Hello and welcome to Five Minutes in Nature with me Liz Scott and I'm up on Dartmoor and this has been great because I've been walking without really thinking and my feet have taken me across the old golf course and towards a rock that I love to sit on and reflect and I hadn't expected to go this way.
I hadn't really planned which way to go when my husband said which way are you going?
I said oh I don't know I'll either go up the hill or down the hill and as it is I've gone up the hill and I'm moving towards one of my favourite sitting spots where I can just sit and look across the South Hams,
That's the area I live in.
Just take in the air and breathe and settle.
Blue sky,
A few clouds,
It's a warm day but not too hot,
This is a good temperature for the time of year.
Today's reflection is all about the simplicity of a gift and I was sitting having a cup of tea with my husband and he had just delivered a freshly made loaf of bread to our neighbour and he'd made this bread by hand.
He loves making sourdough bread and it's absolutely delicious and there is quite a process that he goes through,
It's an art form and no bread is the same,
No two loaves are the same.
Everything is always slightly different,
The conditions it rises in,
The amount of flour he puts in,
The way he kneads it,
Everything is slightly different.
So every loaf of bread is unique and he helps out with a neighbour who's had a stroke and he felt really compelled just to deliver a loaf of bread to him,
So he did.
And as we were sitting down having a cup of tea he said,
Oh our neighbour has just said thank you for the loaf of bread and it's delicious and we just mulled on how nice it was that Stu had first of all felt compelled to offer a gift of a loaf of bread and that the neighbour had taken time to thank him and had enjoyed it.
And then what followed was a conversation about the simplicity of just gifts and giving and gifts don't have to be overt or big,
Gifts don't have to cost any money,
You can give someone the gift of your time for example,
But there's something about this exchange of energy where you're not giving a gift because your ego is telling you to do something for somebody who's worse off than you so you can feel better about it,
But you're being guided more by,
Well I'm standing here with my back to the breeze and it's almost like I'm being guided,
You're being guided by the breeze,
It's like you're a boat with a sail up and the wind is guiding you to give.
And there's something really special about hearing back from the person who's received your gift when someone comes back to you and again we were talking about this,
My husband and I,
Saying well it's not that we're expecting a thank you,
We don't give a gift because we want to thank you and yet there's something about this wonderful exchange of energy when you give something and feel compelled to give something and then somebody responds back in kind,
There's something so healthy and nourishing about that,
It's a relationship,
A relationship building exercise and even when I say a relationship building exercise it feels as though that's a doing and I don't mean it as a doing,
It's something you do in order to build relationship,
It's just a natural way of engaging and building relationship and connection with others.
So today is a reflection on giving gifts and receiving gifts,
It's about what might you give today,
What are you drawn to give today and it might be that you're not drawn to give anything and that is absolutely fine,
Never never feel you've got to give or to do something that doesn't feel right and yet I guess what I'm saying is don't ever underestimate the exchange of energy,
It might be you send somebody a little message,
It might be that you give someone your time,
It might be that you make something or you have something in your home that you no longer want,
Maybe it's a book for example and you think ah maybe this person would like this book,
So is there something that you can gift or give today and what what is it that you've done,
Let me know,
It's always good to hear from you,
What have you gifted today?
