Catharsis in Nature

I believe in catharsis. Moreover, I believe that to achieve spiritual freedom, I need nature. I believe that to function, to live, to be truly happy, we have to release our worries. Nature exists without anything tarnishing it, that pure facet helps me to purify myself of burdens. The beauty I see when I am in the wild gives me perspective on life. It is a different feeling than other times when I am happy or content, or when I feel spiritual. Nothing else is around me; I am not interrupted from my thoughts.

When I sit in the water, one ski strapped to my feet, and my families fateful boat pulls me from the water, I am pulled from my worries, emotions, responsibilities, burdens, decisions. All that remains is the water, and after skimming across it for a while, I return to the world by letting go and sinking down into the water. Splash and I remember my responsibilities, and the decisions I have to make, but my worries, my burdens, are gone. Gone in the catharsis of my skiing, my revelation in the beauty of nature.

I may come across solace hanging out with friends. When I am with them hanging out, we are having fun, even releasing tension, but we are not achieving spiritual escape. I may locate peace relaxing at home watching television but I am only watching someone else’s thoughts, life, problems, and while this helps to take my mind off things, it does not release me from mine. I may find fun, excitement, and relief from my stress playing a game, but once again, that is not cathartic for me.

To unearth myself I need nature. When I sit upon a swing in my back yard, when I kayak across a lake, with I gaze out across the world from a mountaintop, when I feel the cold bite of a river, only then do I find myself. It is that contact with nature, which I have enjoyed all my life, which allows me to let go. If I never released these worries, I could not function. I believe that the soul can only take so much and that from time to time it has to be relived. I must return to nature and release these burdens placed upon me by life.