Desert Campfire

Thank you for joining me around the campfire this evening. On summer nights like these, I like to sit and watch the stars come out. From here, we have an amazing view of this ancient landscape. There's nothing like it for producing a healthy sense of proportion. It's a great place to let go of stress and worry and find rest. I think it's always nice to start the evening with a wind down. Tonight's wind down is a breathing exercise. So when you're ready, let's begin. First, just bringing the attention to the breath, noticing where you feel it, in the nose, the throat, the chest, the diaphragm. You're nice and relaxed. We're gonna be taking a deep breath in for four, holding it for four and then breathing out for six. So are you ready? Let's begin, in for four, two, three, four. Hold it for four, two, three, four. Now breathing out for six, two, three, four, five, six. In for four, two, three, four, holding for four, two, three, four, out for six, two, three, four, five, six. In for four, two, three, four, holding for four, two, three, four, out for six, two, three, four, five, six. In for four, two, three, four, holding for four, two, three, four, out for six, two, three, four, five, six. Great, now returning the breath to normal. Sometimes it feels like the desert is made more from open air than any other material. The breeze rushes into canyons, wind sweeps across the fields of sand. Yet as simple as the landscape appears, the desert is the work of millions of years. Hundreds of thousands of years before we made this cozy campfire, there was a giant glacier, frozen in place. As the sun warmed the land, the glacier slowly melted, leaving the valley of the desert. And a long time after the glacier thawed, pieces of the earth shifted, rising into the lush mountains that border the desert. Perhaps a spring gushed forward to flow into a river, running down the mountain into nearby hills. Every season that the river flowed, the water smoothed the rocks around it, cutting a path through the mountain. When the river dried like the glacier long before, its passageway shaped a canyon. In another 10,000 years, the desert will look very different from what we see now. By the glow of the moon and stars you can see from miles in the desert at night. The sand and rocks go on and on, forming mountains or valleys or just flat planes of earth. The land is yellow and dry with strips of red clay running through although the land and clay appear silver and platinum now. Above us, the sky seems infinite. There are no buildings here to interrupt your gaze. Nothing to hide the sky. Earth and air can stretch out luxuriantly. Yes, the Joshua trees are really the tallest things around here. The trunk of the Joshua tree is brown...