Aetherias Moon

I’m sitting out in nature with a pen and paper writing this. It’s a little cold and the trees have yet to bloom, but I still think it’s beautiful (and there are no bugs). I remember sitting out in the park writing the pinnacle of my novel. A girl jumping into the abyss to save a baby dragon. My favorite song was playing (Furlm by Callasoiled) and I was hidden on a bench out on a nature trail. There is something unforgettable about that moment. The song, the warmth, the greenery, my favorite moment in that book. Perfection. It can be hard to find the right spot to write in, but once you do, it’s such a wonderful environment to be creative in.

I’ll be honest, nature has helped me create most of my short stories and novels. I don’t know how many times the origin of my stories have come to me when I let my mind wander out on a hike. There is something majestic about walking in nature that gets the mind working. Walking in general helps my brain understand things. I get sort of antsy and excitable when I’m in the midst of creation and walking helps me get out that nervous energy. 

What’s beautiful for me is the way that the trails I walk have been painted by the stories I imagine. I see my favorite bench in the woods and think of the time I figured out a big moment for my character. It makes me love the trails even more. I’m naturally more of a discovery writer, so outlining is difficult for me, but something about nature helps get the stream flowing. 

My life isn’t only about writing (though sometimes it feels like it) and when I need to work through something, nature is comforting. I’m not going to say that walking in nature is a miracle cure, for it doesn’t make my anxiety and depression go away per se, but it helps. It is a coping skill for me. It nourishes the soul, which nourishes my creativity. I don’t think there is a better backdrop for working through something than watching trees and streams pass you by. It helps me think; it helps me breathe; it helps me live.

I had about two years of the worst depression of my life. I wanted to do nothing but lie in bed and daydream about stories all day. I had a lot going on in my life around that time that made my depression so bad, but even when those issues went away, I couldn’t climb out of the pit I was in. I couldn’t write, I couldn’t imagine what my life would be. 

But one day I found the forest. 

Suddenly I had something to look forward to every morning. I would wake up, eat breakfast, take medicine, and go out on a walk. I would come home, eat lunch, and go out on a walk again. It was healing; it became my purpose, and in that time, the forest was everything to me. Then slowly but surely, things started to change. And I won’t say that the massive amount of therapy I got wasn’t a major catalyst in that change, but going out and seeing that there was something worthwhile around me certainly helped my worldview.

I couldn’t write for a long time, but eventually the seed of a novel was planted in my mind as I walked through the forest. As I continued to step through the foliage day by day, a novel slowly took form in my mind. I started to write again, nature as my guide. And now that novel is finished, and it is colored by those days in the forest, both warm and cold.

I think if you like to write, try writing out in nature. Bring a pen and paper (a laptop if you’d like), look out at something beautiful and see where your mind takes you. If you don’t like to write, then I think you should purchase a journal (I’m obsessed with journals and think everyone else should be too) and write down your thoughts while listening to the swaying of the trees. If you’re feeling a little lost and all of those things seem difficult, just take a moment outside. Even if you don’t walk, just look up at a tree and remember that they exist. That they let you breathe. Take a breath of that sweet air and find yourself again.

Though I love sitting at home, being a couch potato as I write, some days I have to go outside. Those days are more memorable to me because of it. 

The forest I love, colored by my worlds, is the most beautiful thing to me. Happy writing,

-Aether

An excerpt from what I wrote that day in the forest:

We have to go, Taya mouthed. Rezrin glanced back and watched as the youngling scrabbled at the edge and fell. And it was falling. Rezrin knew deep down from all her days helping the younglings at home that one didn’t know how to fly. 

Rezrin ripped her fingers from Taya and ran when there was purchase and fell when there was not. She reached the edge, falling out into reddish purple ending in gray below. She saw the youngling tumbling end over end without a plan into the abyss. She pulled her body in until she was a dart falling head first. She angled herself without thinking; the wind carved around her, egging her forward, until the dragon was paces away. 

She pulled back, watching the chaotic spiral of limbs. The air told her secrets, and she dove, fingers outstretched, inch over inch as the dragon’s back tilted up to her.

Her fingers caught around the ridge on their back, latching on, forming a connection. She sent a memory of flight. Thousands of flights on different wings with different names, all carving themselves into the wind until the air was theirs, inside and out, until the ground was a useless tether. They remembered soaring.