Patterns In Nature: Gratitude And Joy

The Christmas season always puts me into a reflective mood where I ponder on how grateful I am for all of the blessings that have come my way. Many of these blessings have come from my dear readers and followers. You folks who have encouraged me, offered valuable critique, and have enthusiastically read and used my writings and photographs over the years.

While my blog is only a year old, I have been publishing lecture notes and book drafts for many years. In the year 2000, I decided to publish my lecture notes from a graduate level course I had taught over the previous decade. Gradually, I re-crafted this material into a book on patterns in Nature. I published the updated drafts of this book on a web site. One day, I received an email from a professor in Canada advising me that my site was down. He stated that he found my material helpful in a course he was teaching. I quickly fixed the site and went on to check Google Analytics. To my surprise, about 2,500 people all over the world were regularly reading the online draft of my book. It was then that I realized that the subject of patterns in Nature was of interest to a goodly number of people. Because of the demand, I purposely keep this web site going today even though I don’t update it.

I also discovered that people liked my Nature photography. I travel about 5 months a year capturing new Nature images as I get new ideas for blogs. I display some of these images on a separate web site . I am grateful that this site is also popular.

From there, I decided to publish a PDF version of an expanded book on patterns in Nature  that includes both text and some of my images. In addition, I published a free PDF book of Nature images that offers a contemplative experience.

In October of 2011, I opened my blog site which offers twice-monthly posts on various topics surrounding the subject of patterns in Nature. As I matured in my research and in my writing, I found that people are interested in the subject of connections in Nature. I have grown to believe that the development of a human consciousness of connections in Nature could be the keystone to reversing the destructive path that our species is now on as it destroys our precious environment.

Much of my blog site content and the maturing of my thinking has come from my dear readers. The blog comments, personal emails, and phone calls from my readers have had a major influence in what I write and how I write. One important comment actually reversed my thinking.

So, this web site is accomplishing what I had hoped it would do. My readers have become an extremely important part of the team that shapes the material that I write. You also shape some of my conservation activities. For your enthusiastic support in many ways, I am deeply grateful.

My blog is gradually becoming a discourse on connections in Nature simply because I hope that people will become aware that broken connections in Nature can result in the destruction of our fragile environment. Broken links that we cannot fix. This effort includes the publishing of an eBook that is a collection of 50 photo essays on connections in Nature. 

Due to comments by some of my readers, I have recently become convinced that a change of consciousness toward Nature by the human race can only come through our children. You can see my gradual change in thinking in blogs over recent months. More and more, I am hoping to introduce the idea of connections in Nature to young people through sustainability education programs. Currently, I’m building a sustainability education program at the school where I teach.  

With this blog post, I offer my deepest thanks for the guidance and encouragement offered by all of my readers. As the new year approaches, I wish all of you the richest of blessings for both this new year and the years to come.