is a part of my route to reach my seat on the mountain. As I move along it, I am aware of the effects of my presence.
If I approach noisily and unaware, I create the ‘bird plough’ which is literally a giant ripple through the ecology of this place. The birds cry out in alarm and fly away from me, each alarm triggering the bird in the next territory which triggers the next.
The foxes, mongoose, genets, and maybe even the lynx are listening to these alarms. Long before I appear, they will have melted away in response to the birds calls and so I appear to be walking through an empty landscape.
Of course the animals are really still here and will be looking at me from the safety of dense cover, silent, and patient they wait for me to pass.
Creeping along ‘stealthily’ will not help either and camouflage fools no one.
However, walking with an awareness, openly and connected through my senses to the environment allows the birds to relax. I cease to be a threat, I am simply another curious animal sharing this space.
In this way, with no alarms the other animals have less reason to disappear, and it is at times like this that I find the fox relaxing in a pool of golden sunlight or the genet cleaning her fur in the tall oaks.
I am no longer looking in upon a view I am fully participative within it.
This used to be our way as humans when we understood the language of nature.
Photo: Cork grove on the mountain. Courtesy of the author.