Nature Moves Slow, Maybe We Need To Slow Down TooIf you're living too fast you're not living life at all.. here's what we can learn from nature
Sometimes, there are lessons hiding in plain sight. Sometimes, you just have to sit back and observe nature. We’re all rushing so fast living life at high-octane speed in the 2020s that most times we forget that we’re here to live & let life unfold. Somewhere in a dense, deep forest, that has lasted for centuries, an oak tree stretches its roots deeper into the soil. It doesn’t rush to grow tall & firm, nor does it measure its progress against its neighbouring trees. It simply exists, unfolding ring by ring, trusting the process that has guided life for millennia. Oak trees take a century to grow, half a century to live, and another hundred years to die. That’s nearly a hundred thousand dawns and dusks. It’s in absolutely no hurry. Meanwhile, we, on the other hand, are sprinting through life like we’re in a race we don’t remember signing up for. We’re rushing through meetings to attend, deadlines to meet, and goals to chase. We wake up to alarms, rush through or skip meals, check emails at stoplights, and chase our ambitions & targets, and even after we accomplish them, they only reveal more goals & targets. It’s a never-ending cycle fueled by living in a society which believes that more is never enough & that fast is better. We’ve mistaken movement for progress, and busyness for purpose. But if you look around nature tells a different story. Nature is forged firmly in patience, rhythm, and an understanding that real growth takes time. We hurry. I hurry. You hurry. Late for meetings, late for opportunities, late for life itself. Time has become a tyrant, with each tick of the clock serving as a reminder that we are always behind. But step outside the walls of human civilization, and time reveals its true nature—fluid, unbothered, infinite. Glaciers sculpt valleys over millennia. Rivers take centuries to carve their paths. The moth will not emerge from its cocoon until it is ready. The flowers & fruits on a tree grow according to their seasons. The universe itself took 13.5 billion years to form. Yet, here we are, glancing at our watches, demanding that life move at the pace of our urgency. The Affliction of UrgencyI come from the hustle of Mumbai city, but look around everywhere, and you’ll see the symptoms of a world that refuses to slow down. A young entrepreneur working 16-hour days to scale a startup, burning out before 30. A college student juggling internships, side hustles, and coursework, losing sleep in the name of “productivity” & to meet deadlines. A middle-aged executive skipping family dinners convinced that if he just works a little harder, he’ll finally have time to enjoy life—later. But does later ever come? We’ve all been sold the idea that our worth is tied to our output & how ‘productive’ we are with our time. And that if we’re not maximizing every second, we’re wasting time. But what if the real waste is living life in fast-forward, never pausing long enough to actually experience it? Extractivism and the Endless ChaseOur obsession with speed and efficiency isn’t just personal—it’s systemic. We’ve built a world that operates on extractivism: the idea that we must extract the most out of our time, where more is always better, and that anything that doesn’t produce immediate results is a failure. We mine the Earth faster than it can replenish. We burn fossil fuels faster than the Earth can heal. We fish the oceans faster than species can repopulate. We farm land until it is barren. The same mindset applies to how we treat ourselves—pushing our bodies and minds beyond sustainable limits, extracting energy without replenishing it, and expecting infinite growth from a finite system. But nature works differently. The rainforest doesn't bloom overnight. The glacier carves its path over thousands of years. The salmon returns to its birthplace to spawn, guided by instincts that are older than human civilization itself. Birds migrate staggering distances taking their time in flight. None of these things happen according to a quarterly target or a five-year plan. They happen in their own time, at their own pace. And they thrive because of it. Time Is Not Money—It’s LifeMoney is a predetermined contract we all unwillingly signed up for before we were born. But our time living is not renewable. And yet, we trade our moments for wealth, or in search of accruing more wealth, as if life itself were an investment to be cashed in later. But you can’t do that. You can’t buy more time. You can only spend it from moment to moment, & breath by breath. So the question is not how to get more time, but how to fully live in the time you have. Lessons from the RiverRivers don’t force their way forward. They bend, adapt, and carve their path through patience & over time. A river doesn’t flow forcefully through rocks; it flows around them. And yet, over time, it shapes entire landscapes. We, on the other hand, try to bulldoze our way through life. We force things—careers, relationships, personal goals, work, happiness etc. — all the time rushing to reach some imagined destination. But real change, real progress, doesn’t come from force. It comes from flow. What if, instead of pushing harder, we learned to move like the river? To trust that we are going somewhere, even if we don’t always see the destination? To allow time to do its work without micromanaging every moment? The Luxury of SlownessSlowing down is a privilege, some might say. And in many ways, they’re right. The world we’ve built doesn’t make it easy. Bills have to be paid. Jobs demand results. Society rewards speed. But slowing down isn’t about abandoning responsibility. It’s about reclaiming presence. It’s about choosing, even in small ways, to live differently. It’s about taking a walk without checking your phone. Eating a meal without multitasking. Saying no to things that add urgency but not meaning. It’s about realising that life isn’t something to be won, but something to be lived. Rushing to Where?There’s a strange paradox to all this rushing — we don’t even know where we’re going. We hurry toward promotions, financial security, and early retirement—always assuming that happiness will be waiting for us at the finish line. But what if there is no finish line? What are you rushing toward? What is at the end of this race? A finish line that does not exist? What if the goal was never to get somewhere, but to be here? Right now. In this moment. Living it to the fullest. We rush toward deadlines. Toward milestones. Toward the weekend, the vacation, retirement. Always toward something else, something beyond where we are. But if anything, my message is this: Go slow, just go slow. Take time to let life unfold, live every moment to the fullest & it’s okay to take time to grow at your own pace & live life slower, and more purposefully, not faster & more incomplete. The oak tree doesn’t rush to become an oak. It grows as it must, through seasons of storm and sun, without anxiety about whether it’s growing fast enough. The river doesn’t check its progress. The moon does not ask if it’s behind schedule. Nature doesn’t rush. And yet, it accomplishes everything. So maybe we can too. Thank you for being a valuable subscriber to my newsletter Light Years! If you liked this post & found it informative, feel free to share this publication with your network by clicking the button below… I hope you found this post informative & it helped you in some way. As always, feel free to subscribe to my publication Light Years & support it & also share it if you’d like. Get it in your inbox by filling up the space below! 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Sunday, 23 March 2025
Nature Moves Slow, Maybe We Need To Slow Down Too
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