[An Essay from My Heart]

Whispers of Spring in Winter’s Silence

Even in the cold and shadowed depths of winter, spring is already making its way toward us—quietly, without announcement. Trees stand bare, fields withdraw their color, and human hearts, too, draw inward. Yet this silence is not an ending. Beneath the frozen ground, spring is already at work, and nature feels no need to proclaim it aloud. Spring has always arrived this way: without sound.

Nature follows its unyielding order. The turning of the seasons does not bend to human impatience or desire; winter deepens so that spring may grow more faithfully beneath it, and the darker the night, the more precisely dawn keeps its promise. Before such order, we come to understand that we are not masters who command the flow of time, but learners who move within it. What we are called to do is not to rush ahead, but to endure and wait where we stand.

In that waiting, we are taught our own fragility. We falter before time that refuses our will, and we tremble before a cold that seems endless. Yet it is precisely within this fragility that humility takes root. To accept that not all things yield to effort, that certain seasons can only be crossed through patience, is to grow closer to the rhythm of nature itself.

Spring, then, becomes a quiet lesson. It testifies—without raising its voice—that change arrives in its own time, without haste. Just as blossoms appear only after winter has endured, so too must human lives pass through silence and restraint before renewal becomes possible. Even now, as the air remains sharp with cold, it carries the unmistakable direction of spring. Trusting this, we continue to learn—one season at a time. ***

February 4, 2026

Ipchun, Beginning of Spring
 

At Sungsunjae (崇善齋)

{Solti}

한국어 번역: https://www.ktown1st.com/blog/VALover/348343