Anam Cara

The Sanctuary of a Favourite Place

To awaken a sense of our ancient longing for Nature can help us to anchor our longing. When we go out alone and enter its solitude, we return home to our souls. When you find a place in Nature where the mind and heart find rest, then you have discovered a sanctuary for your soul. The landscape of the West of Ireland offers welcoming shelter to the soul. You can go to places in the limestone mountains where you are above the modern world; you will see nothing from the twenty centuries. There is only the subtle sculpture that rain and wind have indented on the stone. When the light comes out, the stone turns white, and you remember that this is living stone from the floor of an ancient ocean. Your eye notices how the fossils were locked into its solidification. Some of the stone, particularly at the edges, is serrated and shattered. In other places, the long limestone pavement is as pure and clear as if it had just been minted. Swept clean by the wind, these pavements are smooth and certain. The eye is surprised at the still clusters of white, red, and yellow flowers amidst the applause of rock. Moments of absolute blue startle the eye from the nests of gentian. Purple orchids sway elegantly in the breeze. Over the edge of the mountain, you can hear the chorus of the ocean. Its faithful music has never abandoned this stone world that once lived beneath its waters. Perhaps Nature senses the longing that is in us, the restlessness that never lets us settle. She takes us into the tranquillity of her stillness if we visit her. We slip into her quiet contemplation and inhabit for a while the depth of her ancient belonging. Somehow we seem to become one with the rhythm of the universe. Our longing is purified, and we gain strength to come back to life refreshed and to refine our ways of belonging in the world. Nature calls us to tranquillity and rhythm. When your heart is confused or heavy, a day outside in Nature’s quiet eternity restores your lost tranquillity.