The Dreamer's Pen

It’s strange, isn’t it? That we, as humans, are woven into the fabric of the natural world, yet so often we distance ourselves from it. We come from the earth, we breathe its air, and we are sustained by the food it offers. Yet, in our modern existence, it seems we’ve drawn a line, perhaps an invisible one, that separates us from the world that made us. We’ve constructed barriers, walls of stone and steel, boundaries of time and convenience – around ourselves, convinced that to truly live is to escape the raw, untamed forces of nature.

There’s something ironic in this. We marvel at the beauty of the world, we romanticize the wilderness, but we often resist the very essence of it that courses through our veins. We see ourselves as separate, as more advanced, as if we’ve transcended the primal energy that pulses through the trees, the oceans, the wind. But in doing so, we’ve lost something vital. We’ve forgotten how to listen, how to be fully immersed in the present, in the subtle rhythms of life that go beyond our human made constructs.

In a way, it’s as though we’ve turned away from the very thing that gives us life, the very thing that connects us to the deeper layers of existence. We numb ourselves with distractions, rush through our days with purpose but without presence. And in doing so, we silence the quiet voice of the natural world, the whispers of the forest, the call of the birds, the hum of the earth beneath our feet.

Yet, deep within us, there is always a longing to return. To reconnect. We feel it when we stand beneath a vast sky, or when we see the sun casting its golden light through the branches of a tree. We feel it in the silence of a walk along the shore or the gentle sound of the wind brushing past us. In those moments, something within us stirs. It’s as if we’re remembering who we truly are, not as separate from nature, but as a part of it, a vital, integral part of a much larger whole.

John Muir once said, “In every walk with nature, one receives far more than he seeks.” Perhaps we distance ourselves from nature because it reminds us of the raw, unfiltered truth of life:  that we are fragile, that we are connected to something far greater than ourselves, and that, at the end of the day, we are not in control. It’s easier to live in the illusion of separation, to believe we’ve mastered the world around us, than it is to embrace the unknown, to surrender to the forces we cannot control.

But there is beauty in that surrender, too. There is grace in allowing ourselves to be part of the ever-evolving landscape of the natural world, to become attuned to its rhythms, its cycles, its quiet wisdom. It calls us to slow down, to breathe deeply, to rediscover a deep-rooted sense of peace that comes not from conquering the world, but from coexisting with it.

So perhaps the question isn’t why we push ourselves away from the natural world, but how we can begin to let go of those barriers. How can we return to what we’ve always been, part of the earth, part of the sky, part of the unspoken harmony that flows through every living thing? The answer, I think, is found in the small, simple moments. In the pause of a deep breath, in the quiet reflection of a sunset, in the stillness of the forest. In those moments, we are reminded that we have never truly been separate, we have only forgotten how to see the connection.