Subscribe | | Log in

Our Latest Treasure

Treasure in the New England Woods

Keeping on the Autumn theme, here’s another way to learn from leaves.

Treasure Hunters notice things other people miss. And when they notice them, they continue on and get curious.

It’s a huge part of Treasure Hunt, that simple ability to notice and get curious. They’re skills that we can practice so that when life doesn’t seem like a treasure, it’s easier for us to switch things around.

And when we engage all of our senses--including sound--we can help our brain to relax and become more open to the world around us.

Spend a couple of minutes watching (and listening to) this Treasure Hunt I found myself on in Massachusetts not long ago. And take a couple of minutes to notice the sounds around you. Become aware of them for the rest of the day.

Intentionally stopping to notice and get curious about your surroundings can help you train your brain to see treasures you’ve been missing and, over time, can help you become more present, relaxed and focused.

And that’s always a treasure!

How you can lose 10 pounds, travel all summer and turn into a leaf

yellow leaf 1

Take a minute or so to look at this wonderful child of the New England Autumn

  • What do you notice? What patterns are you seeing?
  • Do the swirls and whorls make you think of anything else?
  • How did this little leaf become this way?
  • How did it know to look like a birch leaf, and not a maple or oak leaf?

It’s all a matter of following some Simple Rules
Mathematicians and biologists talk about fractal formations, attractors and dynamical systems. From the leaf’s perspective it all boils down to:

Follow a few simple mathematical rules over and over again, and you’ll end up looking like a birch leaf.

As cells divide and shift and combine and mutate, they follow these simple rules, and over time you get a leaf. It is unlike any birch leaf that came before, but by following the same rules as all other birch leaves; it clearly is still a birch leaf.

And the brown swirls are all close cousins, if not brothers and sisters.

We call these oft-repeated mathematical principles, The Simple Rules.

Simple Rules govern our lives as well.
The tiny little rules we follow over and over again are both intimately familiar and mostly invisible to us.

Over time as we follow these rules we get something that looks pretty like our predictable life. I have a couple of powerful examples in my life from the past year or so:

My 43-year-old body was stuck at almost-fit-but-never-quite-there. Then, I noticed and got curious about my simple rule of walking to the store five days a week for a can of soda and a candy bar. I replaced it with popping a handful of nuts and raisins in my mouth and drinking a glass of water before heading to the store. And before too long, I changed the Simple Rule of I need my daily Coke to I don’t like sugared soda, it makes me ill. Lost 10 pounds like nothing at all.

A year ago I noticed a recurring thought: “Don’t Trust.” It would sneak in throughout the day, and without realizing it I was making lots of little decisions and taking lots of small actions grounded in not trusting. As soon as I noticed it, I got curious. What triggered it, what it led to, and what did it feel like? And, by playing around, I replaced it with the question, “what would I do if I were being BOLD?” Changed everything. Thousands of little actions later, I’m at the end of an amazing four-month summer on the East Coast, working on the road and visiting family and friends.

I used to look for the big fixes, or settled for the inevitable. Neither worked, neither was satisfying. Noticing my Simple Rules, getting curious about them, and playing have worked magic in my life, and in the lives of many Treasure Hunters out there.

What are your Simple Rules?

  • What’s a small thing you do over and over?
  • What’s a small thought that comes into your head on a regular basis?
  • What’s a familiar sensation or feeling you have?
  • What small patterns repeat again and again.

Just notice them, and get curious. There’s nothing to fix, nothing to change.

You can play with them, interrupt them, use them as triggers to start another simple rule. We’ll explore some ways to do that in other posts.

And for now just start with noticing and getting curious. Sometimes this is all you need to break free of a simple rule, and allow something larger and unexpected to emerge.

Have fun!

The Curious Case of Cackling Crows

I love taking long walks, noticing the world around me. By noticing and getting curious about the world around me (and the world inside my head) I find myself more peaceful, more aware, more open to the moment and to the treasures around me.

Cackling and cawing.

A flock of crows in the woods, flitting about, chatting with one another, seemingly oblivious to me or the cars on the road nearby.

crows on dead treeAre they just making noise because that’s what crows do? Is it some sort of basic, simple communication system? Or, are they talking about what to have for dinner, Gladys and Herman’s falling out, how well the kids are learning to fly and how brave some of them are in the corn field?

An ornithologist, I’m sure, could answer some of these questions—but right now I don’t care about the answer.

The questions and the curiosity are just too enticing.

For the first time in my life, I’m looking at crows and not thinking something like “if you’d just shut up I could sleep a little longer!”

Suddenly, in their mystery, they are interesting to me—and that makes life in this little sliver of time more interesting.

I may, when I get home, google ‘crows’ and find the answers to my questions. But for now, I’ll put down my paper and pen, look up, listen, and enjoy the wondrousness of the world when curiosity rules the roost.

(And here’s something extra curious: A group of crows is called a “murder.” This name came about because a group of crows will sometimes kill a dying crow.)

Notice. Get Curious.
Before you can get curious, you need to notice something. Otherwise, there’s nothing to get curious about!

You may notice something that’s shiny and new, or a movement in the distance, or a sound.

You may notice a thought in your head, or some words that come out of your mouth. Or words that come out of someone else’s mouth..

You can notice things in the physical world, in the spoken world and in the world of your mind.

And every time you notice something, you have the opportunity to get curious.

And that’s when the world gets a lot more interesting.

Your Treasure Hunt
This is a deceptively simple, incredibly powerful, and way-too-much fun practice that will get you “curiouser and curiouser.”

When you notice something, keep your attention on it and get curious.

When you notice your mind working, keep your attention on it and get curious.

Don’t try to understand anything. Don’t try to fix or change anything.

Notice. Get curious. Just look, see, listen, explore.

It really is that simple!

« Older Entries