Author: Michael Smith
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Hope
Look at what’s going on around us. World events, greed, cynicism, hate and disinformation squeeze our capacity for hope into a narrow thing, almost hidden away. And yet hope is essential. We have to believe in the possibility of good things and good people. We must have some expectation that things could get better, and […]
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Gimme Shelter, 2022
“Oh, a storm is threat’ning My very life today If I don’t get some shelter Oh, I’m gonna fade away” — The Rolling Stones This is a day for shelter from the storm, and also for speaking up in resistance to that storm. Shelter so that the storm does not blow us away, and resistance […]
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Crows and Compass Plants at Tandy Hills
On a bright February afternoon, Tandy Hills Natural Area was a great place to walk through the prairie. A couple of hours of mindful awareness of limestone ridges, junipers, crows and compass plants was just what I needed. I put my phone away and, when my mind strayed, I brought it back to this moment with these grasses and these junipers. […]
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Introducing You to the Grasslands
We want you to spend time in nature and come away in love with the place. We want your kids to love the grasses, ponds and woods. “We” are the LBJ Grasslands Project, and so far that is Michael Smith and Kayla West. We think time spent in nature is important, and we’ll meet you […]
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“Letters to Nature Kids”
I’m adding something new: free, downloadable “Letters to Nature Kids” that I will write from time to time. As I noted on the page for this publication, we “don’t send letters so much any more, but a good letter can feel like part of a long-distance conversation, informal and personal.” The first issue is only […]
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In the November Woods
Hardly anything is finer than a green Forest Service gate opening onto trails that lead through the grasslands and oak woodlands of LBJ National Grasslands. Those meadows and woods change throughout the seasons, and each of those changes is beautiful. If I had to pick a favorite, it would be autumn (but ask me again […]
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Falling Deeper into Prairie Magic
Fields of grasses and flowers stretching into the distance pull me into some sort of enchantment. In late autumn and winter their colors and textures could keep me wandering for hours, with the sun glinting through the tufted seeds of little bluestem and the inflorescences of Indiangrass waving at the tops of tall and slender […]
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Being Open to the Benefits of Nature
We need nature. Flowing water, plants, sunshine or clouds, the simple sounds of birds and breezes. Research is confirming the substance of what most of us intuit: we are better when we spend time in nature – happier, healthier, freer from the darkness that clings to us when we are closed within our own contraptions. […]
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At Pedernales Falls
The Texas Hill Country is a beautiful region, and Meghan Cassidy and I finally got around to visiting it in mid-October. In our work on a forthcoming book on mindfulness in Texas’ nature, we have been to a lot of places around the “edges” of Texas but not the central region, dominated by the massive […]
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Mindfulness, Mountains & Snakes in the Big Bend
A few weeks ago, it was back to the Big Bend region with Meghan Cassidy for one of the last trips for the book on mindfulness in nature. I’ve made a number of trips there during the past twenty years, and my attachment to and fascination with that region keeps growing. I felt really fortunate […]
Our Lives In Nature 