The body heals. This fact is a major cause for gratitude and wonder.

The body heals in noiseless self-contained seclusion at a separate pace from the abstract world of thought and the constant impatient fluctuation of the primitive mind.

The way the intellect and the mind try to organise or fix the everyday world they tend to operate in holds little or nothing that concerns the snail-like patience of the body’s enormous potential for healing.

And yet, the giant propulsion systems on which the body depends, and from which it draws its hidden powers of healing depend on the awareness of thought to be left, with a respectful distance, in peace to operate.

These wondrous hidden powers need the mind’s cooperation. They need the courage of self-encouragement and they have a ready appetite for offers of material and environmental support.

A tree throughout its lifetime is entirely dependent on this type of aware protection and nurture from the humans with whom it shares its immediate environment.

The trees and we people are vulnerable as a flickering candle flame. Both need active protection from disasters which arrive from ignorance, hubris, self-harm, unchecked violent impulses, even blind malice.

So, my friend, I am a student of the gentle art of living, balanced between desire and postponement of desire.

A good rule of thumb? Always favour love of the Now over love of the past or future.

And I do