The Nature of Love

“In every walk with nature, one receives far more than he seeks.” — John Muir.

John Muir was a Scottish-American farmer, inventor, naturalist, philosopher, writer, botanist, zoologist, geologist, and environmentalist in the 1860s. In today’s terms, he was nothing short of an influencer. He was the one who contributed most to preserving America’s natural heritage, and is also known as the Father of National Parks. He has written many books on conserving and his experiences in nature.

Why am I mentioning him? Well, because like him, I am drawn to nature too. I have lived most of my life on a campus, as most kids whose fathers work for the armed forces do. These campuses, although they are safe and cut off from the outside world and city buzz, are also well-equipped with nature. As much as you want or need. So naturally, I am drawn to places with the most greenery, and dread the noisy city life.

In my recent write-up, I have emphasised how walking in nature is all you need to feel healed. This write-up is going to dig deeper into that, and where we stand as a society when it comes to our well-being and our love for nature.

Apart from living on the campuses, I have been travelling to natural environments in the last five years. In 2022, I visited the Rajaji National Park & Tiger Reserve, Rishikesh. We reached there on a Saturday afternoon and returned the next evening.

It was not even a 24-hour day trip. However, to the contrary, it felt like I had spent a week there! The control I had on my thoughts in the surrounding, so quiet, it nearly felt like a dream. The first day, we went to the jungle safari pretty soon after we reached. We felt like we were in a National Geographic documentary in the Savannah Jungles. We spotted some rare sightings. A huge Indian Roller, a Leopard so large, it was almost the length of our Jeep. It crossed our path, and we saw it growling at us in an attacking position! So thrilling. It was a tiger reserve, unfortunately, we couldn’t spot one. But, we did see its territory markings on the trees, that the tigers do with their claws.

The next morning, we went for a jungle hike, where we spotted a rare Hornbill! Our guide told us that we are the lucky ones to have seen so much in just a few hours! What a successful trip. A lot of shirin-yoku!

In all these trips, I just felt that I belong. Maybe because I am an animal ( we all are), and evolution is the only reason, we have been getting farther and farther away from nature, and mostly from ourselves, too.

Civilisation, Capitalism, Community, Technology, Opportunities, and many more things have been so captivating to look back on, or hold back the desires that a human mind could have easily conquered. After all, we’re the ones who did all the discoveries, including the term shirin-yoku which means Forest Bathing, (coined in 1982 by the Japanese Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries to promote it as a way to address the negative impacts of a technologically advanced society on people’s well-being, and help them heal through nature, especially forests).

• In the age that urges to succeed in the name of money, fame and beauty, we have gone too far to see that the money we have may be enough, and it’s okay to earn the bare minimum also.
• We have forgotten that fame comes with all its complexities of external validation and fake beauty standards.
• The real beauty does lie in the eyes of the beholder. Especially if we look at nature — that’s all the beauty we ever needed, which can never compete with any standards that, sadly, are also created by the so-called flag-bearers of society.

As deep as we dive into this subject, the only conclusion that remains is that our nature of love is not in the advancements alone, but being mindful of which ones are serving us for the better, and which ones are draining us.

The sooner we realise our ways of love, self-love and loving nature, the better it is for our overall well-being, and for the planet as well.

Thanks for reading, Namaste. If you liked this, you can connect on my Instagram and visit my Website.