Where Wonder Meets Work: A Scientist’s Journey To Mindful Living

My journey toward mindful decision-making began in the field, but it blossomed through family, travel, and the quiet lessons found between scientific inquiry and shared experience.

During my Fulbright US Scholar Award in South America, I had the rare opportunity not only to pursue research but also to travel the continent with my spouse and children. As a science couple, we have always combined work with family, but being away from our research labs in a new country was something different for us. I spent a total of four months learning and teaching new skills, conducting research, and presenting our findings in Spanish. The solitude and the reunion with family made me reflect on what is most important to me in both my career and family life.

I chose a little-known country, Uruguay, for my Fulbright Research. Why Uruguay? Uruguay is a small, developed country situated near Argentina and Brazil. It has some of the best beaches in South America and is considered the Riviera of South America, where wealthy Argentinians and Brazilians spend most of their time. It is very European, not only in architecture but also in culture, with a relatively homogenous Spanish and Italian population. But for me, the choice was rooted in my research. The Uruguayan economy is heavily based on cattle, and infectious diseases in cattle cause havoc to their economy. As an infectious disease researcher, I found my home at the Pasteur Institute in Montevideo and the National Agriculture Institute (INIA) in Colonia del Sacramento.

While Montevideo is a big city, it was Colonia del Sacramento, my home away from home, where I first began to slow down. Working at INIA and living in Colonia, I was struck by the way life unfolded gently, with intention. The pace was slower, more deliberate. Mornings weren’t rushed—they began with maté and conversation. Evenings stretched with time to walk by the beach, observe, and reflect. For someone used to the tightly packed schedules of academic life, this was disorienting and painfully slow at first. I know I wasn’t the fun visitor, but I wanted to get started with my experiments as soon as I got to the lab. However, things work differently in different places, and we learn to adapt accordingly. My colleagues while joked about me being "too American" (even though they were all South American ), helped me see the value of work-life balance. Their day started with maté (which in itself is a whole ritual of slowing down) and chit-chat, focused working until lunch and then a relaxed lunch hour with conversations before going back to work, and everyone left work at 4 o'clock (8-4). To me, that was too short a day. We ahve always sent our kids to before and after care so we can have time to do everything we "need" to do in a day.

Slowly, I adjusted. I began to notice things I’d been missing: how the light changed on the cobblestones at dusk, the sound of church bells, the rhythm of laughter in the plazas. I learned to relax and enjoy dinner at the beachside, just people-watching with a maté in hand, as my Uruguayan, Argentine, and Brazilian coworkers did.

The stillness of the mornings and the gentle cadence of beach life invited me to pay attention in ways I hadn’t before. I learned that not everything needs to be rushed. Some things—like breakfast with my family on our fourth-floor balcony overlooking the beach or observing the subtle changes in trees as we transitioned from Southern summer to fall—were richer when unhurried. I wasn't accustomed to a 3-4 hour brunch/lunch on the weekend, but my South American friends made me relax and enjoy the 5-course meals, wine/coffee, and laughter.

As we journeyed through Chile, the contrast between the vibrant streets of Santiago and the raw, meditative silence of the Atacama Desert was striking. Walking with my children across the small village of Pedro de Atacama, and under star-studded skies (the Southern sky, where the constellations differ from what we are used to seeing in our Northern Hemisphere), I witnessed their curiosity mirror my own. I found myself explaining adaptations and evolution not as a lecture, but as a conversation, often sparked by their wonder. In return, they taught me about the geology and geography that they had learned in school. While we live in the desert state of Nevada in the USA and are well-acquainted with high desert life, walking through Valley de Luna and gazing at the Mars-like landscape was surreal. As the sun sets, the sky transitions from pink to purple and eventually to black. Floating in the lagoons of Atacama, forgetting everything else, being present in the moment was priceless. The desert offered a rare space for stillness and reflection. With no Wi-Fi and no rushing from one commitment to the next, I had the space to just be—as a scientist, a parent, a partner. It was there that I realized how clarity often emerges not from control, but from presence.

[Fun fact: Valle de la Luna was declared a Nature Sanctuary in 1982 for its natural environment and strange lunar landscape, from which its name is derived. The Atacama Desert is also considered one of the driest places on earth, as some areas have not received a single drop of rain in hundreds of years. A prototype for a Mars rover was tested there by scientists because of the valley's dry and forbidding terrain.]

If there's one thing this trip taught me, it's that there are places in the world that feel less like destinations and more like mirrors—vast, silent landscapes that seem to reflect not just the sky above, but the inner lives of those who step into them. The Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia is one such place. We arrived at the salt flats after a long, dusty journey through winding Bolivian roads and sleepy Andean towns. We walked hand in hand over the shimmering white crust, the children skipping ahead, their laughter echoing in the wind. We sat in the stillness, watching the changing light paint golden streaks across the salt, and spoke about things that mattered: dreams, memories, what it means to belong—not just in the world, but to one another. We hugged each other tightly and let the moment prolong!

