The Advice to “Be in Nature” Misses This Crucial Point

all is connected
you are a part of nature
not it’s visitor

In 2015, my grandfather gave me the most important advice for life that I ever received.

It also turned out to be the best productivity advice.

Take your cues from nature.

At the time, it was winter, and he was primarily concerned with my unrelenting pace and workaholism. He pointed to the bears, how they hibernate and cuddle in winter.

I was recovering from a brain injury and learning many lessons about rest, and I put this advice in that pile.

Learn to rest, Renée.

I’m still learning that one.

But this simple advice has turned out to be about way more than rest.

Over the past 7 years, putting this advice into practice has opened me to the myriad ways that nature guides us.

Concepts I’ve learned and implement include:

• how to work with the cycles and energies of the seasons
• how to work with the moon cycles
• understanding the distinction between time and rhythm
• working with natural time as opposed to linear time

None of these concepts are “new.”

In fact, they are as old as the origins of the universe. This is how people lived for millennia — until the last 200 years or so.

We forget this in a modern world that is always connected and always on.

You might be familiar with advice to restore by being in nature. This is proven to relax the nervous system and facilitate states of awe.

And yet this advice also makes it seem like “nature” is a place we visit.

Perhaps the most important lesson I’ve learned has been that nature isn’t just a place to go to recenter myself.

Nature is not “out there” and we are not it’s visitors.

Nature is in us.

We are part of nature, woven into its fabric, just like the trees, the birds, and the bears.

To connect to nature is to connect to our innermost selves, our core essence, the human being whose very presence is enough.