The other day, I decided to try a new trail that’s near my tiny abode here in my little swath of the Midwest. It’s called Denmans Woods. And the most important thing I want to point out is that Denmans Woods trails were designed for mountain bikers. While anyone can use the trails, they are narrow and meandering and hard to share.
As I hiked the other night, headed to a geocache of course, I had to share the trail with mountain bikers. In the mile of hiking I did on the trail, I encountered several groups of people getting in an evening ride in the semi-cool July evening. Every single time, because the trails were so thin, I had to step into the brush to allow them to pass. But all of them called out to me and let me know they were approaching me. They were all polite. They all thanked me too for sharing the trail.
Perfect strangers embracing the fact that this world is all of ours to share.
When I doom scroll social medias these days, I am often reminded of Sebastian the crab in The Little Mermaid, who reminds Ariel that “the human world… it’s a mess.” But it’s encounters like these that remind me that perhaps, the human world isn’t as messy as we think it is.
Video below for that adventure over on my Tubes of You…. You can see how narrow the trails were in one clip.
We all have to travel different trails in life. Rarely are they just straight and narrow. Sometimes those trails meander and crisscross with the paths of others. Sometimes they just abruptly end and either it means we are done in life or it just means we have to backtrack and figure out what went wrong and what path we have to be on.
But one way is all we can go at any given time. We can’t just walk every path at the exact same moment. And there are times we don’t know where we are going (oh, hey, I wrote a blog post recently about that…..). Also remember, we must share the paths as well. We have to give those a “coming up behind you!” and thank those who get out of the way when they are slower than we are. We have to actually look up and see the people we encounter instead of just reading the stuff about them in our doom scrolls. We have to say hello and learn their stories as well.
Yes, the human world is a mess. And yes, it seems like it is getting messier each and every day. But we can all do something about it. Whether it is something as simple as looking at the people we encounter on a daily basis and seeing them for who they actually are, or standing up for the least of these by videoing yourself reading a simple Bible passage like Jen Hamilton recently did:
We can make this world less messier.
So stop with the doom scrolling as you walk your own trail. Start looking for the magic. Start finding the hope. Be the peace. Exude the joy. Share the love. Embrace the light. Read the red words. Start talking to your fellow man instead of seeing them just as others want you to see them. And give a heads up when you’re sharing the path!
Stay magical, friends.
Write your own story.
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And as always, #writeyourownstory
K. S. Wood Writes 
glad you enjoyed your hike Kelly! Glad those strangers were kind, and you all were able to share that hiking trail!
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