More Flow in Life
How nature taught me to adapt, reflecting on the 49 yrs of life
I had my B-day last week. 49th. Which opened the door to reflection. Or to be honest, a Pandora’s box of reflections, overthinking, and existential loneliness. PS It’s largely my b-day thing. So, sharing my biggest and brightest insight of the last year today. And an explanation behind the pic with Matryoshkas!
Last year’s Pivot
The thing is. This year was a very special one for me.
Almost exactly a year ago, my life took a pivot that had to do with an experience. To put it in simple words, I experienced in my bones and skin, and blood: I am nature.
It’s the kind of instant learning that you just get and need no additional convincing, training, or proving for because of its full-body nature.
“I know what fire is because I got burned.”
I am still unpacking the experience and its ripple effects. The effects ranging from how I make decisions and relate to people to what I put into my tea and on the plate (can be highly adventurous).
And it’s been an intense ride at times.
Heightened senses. Heightened emotions. Lots to process.
The gifts I’ve received are so worth it, though. And the one I want to give space to today is: there is much more flow in my life today.
PS Coincidentally (or not), Life in Flow is the name of a very dear project that I am working on with two dear friends and flow co-creators. It’s a podcast of sorts. Of sorts, as it’s not a typical one, more on it below.
Roots of Flow
What do I mean by flow in life?
Imagine yourself skiing downhill, off-piste. If you’ve done it you know it’s more the terrain that is leading you. You don’t have an illusion of being in control here. Of creating straight tracks to the desired destination.
You accept turns that lead you further from the destination, some bordering on extreme, most challenging, and tiring.
What you know is:
You are co-creating with the terrain
You have to surrender to the mountain
Detours and challenges are a key part of the journey
When I think about the roots of this flow, I see how it is built into this deeper connection and active engagement with nature.
An adventure I picked up after that experience was joining a year-long Wilderness Educator Program. A mix between being a survival guide and a mentor in discovering the rich knowledge nature has to offer.
I remember the first day of the course last October. 4 days in the woods in front of me, and me having no clue how to put up a modern tent-for-dummies.
One of the first promises of the teacher to us as a group was:
I am giving you freedom of learning within a container. Your exploration and experiments will be unique. Yet, you will find yourselves discovering the same universal principles of life. Arriving at the same universal “laws”, just as groups and generations before you had done.
And we did.
Don’t fight the ultimate power, nature; rather, find a way to flow with it. - was one of those.
Because if it’s raining, you’re not going to start a fire the same way you would on a sunny day. You look for drier material under dense trees or bark that peels off to expose dry wood.
You use a base layer to keep your fragile fire off the wet ground. You might even choose a different location altogether, where the wind is blocked. Your strategy adapts to what’s there, not what you have planned to do.
Actually, you don’t need to be in the woods to discover that principle. Pick up gardening.
I was at an Urban Utopia conference in Berlin yesterday. About plants and the many keys they hold to solving modern meta-crisis and poly-crisis (pick your word).
One of the speakers at the gastronomy panel was the founder of Café Botanico in Berlin, which grows its own herbs and some vegetables in a surrounding garden.
The panel facilitator got curious about how “adapting to what was growing rather than controlling plants” was the strategy in the garden. Why not control plants, and reduce uncertainty?
The reply in my own words was: as nature is a complex emergent system, the norm there can be a wide range of outcomes. It’s simply how a complex system functions. Things emerge.
If you want the garden to be a sustainable, self-regenerating entity, you accept its creative agency. Stop seeing yourself as its creator, but rather give your support in response to what emerges. Even when those outcomes seem to not be going your way.
And just like in the garden, projects and relationships work better when we stop forcing results and start responding to what’s actually there. Or what’s been your experience?
Nature’s teaching style
The thing is, we can go for any interaction with nature - survival, gardening, walks (with certain principles in mind).
As long as we honestly and deeply engage, come with an open mind, we learn a lesson of flowing with life. Because life will do its thing, and it will not be the way you want or designed it.
A side-lesson that emerged from it: those lessons and principles are extremely hard to learn in the traditional educational settings. Be it school, uni, coaching, or psychotherapy.
Because they are not backed up by real-life experience. But constrained by the walls of civilization. Where rules, principles, and dangers are largely imaginary. And I don’t mean to say “ditch civilization”, just stating a fact.
Within those walls, learning the lesson of nature, still being the ultimate power, and us still being part of its web is next to impossible.
In the western hemisphere, we learn about our personal power (for better and for worse). We endow ourselves with single-handed success stories, and go crazy and depressed by making failures feel single-handed as well. And we create decisions in our hands that has nothing to do with the complex system that we are solving for.
Western knowledge transfer does have its merits and survival benefits, of course. As we live in the wild no more. But failing to acknowledge nature as the flow of life might just be the mistake that’s left us with the meta and poly crises.
So, for personal, social, and survival benefits, could it be time for all of us to spend a week in the forest, plant a garden, or … go for off-piste skiing? ;)
And then we get to have those beautiful surfing-life experiences. Cooking with what’s there. Letting conversations flow rather than knowing what to say. Travelling new forest-, city-, or life-paths as they are calling us.
Where are you on the spectrum from total flow to control in life? Who are your flow teachers?
Life in Flow Project
And that is exactly the topic of the first episode of Life in Flow Project, which I am very grateful to be part of. Doing it with two wonderful friends who are practicing flow in life.
This is where the Matryoshkas picture is from. Matryoshkas are the three of us, being of Russian origin. And now flowing together from Berlin, Barcelona, and San Diego.
Have to say it’s not a traditional podcast, where episodes are sleek and the focus is on intellectual. This is an experiment in flowing together. With pauses, occasional umms, and no script. And we’d love to have you in the field.
We talk about:
Flow is more than a peak state — it’s a way of dancing with life, while cooking dinner or listening to jazz.
How our personal stories weave into this project.
Our markers of flow: trust, gratitude, feeling one with the experience, and having fun.
Somatic awareness as a key to accessing group flow.
Our vision for flowing together.
You can listen to it on major podcasting platforms with these links:
On Apple Podcasts:
On Spotify:
On Youtube:
Ways to further explore together:
Come on a breath walk with me!
Join my old-fashioned private email list for exclusive experiment invites and ongoing events.
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Take your team on an inspiring regenerative outdoor adventure. Where breakthroughs happen without being forced. Let’s chat to see if we are a fit.
Your reflections are as beautiful as ever😍.