As I stare out of my window this Kailua morning, I am greeted by three coconut trees. The same three coconut trees who watched my brothers and I play football on the road, play baseball in our yard, and chase each other down the road yelling, “Just wait till you get back home!” during one of our brotherly love moments when we were kids.

The sounds of birds waking up fill the air as the wind rushes over the land. The sun gleams through the window and into my eyes. I don’t mind it. The clouds shield most of the rays. I think, How can I simplify this life in paradise? It used to be much simpler when I was younger. But in today’s world with new technology popping up every minute and our minds functioning like Twitter Feeds, where do we find time for silence. For solitude.

Gas prices go down and car sales go up. More residential developments rise from the ground and there is an increase of homeless people. Big chain stores come to Hawaii while small local businesses get pushed out. More people move to the islands as more people born and raised in Hawaii move away.

The sun now peeks over the pillowy clouds that rest on the horizon, I stare back at the three coconut trees and think of my brothers. There’s three of us – one living in California, while the other lives just a door away from me in our family’s house, but yet we feel distant.

People become distant from what matters most to them during times of change. Our perspectives, our visions, and our way of life are results of our experiences. We can resist change and fight back against the struggle but as I watch the three coconut trees sway back and forth in the thrashing wind, they don’t resist nor do they fall over. They stand strong and rooted in who they are and what they stand for.

While change is inevitable, it doesn’t mean you have to change who you are. It doesn’t mean you have to fit the mold and acclimate yourself to the new trends, fashions, technology, and new “hip” and “lively” culture that is reviving so-called underdeveloped areas. They say we must change in order to see change. What they don’t mention is that you don’t really change, you just become stronger in who you were in the first place.

I hope my two older brothers understand what it means to stay rooted and to not resist or change with the wind. I hope you understand. Maybe like the three coconut trees, who have been calling out to me all these years and only now do I hear them, we should all think about what matters most to us and take root within them.

Aloha. A hui hou. Malama Pono.