mindfulness | Neal Lemery

(published in the Tillamook County Pioneer, 2/17/2025)

(Komorebi: The interplay of light and leaves as the sun shines through the trees.)

Into this place, this space
Open to light, streaming, flowing
Straight light, angled, shaded, scattered in part

By and through
Leaves of trees, trunks, and limbs Dancing onto the ground, my face
In all the colors in this place.
Quiet here, except birdsong and breeze, All that is not human,
And leaves, rustling, murmuring Gathering and scattering the light.
I take it all in, absorbing
Marveling,
Me only a small insignificance,
A mere witness
To magnificence,
Awe.
No word in my language to describe it
I rely on the Japanese
Komorebi
—Neal Lemery 3/28/2023

When I am in need of quiet and contemplation, space to sort things out and re- gain my perspective on life, or simply work through a difficult and challenging prob- lem, I take myself to the forest. I seek out the quiet, off the “beaten path” places, and look to immerse myself into that experience, into what I call the purity of nature.

Unpolluted by human activity, the real forest experience seems uncomplicated, where time takes on a different existence, where process is not measured by modern culture, but by the incremental pace of natural life.

“Slow down” is the message I soon experience, until I start thinking that my hu- man concept of time is actually toxic, harmful to other life forms. And after I move into the “slow down” mode, I start listening. I listen and begin to hear the silence, and then the subtle sounds of forest life and being. A breeze in the trees, a bird song, the al- most inaudible sound of a small twig falling or the faint sounds of moving water. The chaos and sound clutter of modern life ebbs away, and I am left to again discover the calm of natural sounds, and the rhythm of the real world.

In the quiet, I hear myself breathe, hear my footsteps, hear the noises of the for- est, its inhabitants, the breeze, leaves, animals, the now familiar sounds of this world. And, I wonder why I don’t go there more often, to just be, to sit with the natural quiet, to feel the rhythms of the real world. I can hear myself think and I become reacquaint- ed with my thoughts, my true “self”.

What I had thought important and worrisome a half hour ago, is now just noise that is fading away into the background, to be set aside so that I can again hear the sounds of the forest, and feel at peace. Human problems and worries diminish in this visit to nature, and what is really important in life re-emerges, comes out of its hiding places, and takes center stage in my brain.

All is good. All is well. All is calm.

I take some breaths, feeling myself breathe, feeling a deep sense of relaxation, of ease, of the flowing away of tensions and stress. I am in a good place, a place of peace. Tranquility. And in all that, I am comforted, put at ease.

The simplicity of all this, the minimalist being of all this, astonishes me. No money changed hands, it was little effort to come here, and to quiet myself, and begin to no- tice things, and to not notice the things that had been pressuring, irritating me. I could simple be a being that noticed, that observed, that was present. A being focusing on existing, on experiencing the quiet and the spirit of the forest. I was in simplicity, and it was good.

Part of my brain, freed at least for a while from the tyranny of being in “work mode” and being the analyzer and problem solver, worked in the background, and I found myself picking up my brain’s solutions and answers to what had been troubling challenges. I wasn’t very conscious of that thinking, but the answers and paths to solu- tion came forward. It was easy and I just found myself accepting that I was getting some answers, that troubling problems had solutions, and I wasn’t struggling to find them. I was calm, in touch with myself, with the world, and in my focus on where I was at, what I was experiencing in the forest, somehow opened the door to my human world tasks.

I breathed again, deep, and unfocused. I was simply “being”, not doing.

Again, I realized I needed to be a being and not a doing. The creatures and spirits in the forest were all beings, and not doings. I could be like them. I could learn from them, how to live, how to be, how to be immersed in my existence. How I could just be alive.

And that was enough. No great expectations, no objectives. Just be alive and feel.

The forest did not sit in judgment of me, or evaluate, assess, critique. I could just be. Myself. I could just be myself, without expectation.

Whatever purpose, whatever mission I had come to the forest for this day, was ac- complished. I sensed a new feeling of satisfaction, of accomplishment. Maybe not tan- gible, maybe nothing I could check off a box about, but I had come for what I needed. And it was good. It was enough.

