Many people head into nature, be it for fly fishing or some other pursuit, to get away from everything. Everything, of course, is relative. You’re not getting away from the woods. You’re not getting away from fishing. And you’re certainly not getting away from yourself.

And no one is wrong for using that turn of phrase. Everything is normalcy. Everything is the suburbs. Everything is Monday to Friday and commuting and email notifications and go go go. All that is the everything you’re getting away from.

Getting away is good. We were made to rest. We were made to rest daily through sleep. We were also made to take an extended rest on a weekly basis. Whether your worldview is built upon divine revelation or materialism, scripture and science agree that your mind and body need rest. Rest isn’t just laying down with our eyes closed. Rest means stopping our normal, routine, everything and doing something different and rejuvenating.

You could say that when you get away from everything you’re purposefully getting into something.

For the fly fisher that means attempting to fool a fish using a fake bug. There is more to it than that; the ubiquitous art and literature of angling won’t let you forget it. The problem is that the fish don’t always do what you want them to do. They want to eat the other bugs. Or they don’t want to eat any bugs at the particular moment that you are there with your thousands of dollars worth of gear. Or, most infuriating, they wouldn’t mind eating your fake bug… they just don’t want you to be such a clumsy, uncoordinated oaf about the whole thing.

This is restful. This is what you got away from everything to enjoy. So maybe, just maybe, there is more to it than catching that fish.

There absolutely is more than that. Being out there is another part of the everything. Its just that this part gives the everything you’re getting away from a richer meaning. Cold, calculating, and callous people become introspective. The pace and the quotas are self-imposed. The deadlines are arbitrary. No walls, no work boots, no spreadsheets and somehow things get done just inside your head. Always intermittent banter, sometimes with another person.  Still, in and through and especially at the end of it there is a good chance that there was real progress. And what is work if not progress?

Work and rest are good, each in their own time. That dynamic isn’t the problem. The problem is our imbalance. If one is elevated or disregarded, we’re throwing our minds and our bodies and even our souls out of whack. A few hours or a few weeks trying to catch fish or sitting on a mountainside isn’t going to fix that. However, purposefully addressing that imbalance while fly fishing or hiking might be the perfect pathway to progress.

You never truly get away from everything. So? Get away with some purpose: purpose to rest, purpose to work. Getting away only matters if you can come back. Getting away only means something if you come back better.