As Wonderful as We Let It

It’s a beautiful sunny day here in Dana Point. I have a couple mid-morning meetings and I am finally able to leave just before 10:00. It’s 64 degrees outside according to my phone that I have granted the power of omniscience. On the web cams, the water looks pretty stirred up. I don’t see white caps, but I figure I better get to the beach before things get too blown out - not that that should really stop me. When did a little wind ever hurt anyone? Ok. I probably shouldn’t answer that question.

It’s a pleasant drive to the Strand parking lot. I wonder if I am going to find a parking spot in my usual row of spaces and then I see my favorite spot is available. Well isn’t this wonderful? Then I get out of the car and the sun hits my skin and I am tempted to just stop moving because right here where I am seems like it must be better than any other place in the entire world. Why would I want to go anywhere else? Interesting question, but I have to get in the water.

As I walk down the stairs, I look at the water and it sure looks like the current is moving north. This is totally not what I was expecting because the surf report showed the wind coming from the northwest. Is this just an optical illusion and the water just LOOKS like it is coming from the north but really it is coming from the south? I don’t know and I begin to figure it probably doesn’t matter. Nope. Doesn’t matter at all.

The tide is high. It just peaked at 4.4 which isn’t very high so I am surprised to see the water coming all the way to the rocks. Did the surf report get the wind AND the tide wrong? What’s going on here? Again, it doesn’t matter. Here I am - at the beach. It is warm and sunny. The water feels good on my feet. Life has got to be good.

I get in the water and make it past these inshore waves. I start to swim and head north today. There is a lot of movement in the water. The current is definitely moving north. There is no optical illusion here. Below the surface, I can see sand and effervescence moving like wild clouds lending a white and light brown color to their swirling storms that rage around the rocks that rest on the ocean floor.

It doesn’t take long before I realize that the water feels warmer than I expected it to. It’s still not as warm as it was Sunday but it feels pretty nice and I am perfectly comfortable. I’m not warm, but I am very content to be exactly where I am at. Earlier today I was asking myself why it is that I do this. I was not all that eager to come here. Why do I do this? Is this just some identity that I have created for myself that I feel like I need to embody? Is this a story I have written that I feel the need to continue to narrate? Would I be better off doing something else or spending my time elsewhere. It’s all coming back to me now. I understand now why I am here. It’s not something I can package up in a nice little sentence here, but I understand. This water gives me life. I can’t tell you why exactly. Or maybe I could, but I’d never stop if I got started.

I can’t help but wonder what the swim back is going to be like. I stop a few times on the way to the Monarch Bay Beach Club and I just watch wake after wake flow past me on their north bound journey. I can feel them push me along as I swim. As I monitor my course along the beach, I am surprised at the speed of my progress. It seems like I make it to my destination is record time. I wonder what kind of a tempest I will have on my way back as I plow head on into the oncoming current. All I know is that if I could make it back last Sunday, I can certainly make it back today.

I remember Sunday’s inner dialog. There is no need to struggle here. I just need to let myself relax and keep moving. Yes, it will be a slow ride, but I will make it back soon enough. It is even easier to have faith in this on this bright sunny day. Even though there is a lot of water making its way into my nose and mouth, I find that I am slipping into a rhythm that feels far from a struggle. The water is just water and it makes room for my body to move against it. I find a peace in the midst of this seeming turmoil.

It’s almost as though it doesn’t matter how rough or strong this current is. If I can keep moving, I will keep heading further south until I reach the place I need to be. I am reminded of this time in my life when I thought it was so incredibly important to get my college degree. I hated school. I was so miserable, but I thought it was something I had to do. There was failure after failure after failure. School after school. Major after major. Then I eventually got the degree in some major I never ever would do anything with and I would soon launch a lucrative career where none of my employers cared about a degree. All of my struggle was self created. All I had to do was keep moving and follow my intuitions and knowings and desires. It could have been so much easier and enjoyable.

Speaking of school, I am reminded of that one English Literature class I took. I had a TA (not even the professor) who completely changed the way I approached writing. Maybe this one class was the entire reason for staying in school. We would be given assignments to write papers about these books. Just like school in general, I would struggle with these assignments. I would try and try to shape my thoughts and ideas on paper and fall into this trough of depression and miss the assignment deadline. Then I would finally have a break through and turn it in and the TA would write “best in class” on the paper. Did I need to struggle so? My struggle was all about fear of failure. I thought I had to push through the problem but I really just needed to let it sit and take shape on its own and have faith that it would emerge.

I’m thinking about the life I have ahead of me now. I struggle and worry that I will never build the life I want to have and that I will be eternally stuck right where I am. These thoughts simply are not true and makes things so much more difficult than they need to be. I just need to have faith that my best life is in front of me. I just have to receive it. It’s not that I don’t have to work. I don’t even mind work. I like to work hard really. But I don’t like to agonize over things and you know what? I don’t need to.

So here I am swimming against this strong current. This does not have to be difficult and I am in fact having a wonderful time. It is slow going but it feels great. I bob here on the surface and in the sun and there is shimmering blue all around and above and below me. I just keep my arms and legs moving because that’s what we humans do. We were made to move. We were born to traverse a path. Now I don’t know about all the time, because there are hard times we have to go through. But sometimes. I know for sure that sometimes, this path can be as wonderful as we let it.