I increasingly find myself dealing with life's challenges by asking questions. The correlation between the quality of our questions and the levels of fulfilment we experience has been articulated many times.
I have reached the point of employing enquiry as a means to gaining profound insights in a natural way, rather than through the guidance of others. The approach has evolved from my efforts to develop conceptual frameworks and models that are useful to me in the real world.
One foundational question, perhaps more fundamental in its importance than any other, is What really matters? Related perhaps to the search for meaning, the development of a deep sense of purpose, I am posing this question to myself more and more often.
I am inclined to answer the question by asserting, rather obviously, that Health matters more than anything. But that sort of wide, general response of course raises far more questions than it answers. So it is a starting point from which we can expect to gain more profound insights.
Many individuals in recent times are concerning themselves with, in addition to the important matter of human health, the health of our planet. It is not hard to see how the two are deeply connected.
The ancient woodland of Britain, which has diminished from around 15% of land coverage in the Middle Ages to 2.5% today, could be seen as both a microcosm and a metaphor for the combined health of The Earth and its inhabitants. It represents more importantly than any other entity the remarkable beauty of nature, the importance and wonder of biodiversity, the fragile balance between mankind and the landscape and our connection with the past.
I feel ever more compelled to embark on a project centred on the ancient woodland of this country and will write further on this aspiration.