Walking in Nature and Photography as Practice

Most of my adult life, I have lived in the hustle and bustle of the big city (Montreal and Ottawa). My work as a policy director involved research, analysis, management, and administration. I was living in my head most of the time, disconnected from my body.

After leaving my work with the Public Service and more than a decade of working with embodied practices such as mindfulness meditation, body scanning, and EMDR, adding psychedelic medicine to my practice has had the effect of drawing me out of the city and turning me towards nature.

I remember walking along the banks of Kaniatarowanenneh (the St. Lawrence river) after my first psychedelic ceremony. Sitting down on an outcrop of rocks looking out across the river, I listened to the sounds of the water rushing by and the wind in the trees. I remember feeling very grounded, present in my body, and in touch with the environment. I felt intense bliss, and a healing energy awakening deep inside me.

Since then, my connection to nature continues to deepen. The insights I receive in contemplating nature are often heart opening and sometimes profoundly spiritual. Walking down by the river, through the trees and the bushes, among the wildflowers, is such a beautiful reminder of how both light and darkness coexist to create mystery and beauty all around us.

I feel gratitude for the flowers, the wildlife, the trees and the river. I am blessed to be present with the cacophony of nature around me, birds singing, insects humming, leaves rustling and the water in constant motion.

Wanting to capture these moments of beauty and bliss, I started to take photographs with my smartphone as I walked. This evolved into a practice where the process of taking photographs has become a form of meditation in itself.

I no longer walk to "exercise" but to slow right down. I take time to contemplate the beauty that surrounds me, I look through my eyes, and then I look again through my phone, and with gratitude for what I see, I compose an image with the elements in front of me. Time stops, I am grounded in my body, and present for what is before me.

Try it for yourself! The goal is not to impress with your photographic skills but to help you slow down, to become grounded and present in the moment, and to open your heart and feel gratitude for the beauty of nature.