Ep. 15 Nature Flirts as a Guru Principle

In this episode, CRR Global co-founder Faith Fuller and faculty member Janet Frood are back on the show talking about nature. Building on the idea of nature as an ally which was introduced in season 3, Janet and Faith explore nature flirts as a guru principle. Across the conversation they discuss:

• The notion of a guru principle and how it can reveal your mind to you
• Quantum flirts and how they can help us to be more aware and awake to things
• How nature flirts can open up portals for inquiry through sensory awareness
• What we can learn by embracing the full range of our experience with nature
• How can we create more space for the signals that nature is sending us? 

Faith Fuller is a co-founder of CRR Global. She is a psychologist and experienced trainer and coach, with over 20 years of experience in working with organizations, couples and communities. Faith takes a systems approach to coaching, namely that all aspects of the system need to be addressed in order for effective change to occur. Her particular skill is empowering powerful, productive and joyous relationships in couples, partnerships and teams. She also has a background in consultation, team building, conflict resolution and community crisis intervention.

Janet Frood is a faculty member at CRR Global and an internationally certified coach specializing in executive, leadership and team development. After 20 years of what Janet calls her “accidental” career, she made a big leap and completely changed my own career path. In 2005, she founded Horizon Leadership and dedicated her work to supporting leaders and teams on their journey. Janet’s inspirational work focuses on the human and relational dimensions of organizational life – cultivating the talent and resourcefulness of individuals and teams so they move towards their goals together.


For over 20 years, CRR Global has accompanied leaders, teams, and practitioners on their journey to build stronger relationships by focusing on the relationship itself, not only the individuals occupying it. This leads to a community of changemakers around the world. Supported by a global network of Faculty and Partners, we connect, inspire, and equip change agents to shift systems, one relationship at a time

We believe Relationship Matters, from humanity to nature, to the larger whole. 

Transcript

Key 

KC – Katie Churchman 

FF – Faith Fuller 

JF – Janet Frood 

[Intro 00:00 – 00:09] 

KC – Hello and a warm welcome back to the Relationship Matters podcast. We believe Relationship Matters, from humanity, to nature, to the larger whole. I’m your host, Katie Churchman, and in this episode I’m very excited to have Faith Fuller and Janet Frood back on the show to talk about nature. In season three we discussed nature as an ally, and in this episode we build on the conversation by exploring nature flirts as a guru principle. Across the conversation we discuss the notion of a guru principle and how it can reveal our minds to us; quantum flirts and how they can help us to be more aware and awake to things; How nature flirts can open up portals for inquiry through sensory awareness; What we can learn by embracing the full range of our experience with nature; How can we create more space for the signals that nature is sending us? Faith Fuller is a co-founder of CRR Global. She is a psychologist and experienced trainer and coach with over 20 years of experience working with organizations, couples and communities. Faith takes a systems approach to coaching, namely that all aspects of the system need to be addressed in order for effective change to occur. Her particular skill is empowering powerful, productive and joyous relationships in couples, partnerships and teams. She also has a background in consultation, team building, conflict resolution and community crisis intervention. Janet Frood is a faculty member at CRR Global and an internationally certified coach specializing in executive, leadership and team development. After 20 years of what Janet calls her accidental career, she made a big leap and completely changed my own career path. In 2005, she founded Horizon Leadership and dedicated her work to supporting leaders and teams on their journey. Janet’s inspirational work focuses on the human and relational dimensions of all organizational life, cultivating the talent and resourcefulness of individuals and teams so they move towards their goals together. So without further ado I bring you Janet Frood and Faith Fuller talking about nature flirts as a guru principle.

KC – Janet, Faith, welcome back to the Relationship Matters podcast, season four! 

FF – Wow, season four. 

JF – That’s amazing. 

KC – It’s been a while since we last spoke about nature together so I’m happy to be with you both today talking about nature flirts as a guru principle. So I’m very curious about this topic and what the title really means, so I wonder if we could start there? 

FF – Well, I think the thing to understand is what is, exactly, guru principles because it’s so easy to misunderstand that. A guru principle is simply anything that shows you your state of mind or makes you aware of your emotions or your thinking, anything that wakes you up to who you are being. So it doesn’t involve a guru as a person, guru’s as people can do that, of course, they can wake you up, good teachers can wake you up, doctors can wake you up, but in this particular application we want to talk about nature as something trying to wake you up. 

KC – Feels very enticing, I feel lured in by this call. 

