What’s the big picture?
That’s been the burning question in my life lately. Yes, I know that life gets lived in small, daily choices, and it’s wonderful to be in the moment, and yet, living like that can leave a person feeling like a rat in a maze.
I don’t know about you, but I’d rather be the scientist.
I’ve been thinking about this because my life has been in a mahoosive state of flux lately, which is why I have caught myself envying those I know who have big-picture plans in place. It would be easy to live life that way, because if you have a one-year plan, a five-year plan you can make every decision accordingly, right?
Now, nowhere in anyone’s planning did they imagine life during a pandemic, which is an important lesson. We can have the big plans, the future goals, but other things can and will come into play in our day-to-day lives and decisions, whether we want them to or not.
As I’ve navigated my current uncertainty, one friend suggested I channel Bruce Lee’s mantra: “Be water.” Flow with and around. Let the Energy move me where it will.
This idea is beautiful, wise . . . and I fight against it like a fish on a hook.
When I was growing up, my family used to snowmobile. There were five of us in my family, but we always had only four snowmobiles. My brothers got to drive their own machines while I had to ride in a metal sled my father had constructed. He would hook it onto the back of his snowmobile, and I would get dragged around the forest for eight hours in temps that were often below zero.
At my father’s funeral, a family friend and I reminisced about those trips. We both laughed when he said, “I don’t know how anyone thought that was a good idea.”
The intention was sound. Heck, honorable, even. My parents wanted to keep me safe. The impact of that experience, though, left an indelible mark on me—it made me feel as if I couldn’t manage the big and the powerful, to steer myself in my own direction. When I am told to go with the flow, I feel like I am being put back in that sled.
The answer (as it almost always does) comes back to balance, that ever-elusive and ephemeral state of being. The thing we all want, but few of us can ever find, at least not for long. Because how can we feel as if we have a sense of agency and trust the Flow?
How can we manage when it feels as if the Universe is putting up wall after wall inside our mazes and offering us all kinds of side roads that might be far more interesting and surprising but that lead us away from where we thought we were supposed to be going?
How do we stay present, open to what is when we feel so hooked by uncertainty that we have no idea what to do next?
One thought is to look for the small openings. This was the advice of a race car driver. Yes, there is a checkered flag up ahead . . . and the best place to keep your attention is in the moment. That’s where you can explore the tiny possibilities that little by little will move you into the places you want to be.
Another way of thinking about it? In The Alpinist, a documentary about a young mountain climber whose feats have astounded the rock-climbing community, you see him climb an ice floe. He tries this spot with an ice pick. Then another. When he finds a place that will hold, he moves slowly, surely. Before long, he transitions, and now he’s climbing a sheer cliff of rock with only the tiniest of hand and footholds.
There is not one ounce of tension in his body as he climbs. He is determined, focused, but not stressed. Fear wasn’t going to bring any good into the situation, and in fact, it would have probably had disastrous consequences. He is centered, intent, making choice after choice that inch him closer to where he wants to go.
It sounds like an insurmountable feat—to be absolutely present in the immediate moment, to flow like water, to look for the small openings, to stretch beyond our comfort zones and leave fear out of it as we move toward the checkered flag, the top of the mountain.
But when we get centered and clear, we can decide intentionally—what is it in our lives that makes us feel safe and alive? What grounds us and invites us to grow?
How can we answer those questions? We can get curious . . . experimenting just like a scientist. If I do this, what happens? How about this?
We can check in with our guts. What feels right? What might make us uncomfortable now, but is going to lead to a fuller, fiercer self? What can we put in place right now that will move us closer toward what’s next?
We might not always know exactly where we are going.
We might feel like we are out of control and in this moment, whatever it is offering us, we . . . can . . . breathe.
We can trust our choices.
We can move without fear and live light and shine.
I'm rethinking The Alpinist because of this post :-)