The Wilderness Had a Clarity That Included Me

There are things I’ve done that I’m not proud of. Not because they were wrong in some universal, moral sense, but because I did them knowing I shouldn’t. I did them because I wanted to. Because, in that moment, it felt like the only thing to do. And for years, I carried the weight of that, believing that regret was a form of penance, that self-recrimination was the price of redemption.

But what if I never needed redemption in the first place? What if the things I thought I needed to atone for were just stepping stones to where I am now? What if the mess, the mistakes, the so-called missteps—what if they were never detours, but the road itself?

I’ve always been a skeptic. I don’t take things at face value. I poke, prod, dismantle, examine. And yet, for all my skepticism, I’ve been desperate to believe in something. Some grand narrative that would explain the chaos, some higher logic that would tell me it was all leading somewhere. That I was not just throwing darts in the dark, but following an invisible map.

But maybe the belief itself is the problem. Maybe waiting for meaning is what keeps us from actually living. Because the truth is, the only meaning anything ever has is what we give it. And I’ve decided to give it this: I am here. I have made it this far. That is enough.

There is something profoundly simple about being in the wild. There are no choices beyond the next step. No distractions, no numbing agents, no escape hatches. Just me, the weight on my back, the ache in my legs, and the knowledge that no one is coming to save me. That, if I want to move forward, I have to do it myself.

Fear, I’ve learned, is just a story we tell ourselves. And if that’s true, then I can tell myself a different one. I can decide that I am strong. That I am capable. That I am safe. That nothing can vanquish me. It may not always be true, but that doesn’t matter. Because it works. And sometimes, that’s all we need.

The wild doesn’t care about my past. It doesn’t care what I’ve done or who I’ve been. It doesn’t ask me to prove myself or justify my choices. It just exists. Vast and indifferent and breathtakingly beautiful. And in its presence, I understand something I never have before: I belong to this world, too.

I don’t know if I’ll ever be free of the questions. If I’ll ever stop wondering if I could have done things differently, if I should have. But I do know this: I am here. And I am moving forward. And for now, that is enough.