Yesterday my husband and I took a slow walk in nature.
No agenda. No destination. Just the two of us and whatever was happening outside.
There’s a window every year in spring here in the American Midwest, before the prairie grass gets tall and the leaves fill in, where the songbirds are right there. Visible. Loud. Most look small and nondescript to the naked eye but through binoculars they become these little patches of gorgeousness. We caught that window yesterday.
Then a bald eagle made a low slow pass right over us. Full white head and tail. Unhurried in a way that felt almost deliberate. Like it knew what it was doing to us.
We didn’t speak for a moment after that.
The walk ended at a natural spring. Water just bubbling up from the ground. It had been doing that long before we got there and would keep going long after.
I came home clearer than I left.
That’s the thing about nature. It always shows up. It doesn’t ask anything of you. It just does what it does and somehow in the watching, your nervous system exhales. The mental noise drops. There’s a quietude that gets in when you stop filling every gap with something.
I didn’t solve any problems on that walk. No epiphanies. I just came back with more room inside than I had before.
Everyone we passed was there for the exercise. Earbuds in, pace locked, eyes forward. Nothing wrong with that. Your body gets the benefit either way. But your creativity, your nervous system, your clarity? They need you to actually show up for the walk.