Let us take a trip to the Hundred Acre Wood, where Winnie the Pooh and his friends live. Pooh, Rabbit and Piglet are on a walk in a very misty forest and are struggling to get home:
”The fact is,” said Rabbit, “that we’ve lost our way somehow.”
They were having a rest in a small sand-pit on the top of the Forest. Pooh was getting rather tired of that sand-pit, and suspected it of following them about, because whichever direction they started in, they always ended up at it, and each time, as it came through the mist at them, Rabbit said triumphantly, “Now I know where we are!” and Pooh said sadly, “So do I.” and Piglet said nothing.
He had tried to think of something to say, but the only thing he could think of was, “Help, Help!” and it seemed silly to say that, when he had Pooh and Rabbit with him.
“Well,” said Rabbit after a long silence in which no one thanked him for the nice walk they were having, “we’d better get on, I suppose. Which way shall we try?”
“How would it be,” said Pooh slowly, “if, as soon as we’re out of sight of the Pit, we try to find it again?”
“What’s the good of that?” said Rabbit.
“Well,” Pooh said, “we keep looking for Home and not finding it, so I thought that if we looked for this Pit, we’d be sure not to find it, which would be a good thing, because then we might find something we weren’t looking for, which might be just what we were looking for, really.”
“I don’t see much sense in that,” said Rabbit…
“If I walked away from this Pit, and then walked back to it, of course I should find it.”
“Well, I thought perhaps you wouldn’t,” said Pooh, “I just thought.”
“Try” said Piglet suddenly. “We’ll wait here for you.”
Rabbit gave a laugh to show how silly Piglet was, and walked into the mist. After he had gone a hundred yards, he turned and walked back again… and after Pooh and Piglet had waited twenty minutes for him, Pooh got up.
“I just thought,” said Pooh, “Now then, Piglet, let’s go home.”
“But Pooh,” cried Piglet, all excited, “do you know the way?”
“No,” said Pooh. “But there are twelve pots of honey in my cupboard, and they have been calling me for hours. I couldn’t hear them properly before, because Rabbit would talk, but if nobody says anything except those twelve pots, I, Piglet, I shall know where they are calling from. Come on.”
They walked along, and for a long time Piglet said nothing as to not disturb the pots , but suddenly he gave a small, happy sound… because now he believed that he started knowing where they were; but he didn’t dare say it out loud, just in case they were not there yet. And just as he was so sure that it was the right place, that it stopped being important whether they could hear the pots calling for him or not, they heard someone right in front of their nose, – and out of the mist Christoffer came walking.
Dear Pooh needed peace and quietness to be able to listen. Maybe we all know that feeling? In a busy day of life, it’s easy to get swallowed up by everything – some things seems more urgent than others. There can be so much noise – also metaphorically speaking at the mental level- that we forget to listen to ourselves.
With Pooh in mind, there must be room for the most important things: The inner honey pot’s songs and messages, the nectar of life and the well-being.
We can nurture the ”honey pot contact”, by consciously creating space to BE and to LISTEN and find out what nourishes us, such as nature, music, art, a quiet moment in front of the fireplace or on the couch, good and nourishing company. We could call it well-being meditation, or simply the Pooh way – something as vital as the everyday gospel of honey pots.
Happy New Year!
About the author
Dr. Pernille Knudtzon, MD, Specialist in Family Medicine, Acupuncture, New Health Technology and NLP Trainer runs Vitafakta Health Clinic in Southern Spain. Her main medical training was done in Denmark. But curiosity led her to travel and study Holistic Medicine and Lifestyle aspects in many places around the world over the last 30 years. From her consultation in southern Spain she is now providing Personal Health Consultations based on a holistic health and functional medicine approach. She focuses on Health, Wellbeing and Vitality and guides her clients to live a healthy life and to thrive and shine the most. She is presently studying Functional Medicine at the Institute of Functional Medicine https://www.ifm.org/.