FF – Well let’s entice more, yeah. So we can talk, let’s talk about what’s the best way to do that, to run into nature as guru. And one of the best roads is flirts and Janet, I’m gonna let you take over there. 

JF – Yeah, so if we think about quantum flirts and certainly we try and train it as part of the relationships systems intelligence of helping people become aware and awake to things, it really is that awareness, cultivating awareness. And it really is, you know, it’s, like a flirt is something that grabs your attention. It can be a sound, it can be a sight, it can be… 

FF – A smell. 

JF – A smell, but it’s very sensory, you know, flirts are quite sensory. And that’s why we think that the flirts with nature can be quite provocative because nature’s all a sensory channel. You know, and it’s very powerful that way. So, it really brings a consciousness, when you start to partner, dance with the flirt, it can start to bring to consciousness something that is maybe somewhere in your consciousness but it brings it to light, it brings it forward in a new way. And it’s very imaginal, you know, cause I think when I think of dancing with flirts it’s often what is trying to get my attention? What if I was that noise, how is that living with me? So you start to go into this deeper inquiry about self and awareness. 

FF – And I think flirts are relational. You can’t experience a flirt without connecting with something outside of yourself that is flirting with you. And there’s that wonderful book The Color Purple, forgive me, I cannot remember the author right now, and literally she says I think, the character in the book says I think when you walk by the color purple and you don’t notice, nature gets mad. So it’s very much the idea that the world is already trying to flirt with you. It’s sending colors and smells and beauty and horrendousness and scary things, and it’s up to us to meet it, to meet it, to pay attention, to find out what’s in there, what’s in the third entity between myself and a forest fire or the mosquito? So it’s relational and it’s an invitation to go deeper and to have profound and intimate relationship with the cosmos, with nature, and see what it wants to tell us. 

JF – So, we were dreaming into this a little bit to and thinking well what are some examples? Well, thunder. It scares me but again, it’s like where am I commanding attention as thunder? You know, it’s like how is that in me? Or a forest fire or a hurricane, how am I raging, you know, the rage is all I’m witnessing but how am I raging? If it was an inquiry, it’s offering me an inquiry moment. You know, a plant wilted and it’s like where am I wilting in my life? 

FF – Or it could be applied to the larger system, that’s the me system, or it also could be wow, you know, how is the United States or North America or any other place raging right now? Forest fires or dying or drought, or how is it an analogy, a metaphor for the larger systemic things that are happening in our world? 

KC – I loved the wilting plant example. I have a peace lily who’s very temperamental, and she definitely has a personality so if I don’t water her she’s so stroppy. I’ll turn my back after watering her and suddenly she’s there and that reminds me, if I haven’t eaten I’m exactly the same. I’m very stroppy. So it’s interesting you mentioned that example because there is so much personality and life in nature when we look for it, but often we’re not. 

JF – And I think, when we allow it to be a mirror and a place of inquiry, you know, even to see something that I don’t like in nature and it’s like how might that be part of myself as well. The thing that I reject. And it’s like what if this is something for me to learn from in this moment as well. 

FF – Well when you say that Janet I’m just struck by, nature brings us to our edges often. Sometimes it’s delightful, like I have this brilliant salmon-colored maple in my backyard right now which is more than just flirting with me, it’s a positive strip tease with its… you know, but where do I get edgey If there’s a dead deer that’s decomposing on my trail, you know? What edge does that bring me to? What’s that about? Or spiders that are scary, it brings us to our edges so there’s an invitation to what’s at that edge? And again, it’s relational, you can’t get there without the spider, you can’t get there without that forest fire bringing it to your awareness, and that’s guru principle. 

JF – Yeah. 

KC – I think my understanding of guru principle and as it relates to nature is it was going to bring us more presence, but I realize that’s still focusing just on us and not the relationship. Nature does more than just bring us back to ourselves and presence, it shows us parts of ourselves perhaps that we haven’t even recognized or acknowledged before, would you say? 

FF – Absolutely. Yeah. And we all know perfectly well this time that nature has a lot to say back. You know, there are a number of disasters in the world with forest fires and hurricanes, nature is talking loudly. And it’s like it’s talking and talking and talking and sort of turned away thinking of other things, or, how do we manage it? You know? How can we tamp down this problem? It’s not relational at all, it’s abusive, frankly. 

