Just last week, we were taking a walk at Pine Island Flatwoods Preserve in Florida when we came across this tree.  It stood out, towering above the tall grasses, scrubby bushes, and saw palmettos.  I marveled at it’s curved shape, “a dancing lady,” I thought.  Knowing that hurricane winds have the power to change the shape of trees (We have seen the affects in hurricanes on the trees in a NH conservation area near our home.), and since we were in hurricane country, we surmised that this tree had been bent by strong hurricane winds.

Of course, I just had to replicate the shape of this tree as best I could.  (I’ve been known to do the same with public sculptures too!)   I tried to show the movement I saw in the shape of the tree in my body.  You can be the judge of my success or lack of success.  As I was being the tree, I started wondering about how the winds in our lives sculpt us, create something new of us?  How do we weather the storms?

I imagine all of us have weathered a storm or two or three and during the storm we are just hanging on for dear life.  Yes?  But when the winds subside, there we are, still standing.  We are marked by the event, perhaps on the outside, perhaps on the inside, and I would imagine, on both the inside and the outside.  A change on the outside also affects the inside, though it is not visible.  Take the tree for instance, it’s shape has changed from straight to curved on the outside and everything inside the outer surface has changed too.  

These changes we experience  aren’t necessarily a bad thing.  Sometimes, the winds open us up to new ideas, new ways of being, new awarenesses about ourselves that would not have happened without the stormy experience.  There in lies the gift.

The dancing lady tree was given a new shape, a more interesting shape.  I wonder how many people stop and marvel at her shape as I did?  Did they stop and notice that tree before its shape was sculpted by the wind?  I don’t know for sure, but I would guess it was noticed less when it was straight and tall.

So what does this have to do with anything?  For me it’s a reminder that life brings soft breezes and strong winds, good times and difficult times.  The fair weather days are a pleasure and must be savored and remembered.  They give us strength to confront the winds of challenging times and a vision for what can be on the other side of the storm. It’s the stormy times that transform us, sculpt us into someone new.    I know I would not be who I am today had it not been for the stormy times in my life?

Have you been shaped by the wind?  In what ways . . . ?

Many blessings,

Sandy