Summer’s Not Over! Go Play!

A few weeks ago, I led the participants in an Earth Joy Writing Workshop in Ashland, Oregon, in the following exercise. Ashland is a town famous for play: they have a world-renowned summer Shakespeare Festival there, they often get visitors who enjoy the mellow side of life, and the residents love the way the mountains and forest (and deer!) come right to their door.

But after doing this exercise, many participants shared that they had actually forgotten how fun it is to play.

Try this, and see how good it feels to remember:

Go outside and recreate the action, the motions of your earliest gifts and talents as they were expressed outside in nature. 

Allow your body to remember those early years of playing soccer, rolling down hills, making leaf rubbings and forts and fairy houses, fishing, swinging, swimming, climbing trees. 

Recreate your body’s joy in expressing your talents, gifts, and early sparks of creativity in relationship with the earth. 

Write about what you remember about your connection to the earth and how it may have changed over the course of your life. 

What steps can you take in your life now to reclaim this connection?