Hello and welcome to five minutes in nature with me Liz Scott.
Apart from I'm not in nature,
I'm actually in my garage.
A very heavy rain shower came overhead and I've just rushed back trying to keep as dry as possible and rather than record outside,
Which is what I've been hoping to do,
I'm recording in my garage just before I take off all my wet weather gear and go inside.
And today's reflection is something that's been kind of I say playing on my mind,
Not in a negative way,
But just sort of keeps arising in my mind and it's something that a friend of mine is involved with.
He runs a podcast and a business and one of his taglines is wisdom doesn't follow rules.
Wisdom doesn't follow rules and it's been one of those little taglines of wisdom that has really felt significant for me and I just wanted to share with you some of my reflections and just see whether you've got any reflections about that phrase yourself.
Wisdom doesn't follow rules and I think one of the things that has really inspired me about this has been that I have been a person that has wanted to know what the rules are and then I've wanted to follow those rules.
That's been kind of the way I've lived my life.
So as a child I really wanted to understand what did I need to do in the classroom and how could I be good and I'd like to put my hand up and be helpful but I didn't like to be disruptive or I felt very uncomfortable if people were messing around in the classroom and that wasn't me,
I just wanted to follow the rules and that's continued in my life,
Trying to be a good person,
Trying to be what I perceived a good woman should be and what I should be as a good wife or a good aunt or a good sister or a good daughter.
I've always been looking to follow the rules of what are those rules and I think it's taken me decades.
I'm in my 50s now and it's really only in recent years that I've actually realized the truth of that particular saying which is that wisdom doesn't follow rules and when I was on a self-development journey and I used to read lots of books and try out lots of things,
If I went on the neuro-linguistic programming course I tried to do it to the best of my ability,
Thinking that if only I understood more fully the rules of this particular program or concept or self-development journey,
If only I followed the rules I would be okay.
I've always been somebody that has thought that if my life is not going okay it's because I'm not following the rules of something properly,
Like I'm not being a good enough human being,
I'm not being a good enough friend,
I'm not being a good enough wife.
So it's been a revelation over a period of time to question whether there is such a thing as following the rules and even what are these rules,
Like they're made up,
I made up some rules that I thought I needed to follow and then I broke those rules and then I decided how upset I should be because I didn't follow the rules that I'd made up.
I mean it's ridiculous when you think about it but when you're in it it's not ridiculous,
It just looks and feels real because that's the way thought works,
Thought creates scenarios that look and feel real.
But wisdom is different,
Wisdom comes from a different place than the conceptual mind,
It doesn't come from a place where rules are created.
Wisdom for me comes from a place that is beyond the intellectual mind.
So when we hear the phrase wisdom doesn't follow rules that made complete sense for me when I undertook my pilgrimage 630 miles walking for 50 days across England,
It really made no sense logically to do this,
None whatsoever.
And yet I was following wisdom and wisdom was inviting me and drawing me to make this journey and I followed the nudges of wisdom.
So today as I move ever further towards,
As we all do,
The end of our lives and I don't mean that in a negative way at all but I'm really conscious that here I am now in my late 50s and I'm really reflecting now on what is it that I want to share and be in the world.
I don't want to make up rules as to what that should be,
I want to dig into my wisdom and I want to follow my wisdom and my request is that you do the same too,
Is really bring your attention to your wisdom,
That wiser deeper intuition,
That's the place to put your attention and awareness.
Allow wisdom to lead the way and for sure as far as I can see wisdom does not follow rules.