One evening, just before sunset, we stood watching the sky burn into hues of lavender and rose. Our 12-year-old son, usually reluctant to share his thoughts, whispered, “It feels like we’re the only people in the world.” He wasn’t far off. And in that gentle solitude, we found an intimacy that city streets and busy schedules had slowly eroded.

In Buenos Aires, Argentina, we danced between the energy of the city and quieter moments as a family. We visited museums and markets, and I was able to share how art and science, like family and work, are not opposites but different expressions of curiosity and care. In Brazil, standing with my family before the powerful force of Iguaçu Falls, I was reminded of nature’s ability to command awe—and the importance of making space for that awe in our daily lives.

Amid the dense subtropical rainforest that surrounds Iguazú Falls, the air was thick with moisture and the sound of rushing water. At the heart of it all was the Garganta del Diablo, the Devil’s Throat—a dramatic drop where torrents of water plunge into a swirling abyss of mist. The rainbows that made a full circle were mesmerizing. The spray drenched our clothes, but no one complained. Our children laughed, wide-eyed, chasing butterflies (Diaethria phlogea, the 89'98 butterfly, only found in SA, was the most loved) that somehow fluttered unbothered amid the chaos. Iguazú was nature turned up to its highest volume, a celebration of power, energy, and uncontainable life.

And then, we flew south—far south—beyond Patagonia, to Ushuaia, the so-called End of the World. If Iguazú was a song of movement, Ushuaia was a meditation in stillness. Nestled between the Martial Mountains and the Beagle Channel, the town is surrounded by icy peaks and long stretches of wind-blown emptiness. The streets were quiet. We boarded a boat into the channel, gliding past lonely islands dotted with sea lions and crowned with birds. At one point, the captain cut the engine. For a moment, there was nothing but wind and water and the soft calls of nature. The Les Eclaireurs Lighthouse, known as “the Lighthouse at the End of the World,” came into view—a solitary sentinel standing against the vastness. The contrast between Iguazú and Ushuaia could not have been more profound. One was green and steamy, overflowing with sound and color; the other, cold and austere, stripped down to its rawest form. But both offered a kind of clarity. At Iguazú, I felt the joy of aliveness, the pulse of the Earth in motion. In Ushuaia, I felt the stillness that comes from standing at the edge of a continent, of thought, of ourselves. Darwin had his first sight of glaciers when they reached the channel on 29 January 1833, and wrote in his field notebook, "It is scarcely possible to imagine anything more beautiful than the beryl-like blue of these glaciers, and especially as contrasted with the dead white of the upper expanse of snow." He was so right!

Sharing my research along the way—with local collaborators, students, and even through informal conversations with fellow travelers—became more than dissemination. It became dialogue. My children asked questions, joined field visits, and watched what it looks like to care deeply about work and family. I was very proud that my 10-year-old daughter insisted (and planned the side trip) to visit Isla de Lobos, a small island located southeast of Punta del Este, Uruguay, that has the largest sea lion colony in the Southern Hemisphere, so that she could get pictures for her school project on the effect of marine pollution on these animals. These moments made the fellowship not just a professional milestone but a shared family journey of learning, discovery, and connection.

When I returned, I brought back more than data or publications. I brought back a new rhythm—one shaped by the places we’d been and the choices we made to live those moments fully. I now make intentional time for the family without guilt, and I bring the same presence to my academic roles—whether writing a grant, mentoring a student, or analyzing results. I've learned that I don't have to choose between being a fully engaged scientist and a fully present parent. Mindful decision-making has allowed me to be both.

This shift hasn’t meant giving up on my academic ambitions. In fact, I find I’m more effective now—more focused in the lab, more thoughtful as a mentor, more grounded as a leader. Mindful decision-making has helped me build a bridge between my personal and professional worlds. Rather than viewing them as competing forces, I now see them as mutually enriching. The same values I bring to my research—attention to detail, listening before acting, valuing process—are the ones that shape how I parent, how I connect with loved ones, and how I lead a life that feels whole. Although I can never get used to the idea of an 8-to-4 workday with an hour break for lunch, this experience has taught me to use my time wisely while enjoying the process.
I read this somewhere, " happiness is our true nature when we are truly free from stress. Find contentment and live it."

I look forward to hearing from you all about how you have learned to slow down and enjoy the moment.

 

Viswamitra ji, you have always been an inspiration. I love your positivity outlook and wisdom. Thank you for the kind words! I am reading your response sitting in my small garden enjoying watching the squirrels (I used to get so upset as they destroy most of my plants) and feeling each word in my heart, not just reading it.

Thank you for always being a motivator on this forum.

 

So true! Cultural immersion (travel in general) widens our horizons. One of my mentors (A Harvard-educated woman who had to fight for her rights to be a faculty member back in the 70s0 once told me, "You can have it all, once you know what you're all is. Maybe not all at once, but definitely all that you fight for!"

 

Thank you @Srama! I think I have been working towards the balance for years, but it all fell into place once I had the opportunity to reflect on what is important to me —as a scientist, a parent, and a partner!