JF – And that notion of the third entity that we create with nature in those moments in time, you know, it’s sort of like, I think that that piece is quite profound. Especially when we’re living in a time of a climate crisis, the planet is changing, and it’s sort of the overwhelm that people are feeling of I don’t know what to do and I think the first level in so much of the client action work that I’m starting to pay attention to is saying first and foremost, it’s such a grand issue that it is hard to process but when we can come into our own relationship with nature and what is happening around us and how that lives in us, that is the first sense of you know, where you can act from. If I’m completely disconnected and I don’t cultivate love and care or relationship with the earth and the land and the world around us, then I won’t take action. So there’s something about, there’s that intimacy of connection but it’s that commitment to be in relationship is the vital place that we need to pay attention. And, as Faith was saying, there’s flirts happening all around us, we’re being called to attention all the time and so are we willing to turn and nod and be in relationship or are we turning away at these moments? 

FF – Yeah. And I love what you’re saying Janet in the sense of we, you know, the research is showing actually that all of the death and doom data about the distruction of the world doesn’t seem to shift people. In fact, it makes us anxious and afraid and guilty and then we turn away because we don’t wanna feel that way. But when you fall in love with something in your garden you nurture it, you fertilize it, you go out and trim it, you love that thing so you take care of it. So it starts in your backyard. Can you find something that you love in your household? Your peace lily, your whatever. And start with something that pulls your heart into relationship and you won’t take care of that which you love, and hopefully that which we love can hopefully expand into something more than just our personal garden. 

JF – Yeah, I have a little story, this just happened this week where, so I live in Canada, we’re starting to, we’re in fall but we’re starting to get snow and our garden has been in it’s kinda de-constructing mode, but we’ve had these gerbera daisies that I planted in the spring and I love them because they’re so vibrant and strong and bold, and I looked outside and there was snow and there’s still three gerbera daisies standing tall and bright and I’m like wow, you’re feisty! And I thought, and it was really this interesting thing of like, you know, because it’s cold and everybody’s retreating, and yet it’s like this motion of but I still stand strong, and it, well I used it as a flirt moment and it’s like even when things are dying off or getting cold and retreating, where am I still standing strong and bright? 

FF – I love it. 

JF – And it was really potent, so it was, yeah, they were flirting with me for sure. 

KC – That’s beautiful. 

FF – Well, the other thing that I’m thinking of is, you know, the larger context of what we’re talking about is how can we be in better and reciprocal relationship where we care for nature as well as recognizing that, frankly, nature is caring for us. And you know, I think there’s also a sense of distance from nature that we, there’s us and then there’s nature, as if we’re different. And frankly that’s absurd. Everything is nature. The atoms in your computer screen is nature, they’re natural, the stars out in the sky are nature, you, I, we are nature. And we’re, it’s not separate from us, it’s in us all the time. And part of my desires that I think would help us all is if we could blur that sense sometimes of that distinct I’m a person, I’m a thing, you know, and I have a boundary, and all caught in the space in this, but If I can relax into my own, I’m, you know, my breath is intermingling with nature, I’m breathing the oxygen of the trees and sending out, you know, carbon dioxide. There’s actually a constant movement back and forth between nature and ourselves and we need to loosen up that boundary. And the more we listen the bigger we get as nature becomes an aspect of our own identity. Did that make sense? 

KC – It really did! And I was thinking about how separate we feel from other people, let alone nature, and one thing that really helped sort of crack open the door for me around that was I heard on a podcast someone said that the patterns of nature are repeated on us everywhere, so on our fingertips we have the patterns like the galaxies, and our veins, they’re like estuaries or the roots of a tree. I’d never thought about that before, that the patterns of nature are very much within us and on us and a part of us, and I think many of us do think about ourselves as separate. 

FF – And there’s a terrible poverty in that because I’m all alone. When we are surrounded by nature which is desperately trying to get our attention, sometimes by burning down our house, you know, but sometimes by that gorgeous tree or gerbera daisy in your backyard. We don’t have to be lonely, it’s all out there waiting for connection. 

