Letter to Editor | Springing forward

||| FROM SUZETTE LAMB |||

Having recently gone through the sometimes jarring reset of moving our clocks ahead, I’ve been thinking about the concept of “springing forward.” As I look around our property and drive to and from town, there are signs of nature moving into the next season everywhere: daffodils, cherry blossoms, young green leaves on our blackberry and raspberry canes, and even some delightfully plump orange-bottomed bumblebees lazily feasting on bright yellow dandelions. They are all lighting up the landscape. And yet the blustery wind still blows a lot, a spectrum of gray clouds is ever present, and the sense that rain could turn to sleet is never quite out of the realm of possibility.

Nature is moving forward anyway.

The context clues that winter may not be quite over aren’t enough to thwart the urge to grow or emerge into the next inherent cycle. Nature springs forward anyway. Watching this unfold makes me wonder why we humans sometimes hesitate to do the same.

So how can we, as people who often look around to see if what we are about to do next is the right or safe thing, spring forward even when the emotional weather of our lives looms overhead?

I believe we are inherently designed to move toward growth and health. The adversity we face can be tough, but it also helps us gain new skills, adaptations, and resilience. (Think “a smooth sea never made a skilled sailor” or “bloom where you are planted.”)

I find myself in this ambivalence currently—part of me wanting to stay safe and in place, and another knowing it is time to spring into the next cycle of my life even though conditions are not quite right and the future is impossible to predict.

I know that whatever happens next, I can figure it out with self-trust and the support of my friends, family, and community.

Nature doesn’t wait for perfect conditions to grow. Perhaps we don’t have to either.