The path not (yet) taken?

What different path through today might you be able to take? Why not give it a try?

This is a short post about the merits of taking the path not taken. Or not yet taken.

When faced with two choices, one familiar, tried and true, the other unknown, untested, which would you choose?

As of this past week, my wife and I are now into the 10th year of living in this particular part of East Sussex. We moved here nine years ago yesterday (Monday 21 July 2014 being the date of the big move). Relocating ourselves here was one of the best things we have ever done. In a way, moving to this part of the world was a leap into the unknown. I had never even heard of the township in which we now dwell until a few months before we chose to make our lives here. I am so glad we made that leap. I am thankful each day that we chose to take the path not yet taken.

This is a frequently beautiful part of the world. After nine full years, I often feel as though I know it like the back of my hand. Yet the familiar always, always has the capacity in it still to surprise you.

A tiny example… A few weeks ago, I took a route I’d never tried before on my early morning walk. In return for taking this path not yet taken, I was gifted a little voyage of discovery. The entrance to this particular route is innocuous and almost hidden by overgrown hedges, and consequently easy to overlook.

Yet this new route quickly turned into something unexpected. A surprisingly steep uphill path skirting the edge of dense and beautiful forest, running parallel to and at times crossing over small streams. The sharp uphill gradient of this winding path was demanding. But there was a delightful pay-off to this effort. Towards the point where this path rejoined one of my regular walking routes, I came upon the sight of the beautiful wall of moss in the picture above (although the picture does not successfully convey the height of this moss wall – easily a good head taller than me).

I was perfectly alone on this path not yet taken. It was also a rare moment of pure and perfect happiness.*

What different path through today might you be able to take? Why not give it a try?

May you be nothing but kind today, to others and to yourself.

May today be nothing but kind to you and yours.

FOONOTES

* Mind you, the path not (yet) taken might also involve risk. As it turned out, there was a mild level of risk involved in the walk described above. Shortly after arriving back from this walk, I had my heaviest attack of hayfever (so far) this year. Something is making me think it must be tree pollen to which I am allergic. But faced with the option of going back in time, I would still take exactly the route I took to and through that moment.

IMAGES

• Narcisse Virgile Diaz de la Peña – Path in the Forest – 77.138 – Museum of Fine Arts via Wikimedia Commons.
• Wall of moss photograph by MJCarty, 2023.
• Moss (169720327) via Wikimedia Commons.
• Paul Cézanne – Forest Scene (Path from Mas Jolie to Château noir) – Google Art Project via Wikimedia Commons.