JF – So I think it does beg the question are we cultivating relationship with nature? When and when the flirts come, you know, from the natural world, are we actually willing to pay attention? One thing that I’ve discovered is we do need to, I think all flirt work requires us to slow down to notice. So, you know, just that basic inquiry which is what am I noticing in this moment? And because I think that is, it’s a dream door into the relationship and so I noticed last night, I was out walking in the forest and I went, I was pulled to go aside because I could tell there was a vibrant sunset. It was orange and pinks, it was really stunning but at this time of year the sunsets vert quickly. So I wanted to go and see the colors and then they faded very quickly and so I was with the dog and we were walking, she had an agenda, she wanted to go to the forest but it was dark, and you know entering into the forest, and it’s a place I love and I know it well and yet it was dark, and all of a sudden other parts of me started rumbling because I’d gone from this vast, really gorgeous beauty moment into ooh, it feels a bit dangerous and what if the cayotes come, oh I have to keep the dog closer to me because you know, she might not be safe, and where I walk really with a lot of ease usually, I can’t see where I’m stepping and if I fall, like all of this stuff started coming up. And so, Faith, it really made me think about this notion of deep democracy with nature. And you know it’s sort of oh my beloved forest, it’s where I go, I’m so grounded, it’s like the airy and beautiful, but last night was a reminder that it can be dangerous and scary and unexpected here, even in something that’s familiar. So it was a really good reminder of the dimensionality of it. 

FF – And brining you straight into your edges. 

JF – Yes. Big time. 

FF – Yeah. Absolutely. But that’s the gift in that experience, it’s not just all beautiful sunsets, it’s also that oh my god, it’s showing me my mind when I’m in the dark and the fears that can surround me or, you know, I’ll share a personal moment also around that which is I have cancer. Cancer. It’s part of nature. It’s a natural part of my body. It’s not a separate thing over there and it’s getting me, it’s a natural expression of my body in some way and yet it is so easy to other-ise it. No, over there, that’s not me. But it is me. It’s part of my selves. 

KC – How does that change your relationship with the cancer then, seeing it as part of you instead of this other thing? 

FF – Well, it creates relationship with it. You know. I can ask myself, you know, and I can extend my imagination into the cancer. What is it that is growing there? What does it mean that those particular cells don’t wanna die? What does it mean that it can move around or change. All of those can become inquiries for my own development or inquiries for how this is a mirror for society right now. How is it true for my marriage or my country or the evolution with nature right now. So it’s a dream door that you can move into and it’s no longer an enemy, it’s a conversation. So it’s not who’s doing what to me, you know, what the cancer’s doing to me, it’s a conversation with the cancer and what can I learn? 

JF – And so Katie, the notion of guru principle, it shows you your mind. And so this notion of, and again, it’s that frame because cancer could be something to be feared, forbidden, I don’t want to be in relationship with it, but what changes when that natural system is actually having, it’s working? Like in this case it’s working in Faith but it’s working the bigger systems around her in the world as well. 

FF – You bet. You don’t have cancer by yourself. It involves partners, teams and family… 

JF – It’s a relationship system! 

FF – So this little cluster of selves is having a gigantic natural impact on the mangula of my life. In many, many ways. And that’s nature waking us up. 

JF – And we started thinking about it a little bit through the meet, reveal align and act. So, especially so if we have this whatever the flirt is from nature, so again, it’s something to notice, so meet it. Then we need to feel it and so what is here for me to learn from this flirt? The inquiry. Lean into it, dream into it, explore it, co-create with it. And notice that in the reveal it’s like we need to hold space for you, you can’t rush through it. One little flirt can open up this magnificent portal to inquiry in ways that we would never go, and as we say maybe take us over some edges on the issues. And then when we look at the align and act, then it’s like so with this awareness what am I going to do and what action, what will the action look like with this? 

FF – How will I take back what I’ve learned in this encounter into my life? 

KC – This is a whole part of the conversation I wasn’t expecting to happen here or have, because I think I thought relationship with nature meant all the nice parts of nature that I wanna have a relationship with, but actually there’s always bits that we sort of ignore. And actually I was recently in Mexico for my brother’s wedding and my gosh, I loved that part of nature and the beaches and the sunshine, and then got back to the UK and it’s getting dark at 4 and it’s raining and it’s cold, and that’s interesting, like what is that mirror revealing about me? And there’s probably, maybe, more in the parts that aren’t so easy to accept with open arms for me to learn, perhaps. I don’t know if that’s what you hold to be true, but that’s a harder part of nature for me to lean into as relationship. 

FF – I love what you’re saying because I think what true intimacy is is real dialogue. And if you think about, you know, any real relationship in your life there’s good times and bad times and fights and moments where you don’t get along very well and then you get through it, and you know, it’s like that with nature too I think, what can we learn from the whole full range of our experience with nature? And let it be a powerful ally that wakes us up. 

