Mindanderings: The Wonder of the Wander

Why choosing the detour over the thoroughfare can make all the difference.

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An epoch and an eon ago, I was a middle school teacher. I loved the hum and the heart of the classroom - and the wildly wonderful teeter-tottery landscape of adolescent soup. One of the golden threads from those days, woven into the fabric of these posts, comes from a treasured part of our week: the Mindandering Block... a dedicated pocket of time inspired by a fabulous book from Bob Stanish.

In this space, students were encouraged to let their thoughts drift and dangle. They wandered through the favourite parts of their week, the impasses, the detours, and most importantly, they simply wondered. In that inclusive, loving atmosphere, we found that the mind creates its most beautiful work when allowed to follow its own natural curiosity. We aren't meant to live exclusively in productive zones. I'd say even more now than then, there is a particular kind of pressure to walk in straight lines. An urgency to move from A to B with maximum efficiency, eyes fixed on the horizon, ignoring the ditch from which the wildflowers wave hello, because there is NO time.. 

The meander has always called me more than the thoroughfare. I imagine we have that in common; enjoying the benefits of mind wandering.

And so the subtext of this space, and a reminder to me after being away from it for too long, is lovingly borrowed and slightly nudged from J. R. R. Tolkien ...

Not all minds that wander are lost.

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Wandering is often mistaken for aimlessness. Yet, any horse in a winter pasture knows better. They move with a quiet, zig-zagging logic, following a scent, a shift in the wind, or a memory of where the grass stayed greenest. They are not lost; they are in conversation with the terrain.

Mindanderings pays homage to that kind of conversation. It celebrates that the most profound insights rarely arrive via the highway. They hide in the thickets of ecopsychology, in the myths we carry like warm stones in our pockets, and in the rhythmic breathing of a mare who knows exactly who you are, even when you have forgotten.

The trails also wind through biology and belief, where it turns out the science and the mystery are on excellent terms.

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There will be art.

Because sometimes a splash of ochre says what a thousand nouns cannot.

And there will likely be moments of absurdity, because if we can't laugh at the sheer strangeness of being human, or at the tendency to trip over our own shoelaces when contemplating the infinite, we have probably missed the point.

 Thanks for your patience while I've been away. I'm so glad you're here. Happy Meandering.

Sandra | CHIRON'S WAY

P.S. On this trail, we aim for Alice's “curiouser and curiouser.” If the English gets a bit wobbly or the left brain starts to stretch, you’ll know we’re getting somewhere.

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“Perhaps the truth depends on a walk around a lake.” 

~  Wallace Stevens

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An Along the Way Practice: The Zig-Zag Walk  The next time you find yourself walking toward a destination, even if it is just to the kitchen, take the Mindandering path. Stop to look at a shadow. Notice the texture of a doorframe. Allow the straight line to break, just for a moment, and see what the detour has to say.