20 Jan “Only by letting go of something, you give a space for something new to emerge!”
Dear sailors,
Ship’s bell is ringing, ALL ON BOARD!!!!
My first blog ever, so I am very excited and feel so grateful that I have an opportunity to share my thoughts with you and I hope you will benefit from it.
My first idea was to write my reflections every day during our 122 miles long route on the Adriatic Sea that began on the Island of Krk and went all down to the Kornati National Park and back. However, after having very dynamic and interesting daily experiences, somehow I found myself making reasons to postpone it. The more I was forcing myself to write the bigger resistance I felt, until eventually, I gave up on the idea. Interestingly, the realization that I just need to embrace all of my anxious feelings appeared through the challenges experienced during sailing.
After we embarked all our stuff in Klimno, a small village and inlet on the Island of Krk on the Northern part of Adriatic Sea, almost everything was ready for sailing. There were the blue skies and our willingness was on a peak, but the most important thing was missing: there was just a breeze, too weak wind for sailing. Therefore we continued our tour using the motor power. The next day, to our surprise the situation changed, because the wind was strong, perfect for sailing. However another challenge emerged: the wind was blowing against the direction of our travel (headwind). So we needed to decide how we can adjust the sails but still maintain our direction as much as possible. It was fun and interesting, observing ourselves, being clumsy but persistent to adjust sails properly and gain some speed. We were changing our direction slightly many times, until we finally arrived to our desired destination on the Island Cres, inlet Meli.
As we were retelling our story about sailing challenges that happened that day, I realized that the most of the time while sailing we were actually observing everything around us, the wind, the sea, compass, course, and by doing so we managed to adjusted the sails and reach a satisfactory speed to move. Yes, we were observing, being alert but not struggling against the wind just because we didn’t like the direction of the wind (it would be absurd to argue, to have a debate with the wind, wouldn’t it :)). Instead, we did completely the opposite: we accepted it and found the solution. Exactly that reminded me to do the same with my anxious feelings that appeared because I hadn’t started writing like I was planning to. After I began to breath for a while without any mental purpose and to observe what’s happening in my body, without judgment and expectations of myself, I noticed instant changes. I was not feeling angry any more. As I allowed all form of mental noise simply to be there and simply observe it, instead of struggling against or labeling it, I became calmer. After repeating this for some days I started to feel much better, because I managed to detach myself from those thoughts, feelings and expectations built around my plan of writing the blog every day. Hence I gave a chance for some new ideas to arise. The blog was still unfinished, but my relationship with that fact changed. I got new lenses. Amazing!
Dear sailors, it’s been a pleasure to share my story with you. Now it’s turn to sail on your own and make your own stories. Be brave and sail out! If you feel uncertain about it, please read the quote below!
Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.
– Mark Twain
Here are some questions to reflect and discover answers for yourself.
How strongly are you attached to your current thinking/feeling mode?
How many times did you catch yourself in doing something that you feel is not right, but you keep doing it, expecting new/fresh ideas/different results?
What are your expectations when you start doing something? Are you focused on the process or just on the result?
What’s your relationship with breathing? Do you have moments of conscious breathing?
What do you notice when you breathe without any mental purpose or goal?
Happy sailing! Be here and now!!