JF – Faith, you told me a one time about you and a spider. You said you had a spider, I think in your garage, and you did not like this spider. So, can you tell that story? 

FF – Yeah, sure. So, I actually had a black widow in my garage, right on the garage door, and it was totally identifiable, bulbous body, shiny back, beautiful to tell you the truth, when I wasn’t terrified! And it had the red hourglass, you know, and what’s interesting is it tends to position itself in a place where you can see the red hourglass, it’s letting you know I’m a black widow. And my mind went apeshit. It was like oh my god, it’s a black widow, what if it bites one of the dog's, what if it bites me, it’s dangerous, what if it has babies. And I have images of the entire garage filled with billions of black widow spiders, my brain just went bonkers. In about two seconds, all that rolled out of my head. And the immediately impulse is I gotta kill it, it’s scary, it’s scaring me. And I did it, I stayed my hand, you know, and I just said I’m gonna stay it for today, I’m not making any decisions. And every day I’d go out there and trust me, I’d never walk out into the garage without looking for it and finding it, but I watched again, perfect guru principle, I watched my mind go through its tricks around this and every time I just managed to say my hand because I was so enthralled with what I was learning about myself. And basically it stayed there about two, two and a half months, I saw it multiple times a day and then one day I came out and something else had eaten it, you know, it wasn’t there, there was a couple of legs there and that was it. Something else had eaten it. But that spider taught me more about my fear of the, you know, the things that could happen to me with nature, and my immediate sort of malevolent homicidal-ness over if it’s making me uncomfortable it has to die, and that’s how we are with ants and whatever, you know, and I’m not saying never trap the ants in your household, of course we do but it could be a little bit more conscious rather than knee-jerk, there’s a spider, kill it. So just make yourself aware. It doesn’t mean you have to change your pattern immediately, just become aware and see what will emerge from that relationship. 

KC – Wow. That’s an amazing example of what that mirror can teach us. 

FF – Yeah. 

KC – Yeah, I think I do knee-jerk kill the spiders in my house and they’re not black widows so I think I have a lot to learn. 

FF – Well, and again, it’s not about oh my god, suddenly I have to… we have to be people. Sometimes I wipe those ants out because I don’t want ants all over my kitchen, but it’s not quite as reflexive to kill the inconvenience weed that’s in the middle of my pretty patch of garden. Just become a little more aware. 

JF – It’s making me think of, recently been on a driving trip and we drove a part of highway where there were a number of deer that had been hit. And it wasn’t just one, it was one and then another and another, so it was like carnage, it was, and paying attention to, there was a part of me that was like oh that’s horrible. And then each time, you know, starting to be more like this is a lot of carnage and what’s going on with this? Like what are they fleeing? And it was more about them. And then I was like what is this telling me about where might I be going too fast that actually hitting things and not even observing, and that was the switch where it was like out there and then it was like there’s something for me to pay attention too in this very brutal, you know, death and it was so horrible to see but it woke me up to another inquiry that I could use to explore something. 

FF – Yeah. Powerful. You know I was just thinking for a moment Janet, that if we were to sort of give people just an incredibly simple map, what are some of the ways we might go about if you encounter, you know, a ground squirrel on your garden is eating your tomatoes which also made me homicidal… squirrel-acidal… if we were just to go through very lightly, what are some of the steps people can take to connect with the flirts of nature? 

JF – I think it’s, you know, you notice flirts when you slow down, so one of the base practices is even allowing yourself that time to go outside. I would suggest sitting in stillness and sitting in a place, so there’s a practice called sit spot which is a form of, in a way it’s a bit of a meditative format, but sitting in the same place over time for maybe 20 minutes at a time where you start to get to know the place and the different types of nature elements that are there, and start to see them and start to see, you know, allow yourself to be open to a flirt and to, but to start to cultivate the practice of slowing down enough and being in a place where you can do that. So I think that’s just a basic, basic practice. 

FF – That’s great. Yeah. So be open, let it come in and then hold it in gentle inquiry in terms of what it might have to offer you. And you know, I just want to say one thing because I’ve run into this with people with flirt work, and that’s where somebody sort of says but wait a minute, this is just all my imagination, this isn’t really nature, this is just me making stuff up, and the answer is well yes, that is true, you are making stuff up but you wouldn’t be making stuff up unless you had encountered that mosquito, or that beautiful tree. Or you weren’t threatened by that hurricane. You wouldn’t be making these things up if you weren’t entered into relationship with something, so it’s a true third entity experience. So trust what comes to you, trust what comes to you, whatever comes to you has got a message for you and let it unfold that way. 

