I have the very good fortune to have a lovely conservatory and this is where I sat to practice meditation this morning.

The sound of the birds tweeting helped call me back to my breath. Our minds love to wander and it is useful to have something to help us return to the here and now.

There are many meditation practices out there all with their own unique take on how to come back but for me the simplicity of using what we have, our senses, is an easy place to start. We don’t have to learn anything, it’s all already with us, all the time.

So simply:

• Notice what you can hear.
• What can you smell?
• What does you body feel like?
• Notice the sensations where your body meets with your seat or the floor?
• Feel the inside of your mouth, can you taste anything?
• If your eyes are open really take the time to notice what is right there with you.

This morning when I opened my eyes I saw yellow irises, red roses, lush green herbs. I saw the abundance that is my garden and then just as I was about to get up a woodpecker stopped for a moment on the bean poles just outside. What a delight! I rushed excitedly inside to tell my husband.

This reconnection with what is, with nature, with the delight in our hearts when we engage with other creatures of our amazing little planet is what will save us. When we get it that we are a part of this amazing living world, that it is where we come from and where we go back to and in-between that is what gives us life, it becomes harder and harder to participate in it’s destruction.

We belong to the earth it does not belong to us. If we want to pass on this beautiful abundant world to future generations, our descendants, then we need to take care of it, protect it and nurture it and in the doing of these things we give the same to ourselves.

“To become different from what we are, we must have some awareness of what we are”

Eric Hoffer