I’ve spent hours watching bindweed spiral through hedgerows, its stems testing the air with what can only be described as deliberate intelligence. Each tendril reaches out, touches, assesses, then either commits or releases. What strikes me isn’t the holding on, it’s the letting go.
Most climbing plants could strangle themselves if they gripped too tightly. They’d pour energy into clutching dead wood whilst fresh support stood inches away. But they don’t. They test, they adjust, they release what isn’t working. It’s survival intelligence coded into their growth pattern.
We’re terrible at this, aren’t we? We white-knuckle our way through failing strategies, dead relationships, careers that stopped serving us years ago. We mistake persistence for virtue, as if letting go were somehow admitting defeat. Meanwhile, the bindweed continues its spiral, releasing a dozen potential supports to find the one that’ll carry it towards the light.
There’s a particular moment you can observe if you’re patient enough: when a tendril touches something unsuitable and pulls back. Not slowly, not reluctantly. Decisively. It doesn’t waste time analysing why this particular stick won’t work. It simply redirects its energy elsewhere.
That’s the bit we could learn from. Not the dramatic letting go of things we know are finished, but the swift, intelligent release of what looked promising but isn’t actually serving our growth. The project that seemed brilliant six months ago. The approach that worked last year but doesn’t fit now. The grip we’re maintaining purely because we’ve already invested the effort.
The bindweed cares about growing. Sometimes the most intelligent thing you can do is uncurl your fingers and reach for something better.