The Problem with the Written Word & Why Nature is a Better Communicator

As a writer, the written word is a massive part of my life.

It’s also the way I process life, the way I make sense of loss, love, fear, and joy. Writing is how I hold on to fleeting moments, how I remember, how I let go.

It’s also my work. My passion. My anchor. And as a lifelong reader, I’ve found deep connection, comfort, and companionship through the words of others.

I love reading. Always have. I can fall into a book for hours and feel more at home inside someone else’s sentences than I do in a crowded room.

Reflections... Lake O'Hara

But lately, I’ve been thinking about something that’s bothered me for years and that is the problem with the written word.

You see as much as it connects us, it also leaves a lot of space for misinterpretation.

I truly believe the written word lacks tone. It lacks body language. It lacks the softness in your voice when you're joking or the tension when you're not. When I text someone, I might be sending a quick thought, but the person on the other end can read it as irritated, cold, too blunt, or worse, completely out of context. They apply their own emotion, their own filters, their own momentary state to my words.

And the scariest part? That’s not just texting. That’s emails, that’s social media captions, and yes, even books and articles.

Words, once released, belong as much to the reader as they do to the writer. And that’s beautiful… but it’s also deeply frustrating. Because sometimes, no matter how carefully we craft a sentence, it’s still read through someone else’s lens. Their pain, their history, their assumptions.

This ambiguity drives me a bit nuts and has been a bone of contention as of late.

I think that’s why I love nature so much. Out there, in the wild, there’s no pretending. The communication is direct, rooted, quite literally, beneath our feet.

Take the mycorrhizal fungi I have mentioned before, as an example. These underground networks (the “Wood Wide Web”) connect trees and plants to each other in astonishing ways. Through these tiny fungal threads, trees send warnings, share nutrients, signal distress, and even support each other’s survival. It’s not metaphor, it’s science.

And it’s direct. It’s not open to interpretation. A tree doesn't question whether the signal means what it thinks it means. The fungi send the message, the tree receives it, and the forest responds. There’s no second-guessing, no twisted context.

Wood Wide Web

What would it be like, I wonder, to communicate like that?

No room for confusion. Just clear, unfiltered truth. Could you imagine?

And yet… even in nature, we apply our human lens. We watch a deer and assume it’s skittish. We look at a raven and call it mischievous. We see a storm and call it angry. We name nature's behaviour in human terms because it’s the only language we know. We judge it from our seat on the trail or our cozy deck with a tea in hand. But nature doesn’t owe us explanations. It’s not emotional in the way we are. It’s instinctual. It reacts and adjusts and survives in a way that is honest, neutral, and immediate.

Maybe that’s what I’m after. That kind of honesty.

Denali and I on Whiteswan Lake

When I was paddling on Whiteswan Lake a few months ago, just me, my dog Denali, a gentle breeze and not a single soul in sight. The turquoise-blue water lapped softly at the shore as I pulled up onto a quiet bank, a place that called to me without words. I laid out my laptop in front of me and just started writing. No noise (except the sweet song of birds and the gentle lap of the water on shore). No performance. No expectation. And something about being in that setting cracked me open. The words flowed in a way they hadn’t in months. I wrote an entire chapter I hadn’t even realized I needed to write.

There was no misinterpretation there. Nature didn’t ask for clarification. It didn’t analyze my tone. It was just quiet, present, accepting. And it made space for me to be the same.

This memory reminds me of something we often forget: While the written word is a gift, it is not infallible. It is vulnerable to the reader’s interpretation. That can be a beautiful thing, it allows connection, personalization, shared meaning. But it can also be a double-edged sword. Because you can pour your heart into a piece of writing, and someone else might still miss the entire point.

So maybe the reminder is this: The written word, like any tool, is only as effective as the intention and the perception behind it. It can unite us or confuse us. It can offer clarity or chaos.

But nature... Nature just is.

And if we could plug into that kind of raw, unfiltered network like the trees do, no guessing, no assumptions, just deep-rooted understanding, we might communicate less often, but far more meaningfully.

Until then, I’ll keep writing. I’ll keep paddling. I’ll keep hiking up into the alpine where the mountains tower over me and put everything else in perspective. Where the wind doesn’t ask for punctuation, and the rivers don’t need approval to run wild.

Maybe that’s what I’m really trying to say.

Let’s keep writing. But let’s also listen. And when things feel misunderstood, maybe we just need to walk into the woods and ask the forest what it meant.