I WENT TO TALK TO THE TREES, BECAUSE I COULDN’T TALK TO THE WORLD

At some point in time, the world became too noisy. Greed rained on cities, storming down on poverty, we tore each other apart, flipping the focus from ‘we’ to ‘me’. Acting beneath animals, fighting each other to worship social constructs. And the worst of them all, planners of the wars they don’t fight. Leaving people on their deathbed just for a title. Congrats you king of greed. I hope the lives lost were worth it.

The news was no longer new, repetitive and destructive. The more impatient I felt, the more I thought finding a way to escape was necessary. The crowd rushing on and off trains, pushing each other, the way communication is dead and how people are glued to their phones all the time. I’ve been growing up in a society like that. I’ve been seeing the same sight for the past 20 years but now, everything I was once familiar with seems foreign. And I can no longer find an excuse for my intemperance. The radical frustration was relentless, plaguing me slowly. I cared so much I started to not care. The more emotions I held within myself, the more I lost control. I needed an anchor desperately; the woods.

Nature, unlike humans, is free of judgement. I could trip and fall or even crumble. They are more humane than human, so alive, so unbiased. The sharp gravelled roads seem easier to lie on than the comfortable flooring pieced by tiresome trudges of humanity. Like that, I threw myself into the unknown without a phone. I’d walk for hours and hours with just a book, bottle and camera in my bag. A move the biggest losers take you may say. But you can’t deny the fact that it's better to die in cuts and bruises from nature than to die being imprisoned in your thoughts.

And so I've walked. I walked on and on and on and on for months now. The thing about avoidance is that: There is no escape. I started raising questions on existentialism and slowly, I started to believe that the world is formed by your perspective and only yours. What you think, you truly are. No matter how many walks I take, my take on this cruel world will never change because, as Descartes mentioned, ‘I think, therefore I am’. The moment you think you are imprisoned, you shall bear the chains of your soul. There is no breaking free for it is constantly at the back of your mind, taunting you. To truly break free of yourself is to change the mind. Configure it to think that there is no prison. No. Don’t even think about the prison.

Each walk, I ask myself if it makes me feel any better. Healthier? Sure. But I just know that when I stop walking, the world never changes. Things that happen will still happen. So I went to talk to the trees about what this walk can do for me. Absolutely nothing. But did I enjoy it? Absolutely. If you may already understand it by now, silence can be good. It rarely allows me to escape my problems but often grants me space to think for myself. And If I may be greedy in my own way: if the world can’t have peace, may it allow me to have peace with myself.

Tung Jing Xuan is a university student based in Singapore whose interest lies in exploring nature and connecting with the world.