I took my dogs and my gathering bag for a winter walk in the Bristlecone pine forest behind our house. Elk have been here, browsing among the aspen trees and taking an occasional taste of the soft, nutritious bark. We shared their path for a ways.

The sun dropped low as we meandered along, looking for little nature gifts to put in my bag. I thought I should probably head back home. I paused at that, and then deliberately went slower. Because this world is moving too fast.

When did we decide that to slow down is to lose? What was there to rush back to? The book I’m working on will still be there, and time spent outdoors brings a fresh perspective to my writing. The dishes in the sink weren’t going anywhere, either. The dogs were having fun and I was happy. The Bristlecones around me weren’t in a hurry. If there’s an exact opposite to hurry, it’s these most ancient of trees.

You can’t capture time in a bottle, but it’s here in roots and rings. Most of the trees here are young. Research shows Bristlecones that average 12 to 30 feet in height and 5 to 12 inches in diameter are between 80 and 500 hundred years old. The ones over 500 begin to show crown dieback and dead limbs. For the next 1,500 years most of the remaining limbs will die, but the tree will continue on. These elder trees exhibit twisted branches and gnarled trunks of bare, wind-carved wood, surviving on a single living branch for another century or more. The Bristlecone grows slowly, often only 1/100th of an inch a year.

That’s not rushing through life. That’s slow growth with intention and endurance. We can learn from that. We can learn to savor our lives instead of racing through them.

They can teach us we don’t have to compete today, only create. To grow at our own pace. When your growth feels slower than others, just breathe. You’re not losing. You’re simply growing at a rate that allows your soul to thrive.

And that’s its own brand of success.

And by slowing my pace, I found more woodland treasures for my gathering bag. A branch had fallen naturally in the last storm, and I snipped a few bits from it. When I finally made my way back home, I arranged them in a wooden bowl to put on the headboard. It smells wonderful, of pine sap and crisp winter air. A reminder as I drifted to sleep of time well spent among the ancient ones.