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Nature is our compass. Books are our maps.
This is how we find our way in a world that feels like constant chaos. Nature as our compass, books as our map.
Hundreds of years ago, when sailors were blown off course, they would chart their way back to their destination, by looking to the stars (especially when there were no other landmarks).
They measured the currents, tested the wind. With the sky, air and sea as their guide, they set sail to lands unknown.
When we feel stable, it’s because we know where we stand, where we are located in relation to the rest of the world. It is then that a map is most useful.
Books are messages in bottles, sent from people long ago and/or far away, showing us the way. That they, too, have been lost in the wilderness and found their way. They, too have been overrun by enemies outside and in, and fought their way back from the brink.
We look to books to know that we are not alone, that someone just like us (perhaps a bit wiser) has gone before, has made a path for us to follow. Books teach us how to do things, impossible things, everything from how to build a house to how to build a life. We open a book and escape to another world and come back changed.
