Trusting the Right Path

There’s a game I sometimes play when immersed in nature: ‘What kind of landscape am I today?’ I am never the perfectly manicured garden, carefully curated and pruned to fit expectations. Some days, I am a wild meadow—untamed, abundant, and free. Other days, I am a storm-churned sea, restless and full of energy, needing space to expand. Lately, I feel like an ancient tree, weathered by time but deeply rooted, still reaching for the sky.

Nature has always been my guide in understanding what it means to live the right life. The river does not try to flow in any way other than how it must. The tree does not question whether it is growing fast enough. The seasons do not compete with one another. Each follows its rhythm, fully present in its role. There is no striving, no forcing—just being.

The Path and the Illusion of Success

How often do we find ourselves in places we do not belong, following paths shaped by expectation rather than intuition? The world tells us what success looks like—achievement, wealth, status—but nature teaches us something different. A tree does not measure its worth by how tall it is compared to another. A bird does not question whether its song is good enough. They simply do what they are meant to do.

And yet, we humans often find ourselves misaligned. We live lives that look good on the outside but feel hollow within. We follow rules that were never meant for us. It is tempting to think of the wrong life as something obvious—trapped in a job we hate, living in a place that doesn’t feel like home. But more often, it is a subtle dissonance, a nagging feeling that we are slightly off course, like a tree leaning too far from the light.

For me, well-being is simple: if I am connected to nature, I am at peace. Walking in the woods, feeling the earth beneath my feet, watching the rhythm of the tides—this is where I find clarity. When I stray too far from these spaces, I feel unsteady, like a river being forced into an unnatural path.

Choosing the Right Path

The Japanese film Perfect Days lingers in my mind. Its protagonist, Hirayama, lives a quiet, simple life—cleaning public spaces, tending to plants, photographing the shifting light through trees. He does not chase status or recognition. He does not measure his life by external markers of success. And yet, there is a deep contentment in his existence. Like an ancient oak standing steady in the wind, he is exactly where he is meant to be.

Nature teaches us that success is not about accumulation but about alignment. It is about choosing a life that feels expansive, not restrictive. The right life is not about doing more but about being more—more present, more connected, more attuned to the rhythms of the world around us.

The Balance Between Growth and Stillness

The trees grow in their own time. Some stretch quickly toward the sky; others take centuries to reach their full height. Some shed their leaves each autumn, embracing rest before renewal. Others remain evergreen, steady through all seasons.

As a coach, I often think about this balance—how we, like nature, need both growth and stillness. We cannot always be in a season of expansion. Sometimes, we must be like the trees in winter, gathering strength beneath the surface. Sometimes, we must be like the river, letting go and trusting the flow.

Even Perfect Days, for all its simplicity, carries an undercurrent of longing. Hirayama thrives in his solitude, yet he is not closed off. He remains open to wonder, to connection, to the quiet joy of simply being. His life is not about perfection or achievement but about presence. He is neither striving nor resisting. He is living.

The film’s final moments linger: he drives through Tokyo, Nina Simone playing on the stereo, the city flickering past like sunlight through leaves. And he weeps. Smiling, but weeping. The joy and sorrow inseparable. Sorrowful, yet rejoicing.

There is no perfect life, no single right path. Only the one that feels true. Nature does not second-guess itself. Neither should we. Like the river, like the trees, like the wind moving through the grass—we must trust where we are meant to go.