KC – I think the step I’m most curious about bringing more of to my life is the being open because life is very busy. And I heard from a Buddhist master, someone asked him why do you meditate and his answer was well, to see the pretty flowers on my way to work or something like that, but I wonder about the openness, not just about the flowers but for everything and half the time I really am head down, listening to a podcast and not really focused on what’s around me. How do we be more open when we’re busy and we’ve got back to back calls and maybe not even much time outside in nature? 

JF – Well, and I think that that is the piece where, so we’re all sitting in an environment, I don’t know if you can see nature or anything that is from the natural environment around you Katie, I know, I intentionally positioned my screen in front of a window so I’m often looking out and I can’t tell you how many times something will be happening out there, so it’s a flirt from nature that informs something that’s going on in here, either with me or what I’m coaching. 

FF – It comes to fetch you. 

JF – It does, and it’s like, so I see oftentimes, you know, I have trees outside so squirrels will jump from branch to branch and they are so freaking brave, and it’s like taking this leap and you’re just like, I am oftentimes going ah! It just lands and it moves on, but it’s that willingness to take a risk and jump, and honestly how that has helped me do inquiry even with a client, of just saying so where are you willing to take a risk on this? 

FF – And also, Janet, you’ve a dozen stories of, this is a practical skill we can use with your couples, with all your systems, with your teams, with all your organizations, and Janet you’ve done a lot of work with nature as co-coach, could you talk about that a little bit? 

JF – Yeah, so when I’m working with teams, sometimes what I will do, I intentionally now, wherever I can, try and take people to spaces where if we cannot be outside we actually can look inside, so natural light, big windows, so that we can actually bring in even some of nature’s influence. But oftentimes if they’re working on an inquiry, an issue, a challenge, dreaming into their future, I might say you know, figure out what that topic is and I will take them out to nature and ask them to go and wander and just to notice flirts, what catches their attention. And, you know, to do even a little record of it and then to bring that back in terms of awareness. And I may, in fact, ask them to bring something, a physical element from nature back into the room and literally to share their insights on the topic and then bring that item into, oftentimes it ends up being created almost like a sculpture, we’ll lay it down and something gets co-created and then boom, nature is in there, so we’ve brought wisdom and insight but then there’s a sculpture from nature’s elements that actually are part of now the reveal of their system. And they tell a story about themselves and the issue just by using the sculptural elements of nature to tell the story of what’s emerging, what’s evolving from that issue. 

KC – Just brilliant. 

FF – And I, one of the things I love about that is we know teams are always, most of the teams I’ve worked with are exhausted, they’re always in production, Covid, you know, threw them through a loop, they are always being asked to do more, produce more, there’s never enough resources, and allowing someone to wander out and find something in nature opens them up to imagination, to creativity, to essence dreaming, and it’s naturally refreshing for teams to not have a, you know, a product they have to produce immediately, but just to wander and put the inquiry out. And I had one wonderful and weird experience where I was coaching a team and they actually asked us to coach around management issues, but the particular topic we were working on one afternoon was market share, how could you get more market share and, you know, I didn’t know that much from market share, I didn’t need to know that much from market share, I don’t need to be an expert in market share, but we sent them out just like Janet said, find something that suggested something to you from nature, that suggested something about market share. They all went out because they have their own wisdom and knowledge inside them and nature worked with them and they brought things back that allowed them to more creatively look at market share. So all we had to do was create the structure for them to find their own wisdom and nature truly was the coach to connect them with what they didn’t know they knew. 

KC – I wanna underline that, didn’t know they knew, because so much of what you’re saying here, it doesn’t feel like this new thing that we have to start trying, it’s very much innate and within us. And I know that when I ask clients what’s the pattern that you’re bringing to this session they get it, and we see it in literature all the time, I remember when I was at school everyone got obsessed with the idea of pathetic fallacy and we all learned that term and it was the thing you put in your essay, oh, it’s a pathetic fallacy, it’s stormy and then there’s anger in the relationship, but we know this and we all know it from a very young age, actually, that the storm is angry and how actually we can turn to that again. Not just in the personal but in the professional self that you’re bringing this in with teams because they probably need it more now than ever given how fast the pace of life is. 

