If you watch any media at all you are bombarded by negativity, death, destruction, fear, fear, fear.  I’m not sure what purpose all of it serves but I do know that I am capable of turning most of it off and tuning it out.  I have to admit that I do keep up with current events and can get caught up in many things political.  This past weekend I turned it off.  I cooked, baked, cleaned, kept busy all the way around.

It sometimes feels as if the world around me has really gone off of the tracks.  If you listen to the media or Facebook or Twitter you begin to imagine that the horrors of any particular news cycle are happening in your back yard.  Sometimes you have to say enough.

I have a theory that one of the reasons there is so much absurd craziness is that people have become too disconnected from the natural world. They have lost that reverent respect for life of all kinds.  I believe we are effected by everything surrounding us.  Years ago I lived in a medium size city on the north shore of Massachusetts.  I was surrounded by concrete and pavement.  There were a few large maples on my street but they were surrounded by concrete as well.  I would watch the children playing outside on the street or their paved driveways and was always struck by the fact that they never touched the earth, no playing in the dirt.  I would then walk a mile or so to the end of my street where there was a huge, old cemetery, it was like a big, beautiful park.  I would take off my shoes and walk in the grass.

I think everyone needs to be grounded to the earth.  As crazy as this sounds I believe we attain some sort of energy from the earth itself whether we are walking barefoot in the grass, planting a garden or swimming in a lake.  I think we take something with us every time we do, like charging a battery.  I think the disconnect is growing.  The calmest, most sane people I know have some connection to the earth and understand that even in a subconscious way.

I think we should all spend some time running in the grass in our bare feet.