What My Father Taught Me About Anxiety

A note to young leaders.

One night when I was 12, studying for a Year 7 exam, I suddenly felt anxious – even though I was top of my class, or perhaps because I was.

I left my bedroom-study and wandered into the living room. Only my father was there. He was sitting in his favourite beanbag deep in thought, with the TV playing in the background.

I told my dad how I was feeling. He just smiled and said: “When was the last time you walked barefoot on the grass?”

Before I had time to summon a reply, he exclaimed: “Come, let’s go for a walk.”

I protested that it was already 9.30pm, I had an exam tomorrow, i needed to go sleep – but dad insisted.

We walked and talked. We walked barefoot, on the pavement and on the grass, talked about everything other than the exam – and twenty minutes later we were back home and, presto, the anxiety was gone.

I’ve never forgotten that lesson.

Anxiety arises from a feeling of separateness, a disconnection from the whole.

No mind is an island. Every mind is connected to a body, and every body is a part of the main – the natural world around us.

Sometimes all we need to be grounded is to walk bearfoot on the grass – to rediscover the body’s kinship with the earth beneath our feet, “the lattice of a world where nothing turns or stands outside the whole.”