But by taking the time away, getting myself off the treadmill

In the hush between waves, the elders say, a person hears the shape of their own heart. So when Lindsey Buckingham speaks of taking the time away, of getting myself off the treadmill, of slowing down and learning until he had “so much more to give back,” he names the ancient rhythm of renewal: retreat, ripening, and return. We are not endless springs; we are orchards that need winters. The soil of the soul must lie fallow, or it will bear only stunted fruit. His words remind us that sometimes the most courageous step forward is a step aside.

The treadmill he invokes is the ceaseless drum of obligation—the tour, the task, the timeline that leaves no room for breath. In every age it has a different costume: in one, the loom and ledger; in another, the screen and schedule. But the effect is the same: the self becomes a dull instrument, striking the same note until even triumph sounds tired. To step away is not cowardice; it is covenant. It is to say, “I will not offer the world a burnt offering of exhaustion. I will return when my fire is clean.”

Consider a story from the annals of quiet revolutions: Isaac Newton during the plague years. Sent home from Cambridge, cut off from lecture halls and courtly chatter, he did not wither. In that forced slowing down, he studied the fall of apples and the dance of light; he learned until his solitude grew heavy with discovery. When he returned, he had laws to give back—gravity and optics, the grammar of the heavens. What looked like absence became abundance. What seemed like retreat became a deeper advance. So too with artists, leaders, parents, and workers: the interval of stillness is often the womb of the next bright chapter.

There is a moral mathematics here. The faster we move, the thinner we spread; the thinner we spread, the less we can give back. The ancients taught it with fields: after harvest, let the ground rest; sow legumes to restore what was spent; trust the cycle. If the earth itself must be stewarded with pauses, how much more the spirit? The pause is not a luxury; it is a law. Neglect it, and we become brittle. Honor it, and we become whole.

And what of the final whisper in his saying—“Maybe that was something that needed to happen for all of us”? Here is communal wisdom. One person’s sabbath teaches a village to breathe. When a leader models boundary and balance, those in their shadow remember their own humanity. Families soften. Teams unclench. Music grows warmer, work grows wiser, friendship grows roomier. The well that is guarded quenches many; the well that is overdrawn turns to mud.

From this, take a clear lesson: protect your seasons. Practice taking the time away before your life demands it, not after. Keep a rule of life that includes deliberate drift: morning silence, evening walks, a weekly hour when nothing is expected of you. When the world presses you back onto the treadmill, answer with three counsels—slowing down, learning, and then giving back. In that order lies mercy. Reverse the order and you will bleed out your gifts on the wrong altar.

Practical steps for travelers on this path: first, schedule your retreat the way you’d schedule an oath—non-negotiable. Second, choose a craft to learn during your quiet: an instrument, a language, a science; let it strengthen forgotten muscles of wonder. Third, keep a “return ledger”: as insights arrive, note how you will give back—a song to share, a mentorship to offer, a problem to solve. Fourth, when you re-enter the stream, re-enter gently; let the new rhythm hold. In doing these things, you honor a wisdom older than fame: that fruit ripens in silence, and from that silence the world receives its sweetness.