Learning to Float

I am a doer. When things are difficult, I make a plan and full steam ahead to solutions. Sometimes, making plans is not the right tactic. Sometimes, you just have to float.

What do I mean by float? Floating is when you allow the circumstances to play out without trying to push a solution. Floating is seeing what happens naturally. Floating is allowing the universe to decide on the proper action. Floating is just floating.

I learned to float when I went through some financial hard times. I couldn't figure a way out. I looked for solutions and couldn't find any. I was stuck. It was a new sensation. I usually am very focused. I know my path and I follow it. This time I was pathless. I kept begging the universe, "Send me a sign! A big neon sign! I can't find my way." And the universe was silent. There were no signs, not even tiny little scratchings on a piece of scrap paper. I didn't know what to do.

Into this empty, silent, signless black hole came an image, a remembrance of being in the ocean and floating. The sea would take me wherever it wanted. I would bob like a piece of flotsam on the tide. It was a peaceful, liberating feeling to be going nowhere, to be a part of the ebb and flow of the water. There was no stress to make shore, no need to drive in any direction.

This memory became my mantra. "Just float Royce," I'd admonish myself when I became anxious over a lack of goals. "Just float, enjoy the ride. No need to make plans. They will eventually emerge. The tide eternally rolls into shore. You will find your way."

It took me six months to learn to embrace floating. At first, I struggled. You can drown when you struggle in the water. I almost did a couple of times. But as the floating took hold, I learned to love the weightlessness and peace of floating. I could sit and let life rush around me without anxiety. And mercifully, I floated into shore and onto the path of my graduate education.

Well, I'm at that point again--directionless, without a goal. I have to begin again to float. I thought the second time would be easier, but I'm a fighter--I want to blaze away. So I have to learn to float again.

Good things come out of floating. I try to remember that as I thrash in the water. A time at sea makes port much more appreciated when you arrive. One must remember that it is in the journey not the destination where the adventure lies.

Okay Royce, just float. Let the water take you where it will. Just float until you find your way.