Wild places have always lured us. Out there amidst timeless landscapes our attention comes back from irrelevant distractions to things that are real and meaningful. Inner qualities find reflection in the outdoors. Senses celebrate the sounds, colours, textures, smells of the living earth. One of the most endangered species of our times - the silence - finds her refuge here. The joy of simple experiences of being alive stayed living here too, close to the land. The range of movement and breathing widens: our bodies are reminded of something, intangible and ancient, that expands their inner spaces and makes everything more fluid. Reminded of the meaning of simple walking in an environment that is alive, and while walking speaking to the land we step on, meeting the wind in the trees, noticing the multitudes of other creatures that are hiding there among the bushes, on the branches, in the water. Acknowledging their existence is an act of paying attention first and foremost, but it is also an imaginative journey towards creating a contact, getting in touch in a deeper way with other Earthbeings inhabiting the planet. 

Any meeting is an act of courage. Whether you meet a human or an animal, to come out and see the other and be seen by them is a courageous leap into the unknown territory. But it is so for both sides: for an animal to come out and see us and really agree to be seen by us is a brave move. Without saying a word they ask if they can trust us. Can they trust that we have come to give our attention, and not to take from them. That our attention is of a more pure intention than a wish to know about them, to observe bits and pieces of them in a microscope on our way to solving this riddle of what life is all about...  For centuries the ambition to exercise our will on the world without asking what the world thought about it educated in us a certain kind of attention - that of consuming and dominating. Though we also know a different kind of longing: a longing towards mindful exploration, encounter, presence. This longing awakens a different kind of attention. The one that doesn't take but that gives. It offers itself as a gift to everyone and everything in its vision. It could be described as attention of a co-creator. Reciprocity.

We sculpt our lives through ways we pay attention. How and what we give attention to influences our awareness and imagination, empathy and courage, wishes and choices. With our choices we write our life stories in many tiny and large, conscious and not, life-long steps of self-creation. Which paths to pursue, and which to resign from? Where is a clear No and where a real Yes? What matters? 

Repetitive monotonous activities, over-specialized work, one-sided conclusions, four-walled rooms and four-cornered screens — there are lots of phenomena out there, which after a long-term engagement shrink our worlds to a tiny lodge. Our imaginations take shape of the buildings we live in, thoughts we think, objects we co-habitate with. Wild places, in turn, expand our outer and inner landscapes. They give us maps with which we trace and re-draw the contours of our interior geographies. Dissolving the boundaries, they remind us of multitudes of different ways of being in the world. There are many options. If only we come closer. 

Coming closer to a simple pine tree, we discover a pattern on its bark we haven't seen before. We notice another plant growing right at its roots, gently touching its trunk from both sides. We see how the green of its needles changes colour towards the edges. Every branch reaching upwards in a different way, each choosing a different shape to stretch and touch the sky. With every new discovery this pine tree stops being just a contour and gains a meaningful presence. The whole landscape grows to have new layers of meaning. Our interpretation of and engagement with reality around depends on our choices of attention, on what we notice and give importance to. As Mary Oliver said, “the world offers itself to your imagination, /calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting- /over and over announcing your place /in the family of things.” Our place in the family of things asks us to slow down, to reconnect to the inner compass and to notice life around through the lens of our sensuous perception, through our living bodies, and not (at least not only) through the beliefs or stories our culture passed on to us. Every story is just one of many possible stories, one part of a large web of viewpoints stretching back into time, tales of people searching to live meaningfully in a world that is our own, or could be our own... as a place of belonging, not possessing.  

To research and explore these subjects further together with us join our upcoming Woods in the City >> Urban Nature: a Journey of Re-wildening

We have always been attracted to forests. Real and imaginary. In the forest we recover our senses. Loves and fears - the magic of being alive. When we are in the forest we are somehow reminded of our own depth. Of multitudes and simplicity. We enter alone but find ourselves in company of so many. Everything finds its place in the forest. Trees. Mushrooms. Insects. Air. Plants. Rain. Animals. Storms. Heat. Lightening. Frost. Evenings by the fire. Birds. Berries. Songs. Pines. Smells after the rain. Silence. Rustle. Hills. Valleys. Sky hiding among the leaves. Quietness of snow falling. Squeaking under the feet. Innocence and spontaneity of animals appearing and disappearing among the trunks. Connectedness of everything. Everything follows their natural stirring. As many creatures as there are here - there are as many ways to live, on earth.

We can experience the motions of seasons in the forest particularly vividly. An unstoppable flow of rhythms and transitions. All creatures go with it. There’s no hierarchy between cycles, each is there for a reason. In human life there are seasons too. Our lives resist turning into a factory, manufacturing standardised people. Things always unfold within and around us continuously.  And things take time. All good things do. Time for buds, for warmth, investment, cherishing, nurturing. Time for flowers, for dances, plays, days, nights, sunlight, storms, clouds, wind. Time for fruiting, ripening, becoming, maturing. Time for releasing, letting go, offering, giving itself, decaying, decomposing, growing into something else.

The wish and raison d'être of Foresta is to invite you into a forest. One next to your house, or on the outskirts of your city. One that you grow on the balcony, or one inside of you. A forest of living creatures, of encounters, of experiences. And of stories, where through voices of others we might recognise bits and pieces of ourselves.