Just a Sound in the Woods
Recently, I read a comment on a “We listen, but we don’t judge” hiking edition post that stopped me dead in my tracks: I cry on hikes because it’s the only place I feel at peace.
I had to pause my scrolling because, that’s some real shit.
More ten years ago, you would have had to club me over the head and drag me out into the woods to hike. I remember my college roommates took me on a hike and I cried the whole time. Like real tears. I hated the bugs, the smells, the walk, the itchiness in my fucking my legs. I hated all of that shit. The fact that people hiked for hours was unfathomable. I couldn’t think of a bigger waste of time.
More than ten years later, I love all that shit! I mean don’t get me wrong, I’m a punk if I see a spider on my hike. But hiking is really one of those places I feel at peace. I hiked up a mountain in 2024. I NEVER thought I would be able to do anything like this in my life. I count it as my biggest accomplishments in 2024, and I published a fucking book (a really good one at that) in that year.
But there’s something that I learned when I worked with people in recovery: lean on your higher power. I never defined my higher power before then. If you asked before 2024, what was my higher power my answer would be, “Uh I don’t know, God?”
But that’s not it for me. While I believe in God, God is not what I lean on in times when I need strength. For me there’s something spiritual about nature. When I am looking over a cliff or an overlook, standing in the woods or on a mountain surrounded by trees, wind, and sounds of birds, there’s a freedom I can’t express with words. Seeing how small I am, how small my problems are in the marvel of nature just puts shit into perspective.
I can admit that I’ve sat in nature, beneath the beautiful blue skies, and amongst the sound of the winds and birds and cried. With the hustle and bustle and constant expectations of who I have to be to others, a mother, a wife, a daughter, an employee, a friend, in nature I can just be nothing. I can just be present.
Just a sound in the woods, and I’ve never felt more free.