JF – It’s particularly powerful when teams or relationship systems are stuck in consensus reality and to get them to go into dreaming, and literally nature, the nature, you know, human connection is very essencey and allowing people to go there and it’s the imaginal, and the dreaming then comes from that. People, I have witnessed people who don’t like speaking on issues and they’re quite quiet and they become like poets when they start to speak from the inspiration of nature. 

KC – Wow. That’s amazing. 

JF – They find something that is in them that they can speak and talk about this notion of resonance and common humanity and like accessing a point, it’s deeply profound to see, you know, and then the emotional field, the dynamic can shift to what’s possible instead of like this is the way it is. So it’s, literally if you get stuck there it’s a magical and fast way to get people out of consensus reality. 

KC – And do you think that is because people are connecting to something that is bigger than themselves? You know, they come into the meeting and they’re worried about themselves and then suddenly there’s this expansion. 

JF – And literally they breathe. They can breathe in a different way. 

FF – They can breath in a different way, but just to change that language slightly, it’s not so much that they’re getting in touch with something bigger than themselves, they are getting in touch with their bigger self. 

KC – Oh gosh, I love that, 

FF – Nature isn’t separate. They are opening up to the hugeness of their own nature that was always there the whole time. And they broke down that barrier and allowed it to enter. 

JF – It makes me think of, we talk about being naturally creative and intelligent, it’s the innate intelligence that is deeply in people and nature and that channel of communication. 

KC – So when you’re in that bigger space of self, do you find it easier to hold life’s really challenging questions, say existential crisis and all those kind of mysteries that as humans we struggle sometimes to hold? 

FF – Yeah. For me I think what it does, again, it expands my identity, I’m also holding so tightly that the weave of my character loosens and I can expand, and it’s sort of like the difference between if you have a hurricane in four square miles of space it’s devastating. If you can imagine the same energy playing out over a vast ocean with all the room in the world it’s not so devastating. So a lot of times I feel like I’m that hurricane in, you know, two square miles, but when I connect with nature and relax and expand my boundary, that fullness of my nature has a bigger space to play out in, it doesn’t seem so catastrophic. 

JF – And I, can I give another example? 

FF – Please. 

JF – Very recent. Because it is around the bigger self. I was working with a leader who, it was becoming quite clear that she was craving some chaos in her organization. We’d been coaching the leadership team and some really hard things had been spoken and so I reached out to her and I said come see me, and we sat in my backyard and I purposely sat her around, I had a fire going, and it was like, because I realized there was something, there was like this spinning energy in her, so remember it’s fall here, and she sat and talked and she was just like this crazy energy and just talking so fast, the leaves were whirling around her, literally. And so, and once she had kind of, and she calmed and all I said was do you notice the leaves? And she’s like yes. And then she calmed, and I said so what do you make up about those leaves and what they’re maybe telling you? And she literally was like oh my gosh, I am a whirling dervish and I’m creating energy all over the place. And then she just sort of paused and then she did, they stopped the whirling and I said to her what just happened? Like it was really doing emotional fieldwork but literally, the flirt being the guru to her and she’s like I need to slow down, I need to be more grounded, I need to be more conscious of the energy that I’m creating and I need to own it. And the conversation completely shifted from that plane, her awareness completely shifted and the action she was able to take from that was both gentle towards herself and yet courageous by owning impact too. 

KC – Wow, that’s an amazing story Janet. 

FF – That’s a great story. 

JF – So it’s also, so I would say, that’s the instinct I have or just encouragement of if anybody doing, whether it’s with teams or individuals, we also have to coach their relationship system as well, it’s like when we try to take them into a natural environment and use the questions, the inquiry from nature to help guide and see what’s available, but if the family brings awareness that can change. 

FF – And a refreshment of some, somehow, because you’re out of consensus reality. 

JF – Exactly, yeah. 

KC – It seems to have offered more clarity in that example, like the glasses were taken off and that individual could see it in a different way, in a different light. 

FF – Well I was just gonna say that we often, once you become sensitized to paying attention to flirts it’s like a fire hose, they’re there all the time, there’s always something wanting to flirt with you! And you know, it’s about finding your way of ok, that’s enough flirts for now but it does open up a creative conversation with the world that can bring you in so much information to whatever degree you can absorb. And it’s there all the time, you didn’t make it up, it’s always there, you just didn’t notice. 

KC – You make me think, my local park would be much more interesting if you have those glasses on and seeing all those flirts compared to when I’m head down running my 5K loop, I wanna go in with some Faith and Janet glasses tomorrow and see what I see and see what I feel and learn about myself too! 

