Looking For Calm

If you could give one piece of advice to a large group of people, what would it be?”
 “When a wave comes, go deep.”
“I think I’m going to need an explanation for that one.”
“There’s three things you can do when life sends a wave at you. You can run from it, but then it’s going to catch up and knock you down. You can also fall back on your ego and try to stand your ground, but then it’s still going to clobber you. Or you can use it as an opportunity to go deep, and transform yourself to match the circumstances. And that’s how you get through the wave.”                             -From Humans of New York

I can remember being in the ocean with Caroline when she was about four. I ventured out a bit too far with her and realized we were caught in that “in between place” where we could not go up and over the wave, because we were not out far enough, and yet we were far enough out where we risked having each wave crash on us. I told Caroline to hold her breath because we were going under. And so I held on tight and dragged her down with me letting the wave wash over us, feeling its power and churn as we resurfaced. There were also second and third waves too, ones I continued to be ill prepared to handle. Seemingly they emerged from nowhere. We quickly took a breath and submerged again. After getting walloped three times, I managed to get the two of us to a small sandbar where we found our footing. And somehow we managed to get to the shore before being enveloped by another set. I remember being frightened, and I know our daughter was too, because she stayed out of the ocean for an extended period of time after that experience.
We went down to Ocean City last spring and stayed at a friend’s place on the beach. The sound of the ocean waves crashing against the shore is among my most favorite. I woke up early one morning and watched a surfer for a about an hour. A couple of things struck me as I watched him. He looked so small against the expanse of the ocean. He paddled along methodically and seemed to choose his waves patiently, carefully and after getting tossed about, paddled back and waited again. He “duck-dived” under many more waves than he chose to ride, which I have come to learn is an essential component to being a good surfer.
How do we know from which waves we run and which ones we choose to “go deep?” How is it that we keep getting up again and again after getting knocked around –where does the resilience come from that puts us out there in the first place?

I have been considering this wave ducking and diving as analogous to opportunities we have in our lives that are put before us. These can be personal or vocational, and we do not always know when they are going to materialize. Sometimes they come out of the blue, like the wave that surprised Caroline and me and we are swallowed up, spit out, left breathless and unsure how to retreat and recover. Other times we have spent time preparing for them, completing tasks that will help us to reach our goal and fulfill a long-standing dream. When some of them come, we are ready and with others, we must be patient and let them come to us no matter how unsteady that might make us feel. What if we cannot run from them or dive below because we feel paralyzed by anxiety, fear or apprehension about what or who will emerge once the wave has settled? There is always that brief period of calm when the wave has crashed, the backwash stills and the water looks amazingly tranquil. That occurs whether we run, get smacked, or dive deep. I believe that the transformation comes when we go deep because we are risking the unknown, we do not know what lies on the other side, but we do understand the exhilaration that we feel when we’ve taken the plunge.