There’s a point in my day when I grab my sketchbook and my pens, and I disappear. I love to nature journal, to observe and channel thoughts beyond words, to learn to truly pay attention to what’s around me.
There’s a technique I learned from a man called John Muir Laws, who is somewhat of a pillar in the world of nature observation. It’s called a String Safari, and it goes like this:
You grab a piece of cord or string, about 2- 3 metres long. You take yourself outside and you place it on the ground, in a circle around you.
The area inside your string is the place that you observe. It’s a way of reducing overwhelm, of breaking the ice as far as knowing where to get started and of tuning in to your immediate surroundings. Then you sketch, you record, or you write, whatever takes your fancy.
Obviously, this technique is meant for those of us interested in sketching the outside, but I’ve drawn on this in a variety of different ways.
We can all, metaphorically speaking, take our piece of string and throw it around ourselves (or perhaps ourselves and our horses) in a big circle as a way of bringing ourselves back. Create for ourselves an imaginary and yet clearly defined line.
What can you see, touch and hear within your most immediate space?
What’s the next best half step you can take from this place?
An emotional string safari for the moments when we find ourselves paralyzed by the big picture, or unsure where to start or what to do next.
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Below is some sketches from my journal- Tīeke is not something I have seen on a string safari but the closest photo of my sketchbook I had to hand
