What Nature Teaches Us (or does it?)

When we step into the forest, it’s tempting to imagine that nature is our teacher… an old, patient professor offering quiet lessons to those who listen.

But that’s not quite right.

Nature isn’t teaching. It’s simply being.

The invitation is ours to accept. The learning is ours to choose.

When we decide to see instead of just look, to listen instead of just hear, the forest changes us. Not because it’s trying to, but because we’re paying mindful attention.

That’s the difference between being taught and choosing to learn.

Walt Whitman understood this. He looked at a tree and saw a mirror of character, a being that stands in silence through every storm, while people scurry for shelter at the first sign of rain:

Then the qualities, almost emotional, palpably artistic, heroic, of a tree; so innocent and harmless, yet so savage. It is, yet says nothing. How it rebukes by its tough and equable serenity all weathers, this gusty-temper’d little whiffet, man, that runs indoors at a mite of rain or snow.

The tree doesn’t instruct, it embodies. It endures. It grows. It responds.

And if we’re willing, we can learn from that, without a single word being spoken.

Nature isn’t there to teach us anything, but it is there for us to learn everything… if we choose to let it.

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I’m Michael Kennedy, a resident of Olympic Valley, CA (in photo above). I’m a visual storyteller and I love exploring nature and getting lost along the way. I know we live in a world that demands our attention. I just want to say thank you for your attention. If you enjoyed this post, please share with a friend. For more photos and stories visit BlueWolfGallery.com.