JF – You know it’s sometimes you have to also, you know how we talk about channel switching in the work, sometimes I’ve discovered we’re so visual so I close my eyes and when I close my eyes I start to hear things and I feel things around me in a different way. You know, so I think it’s also be aware to cultivate the sensory elements of us so that we can have the relationship with nature and receive all its wisdom, we actually have to cultivate our sense, so sometimes touching. I don’t know how many pictures exist of me being at a tree sniffing it or putting my hands on it or putting my cheek on rough bark, Faith, even you and I when we were together, I have a picture of you and you’re like right up to the tree and you’ve got your face right on it, you know, and it’s like cultivating different ways of having that sensory experience opens the channel even wider. 

KC – So, thinking about nature flirts as guru principle, is there one flirt that stands out in your lives that taught you something that was quite profound and maybe life changing? 

FF – I would have to say it was my spider. It was pretty powerful, so that black widow spider for me just was, it wasn’t a flirt it was a two-by-four. 
 
 

JF – Yeah, and I would say for me I had a pretty profound experience a few years ago where I learnt about, you know, when trees fall in the forest and they die, they’re dying, but how they’re decomposing and yet they are becoming nutrients for other plants and oftentimes another plant species or tree species will grow from that tree, so it really was like woah, am I in a stage in life where I’m no longer growing to be the big tall tree and taking up space but rather laying down and getting out of the way and cultivating and helping develop in a different way. So from a life transition moment of sort of, and they’re apparently called nursery trees and so they nurture the forest floor literally with new growth, so metaphorically it was really profound and made me be aware I’m shifting into a new life stage literally, my work may be changing to look different now because of that. 

KC – That’s beautiful, and it also talks to how interdependent we are. 

JF – And inclusive. You know, welcome to diversity instead of fighting it. Creating like literally a safe landscape for new things to grow, and also I mean other things will come in and try and break it apart, that’s what nature is, it’s the fullness of it all. 

KC – I think you’ve both inspired, well certainly me and many of our listeners to get out and listen and look and hear and feel, using all of our senses in a different way, in a heightened way. What was that you said, so that we can feel how big we really are. 

FF – Yeah, yeah. Expand our consciousness to the whole globe. 

KC – Thank you both, this was a glorious conversation and I can’t wait to have you back on for part three, four, five, it’s endless where we can go with nature really isn’t it. 

FF – Thank you Katie, thank you Janet, a huge pleasure. 

JF – Yeah, it was wonderful and yes, thank you for helping spread the word of the power of nature and its flirts as guru and guide and teacher for all. 

KC – Thank you both, take care. 

[Music outro begins 43:36] 

KC – I want to say a big thanks to Janet and Faith for opening up my mind around my relationship with nature. Here are some of my key takeaways from this episode. Quantum flirts help us to become aware and awake to things. They’re those things that grab your attention, it could be a sight, a sound, a smell and they’re very sensory. And flirts with nature can be quite provocative because nature can awaken all of our sensory channels. When we start to partner, to dance with the flirts, it can start to bring to consciousness something that was maybe in the back of your consciousness and it brings it to light, it brings it forward in a new way. Nature flirts are very imaginational and relational, you can’t experience the flirt without experiencing something outside of yourself that’s flirting with you. The world is already trying to flirt with you, it’s sending you colors, smells and even scary things, and it’s up to us to meet it and see what it’s trying to tell us. Being in relationship with nature starts in your back garden. When you fall in love with something in your garden it’s an opening that can help us to be in more conscious and intentional relationship with nature. Everything is nature. We are nature. Nature isn’t something that’s out there, it’s in all of us and it’s a part of us at all times. Seeing ourselves as a part of nature will help us to create relationship with it and one of the easiest ways to do this is through slowing down. Thank you for listening to the Relationship Matters podcast. If you enjoyed this episode please share it with your colleagues and friends so that we can continue to spread these ideas across the globe, and if you haven’t already, do subscribe wherever you get your podcasts to make sure you never miss an episode. And for more information on the ORSC courses please visit CRRGlobal.com. For over 20 years, CRR Global has accompanied leaders, teams, and practitioners on their journey to stronger relationships by focusing on the relationship itself, not only the individuals occupying it. This leads to a community of changemakers around the world. Supported by a global network of Faculty and Partners, we connect, inspire, and equip change agents to shift systems, one relationship at a time. We believe Relationship Matters from humanity to nature to the larger whole. 

[Music outro 46:19 – end]