What I learned about picking raspberries.
As the summer moves along, the flurry of activity at the ranch seems to grow. Although we have the animal care down pat, the garden is overflowing with veggies and our plans to host mini-markets and pickup sites for our deliveries continue to evolve, our experience bookings are increasing, we are continually hosting visitors at the ranch (some random, some planned) and already I am thinking about next year and the fall projects that need to get down in order for us to be ready for the 2024 season.
Last Tuesday was no different - another 5am start and didn’t stop until 5pm - and then exhaustion hit me. I couldn’t seem to stop my brain from circling through what felt like a million thoughts surrounding issues with marketing, party planning, newsletter ideas, problems with veggy storage and presentation, what do I make for supper tomorrow etc, etc, etc. How was I going to solve all of these problems?
So, I decided to change gears and head out for a ride to go check out a raspberry patch. Just me, a bucket, the breeze and fresh air. I was happy to see that the patches were overflowing with ripe, big, juicy, wild raspberries. I started picking and, within minutes, I was entranced in what I was doing, and all of those thought drowning my brain seemed to disappear. I lost myself in the process of picking.
Here is the cool part - when I was interrupted by a beep from my phone, ideas and solutions to those problems that I was thinking about before I left poured in!! I left the patch with several ideas to enhance our marketing, a newsletter topic, solutions for this weekend’s experience that we are hosting, a different way to clean and store veggies, and a plan for supper tomorrow. PLUS- a delicious basket of fresh wild raspberries!!!
Then it donned on me - I had altered my state of consciousness while I was picking. There is a whole school of thought around accessing altered states of consciousness to tap into healing and creativity. Both Rob and I have played around with techniques to enter a deeper state of mind and have found success healing or finding solutions to complex problems. This typically involves repetitive meditation and a lot of waiting.
Well - raspberry picking was much more efficient, productive and DELICIOUS!!
What could spending a morning in a raspberry patch do for you?
