#48 The Quiet Year

Sometimes growth looks like stopping long enough to count leaves.

2025 was a strange year for me.

Strange, because it felt oddly balanced. No major dramas. No big disruptions. And yet, when I look back, some genuinely beautiful things happened.

Isn’t it funny how much better we seem to remember the dramatic years than the beautiful ones?

If you asked me about the years before, I could tell you big stories. The kind with an oh wow effect. Leaving everything behind. Rebuilding from scratch. Walking away, stepping into the unknown. Detaching from the old and constantly stepping forward. So far forward that, at times, I felt lost. Unsure where I belonged. Unsure where “home” was anymore.

And then 2025 arrived.

And things became quieter.

More balanced.

More settled.

Without really noticing it at first, life began to feel a little easier. A little clearer.

And with that came something new for me: the sense that I could finally pause. Slow down. Catch my breath.

What’s interesting is that I wasn’t aware of this while it was happening. When the mind moves along a familiar line of thinking, it can be difficult to realise when the landscape around us has changed.

That awareness only came later — through a book.

In August, I read A Therapeutic Journey: Lessons from The School of Life by Alain de Botton.

In particular, chapter three, Art stayed with me in a way I didn’t expect.

Alain De Botton speaks about Hokusai’s Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji. It is always the same mountain, the same subject, and yet each image reveals a completely different world, depending on perspective, distance, and attention.

He also writes about Muqi Fachang’s Six Persimmons, a painting that, at first glance, appears almost too simple. Just fruit. And yet, the longer one looks, the more depth, balance, and quiet presence reveal themselves.

The idea that struck me most was this:

we think we see the world as it is, but artists see what is actually there because they slow down enough to observe. Through their work, they invite us to slow down too, to pause, and to really look.

I was mesmerised.

Drawing has always been something I loved, so one afternoon (still sitting with these thoughts) I picked up a pencil. I began by copying figures from Hokusai’s work, and something happened almost immediately: my entire system slowed down.

Later, I wanted to draw a place I know intimately: the spot where I spend many mornings watching the ocean. I even had a reference photo. And still, the drawing turned out to be a complete disaster.

That’s when I realised something uncomfortable.

Despite spending countless hours there, I couldn’t actually see the place in my inner eye. No details. No structure. Just a vague impression.

There it was.

I felt like a total beginner.

And strangely enough, this was exactly what I had been unconsciously looking for.

So I kept drawing.

Palm trees became my main subject. But no matter how hard I tried, they always looked slightly off. Something wasn’t right.

I take pride in being a good observer. As a teacher, that is my work. Observing movement, patterns, behaviour, helping people move better in their bodies. And yet, my palm trees looked terrible.

Until I started to actually look.

I counted the leaves.

A healthy palm tree has around ten to fifteen visible leaves. My early drawings had six. Maybe seven.

Lazy shortcuts. The very thing our brains love.

It sounds simple, almost silly. But if you pause for a moment, I’m sure you’ll find your own version of this: moments of seeing without really seeing.

It is not a flaw. It is a feature.

This is how our brains are designed to work.

In psychology, this is often described as predictive processing.

The brain constantly anticipates what it expects to see and fills in the gaps based on past experience. It is a necessary shortcut. Without it, the sheer amount of information around us would overwhelm us.

Which also means: we do not see what is there. We see what we already know.

That realisation opened a door.

For about six weeks, I drew almost every day. I explored different papers, pencils, and techniques. And here I owe a big thank you to my partner (a talented watercolour artist) for endless technical help and guidance.

At some point, without planning it at all, I noticed something: all my drawings shared a common theme.

I was only drawing things that truly mattered to me. And without realising it at first, I was drawing my own past journey.

When I laid the drawings out, I could hear a story — my story, yes, but also a universal one. A story many of us live, just in different landscapes.

Mine happens to include tropical scenes and many, many palm trees. Someone else’s might unfold among snow-covered peaks and low winter sun. Another might move through the desert.

Without planning it, these drawings had become Lost in Paradise, a visual story of walking away, getting lost, and discovering that the only way through is to keep walking.

Creating it made me realise how much actually happened in 2025, how far it was from boring.

This year felt like an ending. Not an ending marked by change or movement, but by deepening.

A year of slowing down. Pausing. Stopping.

There was no single “big thing” this year.

And that gave me the space to go closer instead of further.

And that is what I want to carry into 2026.

2026 is about looking more closely.

Stepping one step closer to what is already in front of me.

Seeing things for what they are and appreciating them as they are.

Seeing people fully. With their beauty and their flaws.

Because we are all strange, imperfect beings, just trying our best.

(drawings above: unripe lemon and palem putri flower, from our garden. Quiet details. Imperfect beauty. The Quiet Year)

Lost in Paradise is the story of walking away.

Of starting a journey without a clear destination. Of getting lost.

And realising that the only way out is to keep walking, one step at a time.

That story now feels complete.

Instead of walking further, I want to stop.

To see.

To look deeper.

Beyond shortcuts.

Beyond masks.

Beyond shallowness.

Deeper into life.

Deeper into connection.

Deeper into the world

and into myself.