Sometimes the path doesn’t appear until you begin walking.
This morning it rained.
Not the kind of rain that sends people running for cover, but the slow, steady rain that quietly nourishes everything beneath the surface.
I sat in my lanai with a warm cup of coffee, watching my little dog, Pixie. Thunder has never been her favorite. Her ears tilted back just enough to tell me she was listening for danger, yet this morning she didn’t run to hide. She simply sat beside me while the rain fell all around us.
Beyond her, the giant trees across the street stood completely still, drinking in every drop.
It struck me that the rain wasn’t interrupting their growth.
It was their growth.
Perhaps that’s true for us, too.
For so much of my life, I believed growth happened during the sunny seasons. When everything was working, when life made sense, when the path ahead was clear.
Now I wonder if we’ve misunderstood the forest all along.
The tallest trees did not become strong because every day was filled with sunshine.
They grew through storms.
They grew through seasons of drought.
They grew through wind that bent their branches and rain that soaked their roots.
And yet, every year, they reached a little higher.
Not because the storms disappeared, but because their roots kept growing beneath the surface.
Everything works from the bottom.
Roots before branches.
Character before reputation.
Healing before purpose.
Identity before success.
The world celebrates what can be seen: the blossoms, the fruit, the towering canopy; but the forest knows that none of it exists without the quiet work happening underground.
The deepest growth is almost always invisible.
As I watched the rain, I found myself thinking about someone I care about very much.
Life has handed this person more grief than anyone should have to carry in such a short time. One heartbreaking loss after another. The kind that changes how you see the world.
Watching someone you love walk through grief can make you wish you could remove every storm from their life.
But perhaps that isn’t what love is meant to do.
Perhaps love sometimes means sitting quietly beside someone while the rain falls, trusting that something beautiful is happening beneath the surface even when neither of you can see it yet.
Grief doesn’t simply teach us how to say goodbye.
It teaches us how deeply we can love.
It teaches us to notice ordinary mornings.
To hug a little longer.
To answer the phone.
To become fully present with the people still sitting across the table.
Those lessons become roots.
I’ve been growing my own roots, too.
For a long time, I thought my greatest fear was running out of money.
Losing my job.
Failing.
Not having enough.
But recently I realized that wasn’t really the fear.
The fear was believing that if everything I had disappeared…
I wouldn’t know how to grow again.
That is a very different fear.
And perhaps…
that was my giant.
Like David standing before Goliath, I kept imagining I needed someone else’s armor. A safer plan. A guaranteed outcome. A rescue.
Instead, I’ve slowly been learning something the forest has known all along.
Fruit comes and goes.
Leaves fall.
Storms arrive.
Branches break.
Healthy roots simply keep growing.
Every chapter I write.
Every BellaYin essay.
Every new skill I learn.
Every small act of courage.
Every morning I choose to show up instead of hiding.
These are not just tasks.
They are roots.
There is something else the forest has been teaching me.
For years I believed I needed to find the right path before I could begin walking.
Now I think the forest smiles at that idea.
Because forests rarely reveal the entire path.
The morning mist hides what lies ahead.
The trees curve around places you cannot yet see.
If you stand waiting until the whole journey becomes visible, you’ll remain standing exactly where you are.
But the moment you take one step…
the next few feet appear.
Then another step.
Then another.
The path doesn’t magically appear because you’ve figured everything out.
The path reveals itself because you were willing to move.
Perhaps that is how faith has always worked.
Not seeing the entire journey.
Only trusting the next step.
And maybe that’s why I love forests so much.
No tree tries to become another tree.
The plumeria doesn’t compete with the oak.
The oak doesn’t apologize for growing more slowly than the bamboo.
Each one simply reaches toward the light in the way it was created to.
Maybe becoming has never been about becoming someone else.
Maybe it has always been about growing deeply enough into who you already are that your life naturally begins to bear fruit.
So this Sunday, I’d like to offer you an invitation.
Come walk with me.
Come into the forest.
Don’t worry if you can’t see the whole path.
None of us can.
Just take the next step.
Then another.
Then another.
One morning, you’ll look behind you and realize something extraordinary.
The path wasn’t waiting for you all along.
It was being created…
with every brave step you chose to take.
And somewhere ahead, just beyond the morning mist, the sunlight is already filtering through the trees.
Not to show you the entire forest…
Only enough light for the next step.
For now, that’s enough.
Because roots are always growing, even when we cannot see them.
And so are you.