On a recent trip to Tofino on the west coast of Vancouver Island, I found myself overcome by a large set of breaking waves in the surf zone. One wave after another pummeling me, pushing me underwater and towards fear as fatigue began to set in and I began to think that I could not survive one more wave. When will it stop? How can I get out of this?
‘Ironically’, I was asking the same questions in my life. Feeling trapped in an all too familiar situation I thought I had already moved beyond. But here it was again dominating my life, and here I was again trying to stop it, trying to escape it. The more I focused on that, the more the situation built in intensity, along with a torrent of feelings and emotions I was also trying to push aside. How did this old way of reacting again ensnare me?
The trip to Tofino was an important shift in being. In honoring my need to step away from the situation long enough, I was able to express and honor my feelings and emotions, acquire a new perspective, and receive the messages that are always waiting to be heard when one is open. I received:
• “Focus on what you want, not on what you do not want”;
• “Always feel the feelings, and sit in gratitude until it surpasses the reactivity” (thank you Bev); and
• Pema Chodron’s relaying of her spiritual mentor’s advice “So the waves keep coming, and you keep cultivating your courage and bravery and sense of humour to relate to this situation of the waves, and you keep getting up and going forward. After awhile, it will begin to seem to you that the waves are getting smaller and smaller.” “It isn’t that the waves stop coming, it’s that because you train in holding the rawness of vulnerability in your heart, the waves just appear to be getting smaller and smaller, and they don’t knock you over anymore.”1
The morning before leaving Tofino I smiled at the sight on the beach. Algae scattered all about in the swash zone as you see in the photo below. Somehow it was symbolic of all my previous disorganized, highly charged thoughts, feelings, and emotions that would have been strewn about like a yard sale much like the algae had I let it build to the breaking point.
Sometimes there is a deeper level of awareness and learning we must journey through. I left Tofino with a deeper gratitude for my life, for my life experiences, and felt stronger, more empowered and ready to experience what I want. It has begun and I am gratefully in this.
1Chodron, Pema. 2015. Fail Fail Again Fail Better. Sounds True, USA.