Imagine you are in your favorite forested place. There are lush green trees all around with peaks of bright blue sky overhead.
In the distance you hear what sounds like a faint trickle of water. You are a curious person, and so you begin to walk in the direction of the sound. As you get closer, the sound of the running water grows louder. You continue to walk until you find yourself at the bank of a flowing river. In some spots the water rushes quickly and powerfully. There are also some deep and wide pools into which the narrow, sweeping streams of water pour out and open up. Here the flow is almost imperceptible. As you look downstream you see that there are some rocky parts, and then also some trees and turns kind of obstructing your view.
At the bank of one of the pools, where you stand, the water is the most incredible shade of blue. You just… I mean, you have got to feel this water. So, you take off your shoes and socks and anything else you don’t want to get wet, and you dip your toes in the water. The temperature is absolutely perfect. You step your other foot in the water and shuffle your feet around in the water. You wade up to your ankles, then your knees, and before you know it you’re in up to your waist.
By this time you’ve wandered toward the middle of this pool, and the under current is stronger here. You dig your feet into the riverbed, but it’s hard to stand and resist drifting downstream. Your legs are getting tired. You look to the shore where your shoes and your stuff are waiting for you. You look downstream. You take a full breath in, and then as you exhale you lift both feet off the river floor, lie back, surrender to the pull of the current, and it carries you down river.
I don’t know what happens to you after this… and neither do you.
There is a current flowing within each of us. It is deeper, truer, and more constant that any roles that we play, jobs or careers that we have, relationships we are part of, or identities that we hold. Stepping into the current requires curiosity and courage. Letting the current carry us requires that we surrender and have faith.
The poet, Mark Nepo, describes surrender as “finding your current and going with it.” Judith Hanson Lasater says this of faith:
“…faith is the willingness to experience reality as it is, including the acceptance of the unknown… Faith is the quiet cousin of courage.” —Living Your Yoga
When we’re flowing in the current and we follow the aliveness, staying close to whatever it is that brings alive, our identity evolves naturally. Mark Nepo talks about when we identify ourselves and try to concretize our identity (he uses examples like I am a writer, or I am a gardener, or I am a singer):
“We’re being turned into a noun when the aliveness is in staying a verb.” — Mark Nepo
Awaken your curiosity, tap into your bottomless well of courage, step into the river, and then surrender to the pull of the current. Release the identities, the ego, the titles, the attempt to make it all make sense or accumulate to something. Do the things that bring you alive — there’s your current, your path to a full, meaningful, and connected life.
Krystal Barschig 