Valuing Paths Less Traveled

Seeker's Psychology

Euclid implies the straightest path between two points is also the quickest, but psychology offers very different testimony. I've learned some unusual life lessons by treading the vast, uniquely beautiful southern California acres of Lucky Six Farms. Case in point: threading my way through the thick, often thorny brush so typical of the high desert landscape. How should we go about finding the best paths to our most important goals? Often, when my interest has been aroused by a particularly striking geological formation or topographic vantage point, I've trusted the seemingly ironclad conclusions of plane geometry and sought to reach the place via the most direct trails. At first blush, this approach certainly seems to be sober, clear-eyed, rational, and eminently sensible, given the wilderness of rough terrain dotted by spiny undergrowth separating me from my ultimate destination. Yet psychology wins over math almost every time.

Desert Psychology Is Subtle

How can I draw such a peculiar conclusion? Indigenous intelligences which blazed those trails understood that paths obvious to travelers would be equally clear to predators. So, in terms of desert psychology subtlety is a cardinal virtue while transparency can be a deadly sin. From my more mundane position, I've found what appears as the shortest, most obvious route usually proves to be nothing but a dead end. Thus, after a taxing series of laborious trials and errors, I find that the quickest, least precarious way is one that initially seemed quite obscure or even nonexistent. In much the same way, although we may long to experience the full benefit of energetic purification, we hesitate to make use of venerable yet unfamiliar aids like White Sage essential oil, hydrosol, or smudge sticks.

Lessons From Natural Psychology

The potent White Sage lovingly grown and harvested in the imposing shadow of Madre Grande monastery manifests its assistance via a number of little-known but amazingly effective products. By taking just a bit of extra time to travel the paths each one of them opens, it becomes possible to approach an empowering luminance with surprising ease.