Discovering Portable Pleasures
Are your arm, leg, and abdominal muscles tense? Have you forgotten how to relax, or has relaxation become one more follow-the-rules mechanical activity? For a more satisfactory approach, develop oneness with nature for a few minutes every day. It may improve your quality of life beyond all expectations.
The visual delight of clouds moving across the sky awakens spirit and renews hope. It reaffirms faith in all that nature offers. You are part of the fabric of life. Plants and trees grow, enfold you, and reproduce regardless of your presence or interest.
When you feel stressed, place yourself in different and more natural surroundings. Hummingbirds come to flowers for nourishment, entertaining with the sound of feathered wings beating the air. We marvel at the apparent impossibility of these tiny birds flying thousands of miles on their annual migration.
Mechanical entertainment may fail or require repair or replacement. Nature is all around and always available. Place yourself properly to absorb a multitude of wonders.
Move about in your neighborhood outdoor swimming pool. Experience the pleasure of a raven landing on the water to swim and bathe with you. Another raven arrives, and another. On this warm sunny afternoon, you swim and cavort with ravens. Your sensors in eyes, ears and skin all tingle with excitement. Fluffy white clouds drift above. Your world is complete in this moment.
Awaken to the joys of the natural world. Develop awareness. Animals, plants, insects and even grubs provide limitless fascination. Pleasure sources await you every day wherever you are.
Do you walk across a field seeing only where to walk safely? Let your eyes wander. Is that a cat paw print? Is it a squirrel track? Follow that trail. Be curious. Chewed vegetation is a clue to whether you are trailing a car or a squirrel. Squirrels cut the plants at an angle. Cats claw the ends leaving straggles at the top. Listen for clues. You do know the difference between a chirp and a meow. Find that animal by using all of your senses. Look around. Perhaps that cat or squirrel is watching you.
Learn to feel that you are one with some element of nature. Choose a small animal that is abundant where you live. Read about its life and problems. Go for a walk to see if it is at home.
When you feel stressed, place yourself in different and more natural surroundings. Be aware of the daily life of creatures that make their entire living there. Free your mind.
Stress is sometimes a discomfort you feel about situations. Stress may cause pain in your muscles. It can affect strokes, heart disease, even sudden death. Stress often causes blood pressure increase, or upsets your gastrointestinal system. Chronic stress can trigger immune system disorders.
Researchers study the use of virtual reality to enhance physical functioning. They scrutinize the relationship between physical medicine, rehabilitation, and virtual reality. Heewong Yang , 2001, reports that a virtual reality exposure may be effective in the treatment of anxiety disorders.
CDs relaying sounds of nature are readily available. A large collection of nature sounds can be assembled easily. They are also available in most local libraries. Whatever your source, relaxing sounds of nature are second- hand transmissions to your ears.
You are portable. Think of nature as your portable entertainment system. Batteries not required. Genuine sounds in natural settings enfold you in visual, olfactory and auditory delights. This full sensory approach is relaxing as one with your world.
Enjoy relaxation in your portable entertainment system. We all live in the natural world. Many layers of technology and buildings and roads may be barriers around us. Move beyond those barriers for a few minutes each day.
Let the visual delight of clouds moving across the sky and the joys of relating to animals in your field of nature awaken your spirit and renew your hope.
--the end—
Jean Douglas MA
665 words
Retyped from published version 3 18 2011
Published October 2004