Some people see life through a negative lens and some through a more positive lens. I’m generalising of course.
When I was young, I was often shamed for having a positive attitude. I was told I saw life through rose coloured glasses. As if somehow that made me stupid. Less than. I was naïve and I needed to wake up and read the newspaper or watch the news. Get a grip. Didn’t I know the world was going to hell in a handbag? I needed to be more realistic. and less ‘Pollyanna.’ The message drummed into me was: ‘Life is hard and then you die.’
When my parents met my husband, Glyn, they probably met the most enthusiastic positive person they’d ever met. Glyn was riding high on the success of his band and life was one big glorious adventure. He was twenty-two and we had our whole lives ahead of us. My dad decided Glyn was a dreamer and it wasn’t meant as a compliment. Dad said Glyn not only made castles in the sky, he went and lived in them. Dad thought it was funny. He meant it as an insult only clever people would understand. Glyn took it with a pinch of salt. He was undeterred. I knew I had found my match. Glyn is a wonderful human being and as a fellow dreamer it turned out we were perfect for each other.
That doesn’t mean we didn’t face difficulty. Having a positive attitude doesn’t preclude suffering. It simple means you see the silver lining behind all the dark clouds.
Our lives have taken some big hits. Glyn left the band he had formed and been a part of for years. The one thing he had dreamed of doing his whole life. After he left the band he dared to dream of a new future and we were married the next year. A few months after our wedding, his best friend died. Melanoma took Andy’s life in six months and we were devastated. Then a few years later, the Ash Wednesday bushfires of February 1983, blasted through our little town. Thankfully we didn’t lose our lives or our house. We lost our feeling of safety and all enjoyment of bonfires for a very long time.
Glyn telling the story of his survival in ‘83
This was the view from our house looking next door at the burned out RSL Hall You can see our hedge burnt on the outside. The blackened tree in this photo went on to live for another forty years, only recently cut down by the folk at the RSL.
Looking down at the town from the RSL next door to our house.
A while later the blackened trees sprouted green shoots along their trunks. They were, quite literally, beauty from ashes. The vibrant green stood out like a challenge against the blackened burned trunks. I wish I’d taken a photo. Although even now after forty-three years I still see their startling beauty in my mind’s eye. They were telling a story of hope. The smell of death eventually lifted and birdsong slowly came back. Hope remained. Our hope for the future. It’s ironic that I am writing this in February, forty-three years later.
Being positive or seeing the world through a different lens is not dimmed by experiences. For us, the experiences of devastation and grief made us appreciate life even more.
Even now, at our ripe old age, we are enjoying life. It would be easy to complain about what we no longer have. Our bodies no longer supple and strong, our vision and hearing weakening and various parts of our bodies creaking painfully. We could complain all day long. I’ve known a few ‘Puddleglums’ over the years and quite a few ‘Chicken Littles’ who were convinced the sky was falling. The only thing their negativity changed was their own nervous system. The story they were telling themselves was a self fulfilling prophecy.
Neuroscience is discovering that, along with listening to bird-song, a positive outlook is not only good for you, it rewires your brain. Who knew?
Our subconscious is always listening and always scanning for danger. It is scanning to reinforce what we tell it. If that’s ‘the world is going to hell in a handbag,’ then it will search for evidence of that to reinforce your belief. Lord knows there’s plenty of evidence.
Thankfully the reverse is also true. If you speak kindly to yourself and say positive things to yourself, your nervous system will scan for what you need to back that up. In the same way that it looks for the new model of car you were thinking of buying and you start to see them everywhere. Imagine if your nervous system was scanning for good things all the time. Reinforcing how well you are doing and helping you find more happiness.
I think the clearest example of positivity and abundance comes from trees. Not just as a metaphor for hope. I love trees. I think they are the most generous beings on the planet. I think they’re even more positive than my husband. Trees are so generous they give without being asked. Oxygen, shade, essential oils, habitat for animals, birds and insects. They absorb pollutants, provide food, medicine, stabilise the soil, purify water, absorb CO2, relieve stress, anxiety and depression, and when they produce seeds they don’t just produce one, they produce thousands. Some would say they are wasteful. It is abundance in action.
Did you know trees communicate with each other? Those in the know refer to this as ‘The wood wide web.’ Cute hey? They connect beneath the soil using vast networks of mycorrhizal fungi. If you are interested I recommend having a listen to Suzanne Simard’s Ted Talk on her extensive study of trees over her life-time.
I could go on and on about trees and their amazing qualities. I hope one day we will discover they are sentient and have been talking to us the whole time. Imagine the conversations we could have if we could understand them. The histories they could tell us. Even without understanding we can learn from them. There is wisdom in their stillness.They tell us to be rooted to the earth, they are the epitome of what it means to be grounded. Perhaps even the epitome of positivity. What if trees are the solution to everything. What if they know all the secrets to the universe.
There was a magnificent tree in a nearby town and the council deemed it unsafe. It was chopped down leaving a stump. We think that kills them. I was sad not to see that beautiful tree as I drove past. It left a gaping hole in the sky. Some time later a sapling sprang from the trunk and I couldn’t drive past it without stopping to take a photo. The word it brought to my mind was: Hope.
Did I mention I love trees? Thank you for reading and I hope you find yourself looking at trees in new ways. May you find a forest and spend some time bathing in the beauty and breathing in the forest’s healing properties that will boost your immune system and refresh you. May you find hope and positivity among their leaves. The trees will share with you. You won’t even have to ask.
Rhiannon Dowding - Writer 