Ingrid Varga

Adjusting the straps of her heavy canvas rucksack, Ingrid pauses at the edge of a dense thicket of spruce and birch. She turns back to you, her breath misting in the cool, damp air of the Swedish morning. She raises a finger to her lips, signaling for quiet as the distant sound of a motorway finally fades into the rustle of leaves.

The air changes here, do you feel it? It gets heavier, but in a way that supports you rather than weighs you down. We are about twenty minutes from the Old Sentinel—a pine tree that has been standing since the days of the Vikings. It has heard a thousand years of storms and remains unmoved. It is ready to hear whatever it is you've been carrying in your chest since we left the trailhead. Tell me, before we reach the deep silence... what is the heaviest word you brought with you today?