“It is better to travel well than to arrive.” Buddhist quote.
Those of you who are regular readers of Learning from Dogs, and I am flattered at how many there are now, will recall that on March 8th I posted an announcement of the Rev. Terry Hershey coming to Payson to give a couple of seminars based around his best-selling book, Soul Gardening. Jean and I had the honour of having Terry stay with us for a couple of nights.
Anyway, on Monday morning, the day Terry was to give his talks, four of us took a couple of hours off in the morning to take a walk around the majestic granite boulders, a couple of miles on from our house. These great boulders give rise to the name of the road that we live on; Granite Dells Rd. Most afternoons, Jean and I take Pharaoh and his little pack of dogs for this three-mile walk so today was no different other than the walk being in the morning.
However, one of the benefits of having Terry with us on the walk was that he pointed out something really obvious that, so far, Jean and I had just taken for granted, i.e. missed!
It’s this. That dogs, when out for a walk off-leash, never travel the same journey, however many times they go on the same walk. All dog-owners will be aware of this.
Dogs are all over the place, scurrying here and there, following sweet scents, totally absorbed in the intimacy of their relationship with their immediate experience. There’s no ‘purpose’ to their behaviour, there’s no ‘clock’ running in their head as to what time it is and when they have to be somewhere else. It is the epitome of travelling well, as from the quote at the start of this article.
The metaphor of how dogs journey as a comparison to how so many of us humans travel with eyes closed, never stopping to smell the roses, was mentioned by Terry when we stopped for group photo towards the end of the walk. Terry also touched on the importance of living in the present, as dogs do so very, very well, many times during his later talks.
As soon as we make our happiness conditional on ‘getting’ somewhere in the future, our journey rather becomes pointless.
What a wonderful day this Monday was.
Learning from Dogs 
Hi Paul,
What a nice post. Thanks for sharing the photos. You live in a beautiful place!
You know, I still think dogs are smarter than humans. I know we have more skills and abilities, according to my friend who is a scientist, along with many other folks, but if we are so much smarter then I wonder why do we do the things we do?
I didn’t know dogs took different routes each time. My girl Free was always off leash, but I honestly did not notice this. She seemed to always know which direction she wanted to go in and she knew if there was any new grass to be eaten.
My girl Ruthie is not trained to be off the leash. I wish she was. I also wish we lived somewhere that we could go on a three mile off leash walk. That must be very nice.
Peace and Joy to you and your family!
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