A bunch of people in North America have started a website called We are wildness and they are running a 30 day ‘rewild your life’ challenge. All you have to do is spend half an hour in nature each day in September sans technology except taking photos.

My plan was to spend my half hour near a particularly special tree that I will describe to you some other time. At the last minute it turned out I would have Mr A (my three year old) with me so it ended up more like 20 minutes than half an hour but I’m okay with that.

Given we are in the suburbs and the tree in question is surrounded by asphalt I spent the time on my back looking up into the canopy. I can definitely recommend this to others in urban environments, it’s a delightful tree viewing position.

I spent half the time narrating the experience to myself, composing the blog post I would write later. I had to keep reminding myself to be present and bring myself back to simply experiencing the beauty of the tree before me. Trees are good at reminding me to do that.

After a while a pair of rainbow lorikeets came and sat above me. I told Mr A that one of them was looking at me and this inspired him to lie down next to me and share the view for a bit.

I’ve been reading a bit of Thich Nhat Hanh lately especially about midfulness and children. They talk about the mindfulness bell that reminds us of our wise/compassionate/higher/buddha nature. Thay suggests that other things you love can act as mindfulness bells as you go through your day. Trees are doing that for me at the moment. I’m so grateful to live in such a treed city and I’m grateful to the trees. They are so effortlessly perfect.