Bare Feet and Invisible Progress
When everything looks visibly bleak, go stand in the forest with your bare feet and listen. If you’re still long enough, you’ll hear the trees whisper to you about what it takes to overcome.
I walk outside barefoot year round. I stand on the forest floor with the leaf litter cushioning my steps and crunching beneath my heels. On brisk mornings in the fall and spring, the temperature difference between shaded spots and sunny spots is very noticeable, and stepping from chilly or frosty blades of grass onto ground with a few hours of sun warmth is delicious.
I step on ground that my senses register as solid and unmoving. But is it? The more we study and understand the forest, the more we learn about the complexity of life teeming beneath the soil. We learn that what we see in terms of plant growth–even the largest and oldest of trees—is but the tip of the proverbial iceberg when we consider what is happening in the soil that we take for granted beneath our feet.
Forests are vast cooperatives. Rather than competing with each other for resources, trees share amongst themselves–even between species. They communicate threats across miles and help each other we…
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