reconnecting through nature

Snake River, Grand Teton Nat’l Park, WY

how it started

Most of my childhood was spent outdoors (as a farmer’s daughter would naturally say).

I loved my horses, “went to work” at the farm, and learned early that nature doesn’t hurry — it just is.

But somewhere between growing up, growing busy, and growing disconnected, I forgot what that kind of stillness felt like.

It wasn’t until years later, standing at a trailhead in Grand Teton National Park with a geologist (my incredible travel partner and husband) pointing out rock layers like old friends, that I felt it again — liberation. A deep sense of relief in being reminded just how small we are.

That’s when I finally agreed to give hiking a real shot.

finding stillness again

I didn’t fall in love with hiking for the recreation alone — I fell in love with how it taught me to slow me down.

At first, I approached hiking like I approached everything else: with a goal in mind. Miles tracked, elevation gained, trails completed — all in the name of doing it “right”. Old habits die hard, but nature has a way of teaching perspective. The more I went, the more I understood how trivial my need to achieve and preform was.

I was out there to remember.

To remember what it felt like to actually breathe.
To hear the sound of a breeze without interruption, to feel the ground under my feet.
To feel connected — to the land, to myself, to something bigger than both.

The same feeling I had as a kid out at the farm, watching the sun fade behind that old, lone oak rooted in the middle of an endless plain. I’d just forgotten how to notice it.

what nature keeps teaching me

The more time I spend outdoors, the more I understand that nature isn’t an escape. It’s a return. Every trailhead, every sunrise, every inspiring drive through a park — they all bring me back to the same truth: that the connection and purpose I’ve been chasing has been with me all along.

Maybe that’s what love does, too.
My husband sees a story in the earth’s layers — how time and pressure create strength. I see it in us — the way slowing down has layered our lives with something softer, more intentional, more alive.

closing thought

I didn’t find hiking to reinvent myself.
I found it to remember who I already was — a girl who loved the smell of rain, studied animals with quiet curiosity, and felt a sense of belonging in the vastness of open land.

The trails just reminded me how to listen again.