Lesson from a Quiet Snowfall
STOP… and listen
The Backstory
December. Spending the day working at the office. Giant windows are letting the day light in. No wind. No rain. Just the quiet humming sound of laptops whizzing. It’s 33 degrees outside, but it feels strangely warm.
It’s quiet in the building’s courtyard. Peaceful. One of those moments where even want to whisper will break nature’s attempt to speak to us. I had to capture the moment with my camera without saying anything or disturbing the delicate balance of what was happening.
The Object
This was how the first cumulative snowfall of the winter season happened in December 2016.
A blanket of white slowly cleansed the community and beautifully showed each twist and turn of the trees’ branches. The snow was falling so delicately that each flake stayed exactly where it fell.
One touch of a finger and it would all fall apart. Melting instantly. Each snowflake maintained its perfect shape and attached itself to another with an unmatched strength, as the flakes began to build a wall on everything that didn’t have cover.
It’s amazing how perfect the weather has to be in order to make this happen. Snowflakes melted just enough to stick yet not so much that they pile up like grains of sand. Air so calm that not even a string of snowflakes dangling together like a barrel of monkeys is disturbed.
As I was driving home from work, I captured a “winter wonderland” photo that shows just how transparent a forest is made when a snowfall like this happens. Majestic might be the best word to describe how much it made an uninviting forest look like Disney cartoon.
The Lesson
Perhaps we can learn a thing or two from nature and this quiet snow fall. Every person who sees snow a snowfall like this needs to stop and listen. To nothing, maybe, but what you’ll hear when you stop and listen to snowflakes falling in perfect weather will change your mood for the day… and maybe stretch your thinking beyond yourself.
The Take-aways:
- Shut up and listen to your environment. You might hear something you need to hear.
- The bonds that nature has built within itself exist within each of us.
- It only takes a small amount of effort to screw something up. Apply force in the right places and in the right amounts.
- If only humans behaved and treated one another like quiet snowflakes.
Building each other up. Not letting go. Hanging on until the last possible second before melting or blowing away. Unfortunately, not every one stops… and listens… let alone appreciate… what a simple snowflake has to offer.
Written by Shaun Holloway.
