Withdrawing From the Cares Which Will Not Withdraw From Us
A couple of days ago I came across the following words by Maya Angelou: “Each of us needs to withdraw from the cares which will not withdraw from us. We need hours of aimless wandering or spates of time sitting on park benches, observing the mysterious world of ants and the canopy of treetops.” These two sentences spoke to me in a powerful way; they were words I needed to hear.
I found Maya’s call to withdraw “from the cares which will not withdraw from us” to be especially poignant. In recent weeks I have let some things bother me far more than I should. I’ve had cares and concerns that I seemed unable to escape no matter how hard I tried. It was actually comforting to read this poet’s words. She seemed to understand that there are problems that will not give us a break, troubles that refuse to let us go. But she also had the wisdom to advise us to find a way to withdraw from these nagging cares. She knew that in such stressful circumstances you have to find a way to separate yourself from those cares that want to stay attached to you.
I also appreciated Maya’s advice concerning where one might withdraw. She points us to a number of places in nature to seek relief. She mentions spending time in a park, observing ants, and looking at the trees. I’m not sure that there is a better place to turn for relief from the cares that will not withdraw from us than God’s Creation. John Muir certainly felt this way. He once said, “Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature’s peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves.” In nature, whether there be mountains or not, we often find that our cares do, in fact, “drop off like autumn leaves.”
I am convinced that God intentionally put therapeutic elements into the Creation to help us all deal with the problems and cares we face in life. In one of the most beloved passages of the Bible David wrote about how God provided for his needs through nature. He said God “makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside still waters, he restores my soul.” (Psalm 23:2) In God’s Creation David found the restoration his soul needed. Countless times that is where I have found what I needed too.
I have long understood the restorative powers of God’s Creation. What Maya Angelou’s words helped me understand is that it is imperative that I find a way to return to nature when life gets hard and my cares will not let me go. When I am overly stressed, discouraged or depressed I don’t always feel like getting out but it is precisely at such times I must force myself to get outdoors. In nature I always find reminders that God is bigger than any problem I might be facing and that God genuinely cares about me. I may well have cares that will not withdraw from me but when I force myself to withdraw to God’s Creation I discover again and again a God whose love will not let me go and a peace that passes all understanding. I definitely need to withdraw more often. How about you?
–Chuck
(I took the pictures used above in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan this past fall.)