“When we spend time in nature, our ego realizes it has no audience to perform for and it slowly quiets down.” (David Brooks). We’ve been in the Sierras for a week. As my wife and I were fishing along Rush Creek, we came to this spot. We stopped fishing and sat there for an hour and a half. We were the only people there. I’m grateful for that moment in time, and for knowing the river flows on and I have been, at most, a witness.
Watching the River Flow
Published by Steve Jacobsen
I worked for 43 years in the nonprofit and spiritual development fields....Executive Director of Hospice of Santa Barbara, Director of La Casa de Maria Retreat Center (before it closed in 2018 following the mud and debris flow event), and as a Presbyterian pastor in a variety of states and settings. I've been active in inter-spiritual work for 20 years, particularly with the Jewish, Muslim and Buddhist communities. I've served on several nonprofit boards and published a dozen articles. I enjoy baseball, classical music, listening to peoples' personal stories, politics, history and my family. View all posts by Steve Jacobsen
Steve Jacobsen, Ed.D 
I love it! I’ve been reviewing NatureTrack films for the October film festival. There is one from an Eastern European who immigrated to the US and found solace in fly fishing. You captured his message perfectly.
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Thank you, Nancy. I’ve got a fly rod and hope to learn, but it’s certainly for that full, mysterious sense of awe that even i go into nature.
I know you are coming up here tomorrow. I expect we’ll pass on the highway.
Thank you for reading my blog!
Steve
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Can’t wait to up there
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Thank you, Steve. So glad to hear that you and Ann are having this experience. As you know, I’ve been very fortunate here in NH to have access to many wild places along rivers and ponds. It’s always so restorative. I thought of this from Wendell Berry, I’m guessing you likely know it.
“When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.”
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Hi Steve,
I read this post on Friday, and by Saturday, I had already used the Brooks quote for a ceremony I was officiating. I love that you are out there taming your egos.
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Don: It’s a great quote, like so many of his pearls. Glad it proved useful.
Steve
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