I am taking advantage of some warm temperatures and am blogging from outside. It is near 60 degrees out, and despite being a wee bit chilly with the breeze, I am insistent upon staying outdoors with my MacBook and blogging.

I am basically saying this, that aside from being a little cabin-feverish from being inside all winter, and “enjoying” the outdoors only by rushing to the vehicles to go somewhere, or to get quickly back inside, I need to get outdoors for a bit to “get outside” myself. I think I have blogged on this theme before. The idea is that one cure for what ails you is to go outdoors. By going outdoors and into nature (or whatever passes for it where you are) you can escape for a while the narrow confines of the traps your minds sets for you. The stinkin’ thinkin’ that alcoholics and addicts find themselves in is not easily discarded. One good way is to immerse yourself in something greater than yourself.

I believe Pope Blessed John Paul II said somewhere that believers should go outside to meet God. In nature you find the Lord. He created it, and in His works you can find Him. This does not mean, of course, that you can dispense with Church. In Church (Catholic ones) He is truly really Present. But outdoors, in nature, He is spiritually there, and so you can connect with Him on a different level. Meeting Him in nature is like showing up at a friend’s house “as you are,” no need to get dressed up and be your best. (Although from the Masses I attend, people seem to take this attitude to Church.)

Going outside helps you to get outside of yourself. You get a shift in perspective. Hopefully, a perspective shift that causes a change in attitude.

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