The Price of Progress: Musings From the Edges of the Islands
In its quest for success,Nothing stands in man′s way.Old rivers run dry, soon the birds wouldn't fly. The mountains will be no longer high.And when I really think of it.I does wonder why, oh why - King Austin
This past month, I’ve been moving through the remote corners of a few Caribbean islands — the places where the road narrows, the signal drops, and life returns to its original pace. Every day has felt like a soft reminder of what abundance actually looks like. Mangoes falling freely. Rivers running clear. Beaches that aren’t curated or branded, just lived with. Trees that feed, shade, heal, and hold stories.
People here still use the land as part of their lifestyle — not as an aesthetic, not as a weekend escape, but as a way to eat, to heal, to live. And it has been such a joy to witness.
But alongside that joy, I’ve been noticing something else: a quiet, persistent rush to “modernize.” A desire to trade natural remedies for packaged pills, fresh fruit for imported snacks, wooden homes for concrete boxes, communal beaches for private ones, silence for loud music, and slow mornings for the fast, shiny promise of “progress.”
And it made me pause.
What exactly is the price of progress?
Is progress the brick house, the car with the right badge, the fizzy drinks and candies we see in movies? Is it the packaged food that lasts longer on a shelf than it does in our bodies? Is it the curated lifestyle that looks good online but feels hollow in real life?
Or is progress something quieter — something we’ve forgotten how to measure?
Because I keep thinking about this:
People who live with the sunrise over the hills and the ocean every single day sometimes stop seeing it. Meanwhile, people who don’t have it pay thousands of dollars to experience it for a week.
How does something so priceless become invisible?
How do we become immune to the very things others dream of?
The trade-offs we don’t talk about
Every choice has a cost.
Every version of “success” asks for something in return.
When we choose concrete over wood, what do we give up?
When we choose packaged food over fruit from the yard, what do we lose?
When we choose convenience over connection, what slips quietly out of our hands?
I’m not romanticizing hardship or pretending that natural living solves everything. I’m simply asking: Are we paying attention to what we’re trading away?
Because the more I walk through these communities, the more I see that the things we call “simple” are actually sophisticated forms of wisdom. The things we call “modern” often come with hidden costs — to our health, our environment, our sense of belonging, our pace, our joy.
Maybe progress isn’t a destination
Maybe progress is alignment.
Maybe success is spaciousness.
Maybe abundance is the ability to choose — consciously, intentionally — rather than inherit someone else’s definition of a good life.
And maybe, just maybe, the life I want to live is one I can create.
Not by rejecting modernity, but by choosing what feels true.
Not by preaching, but by becoming a demonstration of what is possible.
A life where the sunrise still moves me.
Where food tastes like the land it came from.
Where healing is not a product but a practice.
Where progress doesn’t cost me the very things that make me feel alive.
These are just some musings from my daily travels and walks — but they’re shaping me. They’re asking me to redefine success on my own terms. And they’re reminding me that the most meaningful progress might be the kind that brings us back to ourselves.
Peace and Blessings