Easing into the current flow of life.

​Over the 4th of July weekend my sister and I took a quick road trip to Steamboat Springs, Colorado. This year I had planned to go to Japan but because of COVID-19 that trip was cancelled and I, like most people right, needed to get out and have a change of scenery. We felt a road trip to a small mountain town would be the best choice given our current situation with COVID-19.

The drive to Steamboat Springs from Salt Lake City is roughly a five-and-a-half-hour drive, it may seem long but the drive is absolutely beautiful, making the time fly by. With rolling hills, green mountains, and quiet small towns there is a lot to see on the route from Utah to Colorado.
We spent three days hiking, exploring, floating the Yampa River, and getting take out at some of the nice restaurants found on the main street. This is beginning to sound like a travel blog so let me skip a head to the point of this story…

On Sunday we purchased floating tubes and decided to spend the afternoon floating the Yampa River while enjoying some local products that can only be purchased in a few select states. We had a beautiful, easy, access point to the river behind our hotel. We loaded up a water proof to-go bag with snacks, water, and treats, tossed our tubes in the river, jumped on and off we floated for the afternoon.

As we floated the river, we crossed paths with many of the locals, they’d wave hello, we’d have some small talk, they’d compliment on how adorable my sisters’ dog is. About an hour into our float we are a few meters behind a large group of about 15 people roughly our same age. There is a fork in the river, the large group heads to the right and our tubes head to the left, the group starts screaming at us, “Don’t go that way! Don’t go that way!” My sister and I look at each other and think, “Oh crap!” This was our first time floating this river and seeing how we didn’t know the path or where certain areas go, we listened to the people yelling at us. I grab onto the nearest branch and try and pull us out of the water, but the current is rough in this area. The dog, Sabine, falls into the water and goes under, thank goodness for the life jacket she was wearing, I grab the jacket and lift her up. There I am standing in a low rapid holding her dog, all our belongings, and the tubes while my sister makes it to shore. Once she made it to the shore, I begin to pass her Sabine and our belongings, while I drag the tubes to the shore. At this point we are socked, cold, and at a loss of what to do. We can’t make our way back upstream, there is no where to go but down the path we were told not to go.

A few moments pass as we get our bearings and a cute couple float by us. We ask, “Is it safe to go this way? People told us not to.” The young couple respond, “It’s fine to go this way, it’s a bit bumpy but it looks like you already passed the worst of it.”

My sister and I look at each other like, “Did we just panic over nothing!”

We gather our things get back in to the tubes and continue on.The path we were told not to go was peaceful, quiet, and had a lot less people. Simply put, it was extraordinarily beautiful! After about twenty minutes the two small rivers reconnected and we found ourselves floating behind the large group of people that told us not to go the way we did.

This experience was one of the most remarkable experiences I have ever had in regards to going with the flow. Is there a better example of going with the flow than going with the flow of a river? If we had gone with the flow, we could’ve avoided so much hardship and struggle. If we didn’t panic when there was a slight change of current, Sabine may have not fallen into the river. Our panic caused another living creature to suffer. Our panic pulled us out of the present and created a moment of chaos and confusion. Our panic created doubt, uncertainty, fear, and anger all in a blink of an eye.

This lesson is vitally important for everyone given the climate of American right now. We have found our country going down a path that is unfamiliar and scary. With coronavirus shaping our daily lives by social distancing, wearing masks, working from home or not at all, and being asked to stay at home. Then we have the Black Lives Matter movement demanding justice for police brutality, the removal of outdated statues, and creating a social environment where people of color can feel safe and have the same opportunities as white people.

Some Americans are going with the flow of change; wearing masks, donating time and money to non-profits, working from home and so on. Then you see some who are trying to go against the current of change, not wearing masks, waving the Confederate Flag, and saying they will not change, they do not accept the new normal and want to keep things how they were before all this uncontrollable change happened.      

There is this phrase from Tony Kushner’s stage play, Angles in America. “Nothing is lost forever, in this world there is kind of a painful progress, longing for what we’ve left behind and dreaming ahead.”
Everything is impermeant, people, objects, thoughts, theories, life itself. We can make progress while remembering the past, because nothing is lost forever, the memory will be written in books, it will live in our minds. To resist the current of change will only cause harm and usually it will harm those who are resisting, but we long for the past because it is safe, it is comfortable. We dream ahead because that’s what humans do; we dream. In order for a dream to become a reality it will be uncomfortable for us, like a seed growing into a flower, it will break from its shell and fight its way to blossom into its true potential.

It is important to know that going with the flow can be uncomfortable and may create a sense of uncertainty, but to deny the fact that change is inevitable is more difficult. Ignorance is bliss until it is challenged.
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Accept life how it is, go with the flow, and my sense is that by understanding and living this concept your life can and will have more ease.

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