Nature

I am grateful that I was raised in places where I could play outside. My early memories are of hunting for butterflies and lightning bugs in the field next to our house. I remember the farmer who would bail hay in that field giving me a quarter for "helping" him throw bales of hay on the trailer behind his tractor.

As I grew older we moved to house out in the woods. My brother and I would spends hours every day running around the mountain behind our house. We discovered small caves, hidden creeks, and climbed trees. One day we came across a rock face and I decided I would climb it. My brother waited below. I think the plan was that if I fell he would go home and report my death. About half way up I got stuck. I couldn't figure out how to keep going up and I didn't think I go back down either. I clung to my spot terrified not knowing what to do. My brother offered encouragement and then he got worried. He asked if he should go home and get mom and dad. As scared as I was I didn't want him to do that. It might mean our adventurers would be curbed. In that moment, I told myself I could figure it out...and I did.

This story came to my mind this week for two different reasons. One, I am preaching this Sabbath (Saturday) on playing in nature and two, I started a book titled, The Anxious Generation, by social psychologist Jonathan Haidt. Jonathan convincingly correlates smart phones, a diminishing of children's time in nature, and parents keeping their children from risk as the reason for the rise in anxiety, depression, and other mental health problems in children and adolescents.

As I think back on my childhood, I can see the ways I learned problem solving and all kinds of other important lessons from being in nature both with my parents and on my own. I am grateful my children, perhaps to a lesser degree, also had those opportunities in some of the places we lived, particularly when I was a summer camp director for five summers when they were young.

If you have kids, work with kids, or just want to understand how the world is changing, I would highly recommend you read The Anxious Generation. The other thing I would recommend...take some time to enjoy nature...maybe late in the evening or early in the morning during this hot Florida summer but get out there, maybe take a risk, and enjoy what God created for your enjoyment and growth.