I breathed again, and gave thanks to the forest where I sat, and was filled with gratitude, and with a sense of completeness, of accomplishment. Not in the human, “civilized” sense, but deeper than that, a sense of wellbeing in my soul.

By Neal Lemery

(Published in the Tillamook County Pioneer, 11/2/2024)

October seems to have moved in like the frenzied autumn storm of a few nights ago, foreshadowing the arrival of the season. The days and weeks this past month had flown by as the holidays crept up on the calendar. I keep wondering where the time goes these days. Brisk winds are bringing down the colorful leaves, with cooler temperatures compelling me to find my favorite fleece sweater and raincoat, and to renew my wintery ritual of a mug of mid-morning tea.

I’ve barely stashed away the deck furniture and filled up the greenhouse with tender plants when the cache of holiday ornaments catches my eye, reminding me I need to at least think about holiday decorating. Time to get serious about the holiday gift list and plan for all the holiday festivities. I’m still working on the last of the summer’s tomatoes and zucchinis, and have just planted my cover crops for the raised beds. The first frost last week was a rude awakening, a call to action.

Fall is a transition, on many levels, and I’m changing into my seasonal routines of being inside more, watching the lawn green up from the welcome fall rains, and adjusting to the shortening hours of daylight.

What’s been missing in all of this change and transition has been some quiet time, some “me time”.

A few days ago, a big item on my “to do” list was to drive to the airport to pick up a family member. I needed to leave early, when it was still dark out, and was able to enjoy the glories of the beginning of the morning light over the mountains, and the emerging colors of the leaves up the river. It was quiet, without any distractions on the drive, except the interplay of the mist and fog rising against the hills, and the brightening of the full spectrum of fall colors on the trees. A few fishermen were out, reminding me I’ve been remiss in satisfying my needs for streambank solitude and meditating on the sounds of free-flowing rivers, the song of the rain, and the kerplunk of a well cast bait and bobber.

Soon enough, I’d be in the midst of Portland traffic, but for nearly an hour, I had the world to myself, just me and my thoughts and the beauty of this place I am blessed to call home.

My brain mulled over what I had thought were the problems and issues of the week, and I began to realize that what I was worried about, what I had been fretting and stewing about, was really darned inconsequential or simply had a pragmatic and quick solution. It was time to work on being a human being rather than a human doing. My “to do” list really could wait. The day was mine to simply enjoy and to just “be”.

I stopped along the side of the road to visit one of my favorite waterfalls, renewed from the last week of rain. The air was cool, misty, and smelled of damp earth and wet leaves. And there’s nothing like the sounds of falling water in the hills to bring me back to the serenity of nature and the wildness of the forest.

The tension in my shoulders and neck eased, relaxing what tensions I didn’t realize was there, and I felt truly at peace, a feeling that was needed in the hectic pace of the last few months. I took a few deep breaths, clearing out the mental cobwebs, becoming a part of our world, living in the moment, moving into deep peace.

I’d gotten back into the range of a radio station and started to listen to the morning news. The old tensions came back, and I realized I’d rather spend the rest of my trip simply being peaceful, unbothered by the latest news and political rhetoric. It’s not like I needed more information for the upcoming election. The months of increasingly harsh and divisive rhetoric had more than informed my decisions as a voter, and, after all, I had already voted. Indeed, I could be done with all of that. I could take charge and just let go.

“Click” and the radio was silent again, and I rolled down the window for some more forest air and the smell of damp leaves. My world was fresh and clean again, and the strident voices on the radio were quiet. I could think again, able to simply be, to be present in the moment, my brain cleared from harsh words and the manufactured frenzy of political events and commentary. I could focus on the brilliant colors of autumn leaves, and the early morning sunlight on the river. I could choose to have my mind be simply manipulated by the beauty of the morning.

My favorite group of herons were hunting in the upcoming swamp, and I slowed to notice their grace and serenity in the morning light. Soon, I’d be in traffic, finding my way on freeways, gearing up for the congestion of the airport. But, now, I had my peace, and I wasn’t going to let it go. I breathed in, again, bringing that self-contained serenity deep inside of me, holding it close to my heart, and remembering to just be in the moment.

11/1/2024