Ford the River

Are we really self-aware? Perhaps we are seeing our universe with near-sighted eyes. We are all spectators sitting on the sandy bank of a great, turbulent river. And we are drawing circles in the sand. Some stop to gaze into the depths for purpose. These people are resolved to journey across the river’s frothy waters. 


Routine sometimes keeps us from remembering the beauty of being alive. When we look again at a seemingly-mundane life as a special opportunity to embrace what’s real, all things become objects of intrigue. The cycle of ebb and flow carries us: day melts into night, which fades into today. A new moment might feel the same as the last without introspection. But during conscientious thought, appears the awareness: I am out of touch but I am the controller of my pain and longing. Fear only exists because I cannot understand its source. 

Frustration impedes us. What is frustration but a tributary of action cut off by an inability to allow what must be. Make room for that pause in volition. If you let the current take you for a ride, the butterflies of tension within you will find another home. We are sometimes turned against ourselves because of disappointment. We want ourselves, or others, to sail in one direction but the wind blows us in another. While expectation is what normally drives action, it need not negatively affect us should we be flexible in our acceptance of unforeseeable outcomes.



The heart flutters in reaction. We are the reactors fueled by the input of experience. We would like self-control yet it is easy to be pulled this way and that by our senses. The world outside us stimulates our needs and wants.  Some are of the body, but most are mind-born. Want is seldom effectively reined by rationalization, but its pangs are ameliorated by appreciating what we already have. The observation and subsequent triage of want from need is a challenging goal to achieve.

However, the outcome of letting go is the reward of liberation. Complete freedom is not comfortable for some. It is the nakedness of limitless possibilities. On the other hand, many are cozier with the cloth society selects for them to wear. Although we all require direction and rules to live by, it is within our fingertips to draw new lines in the sand while we wait for our ship to transport us across the river. We long for comprehension of who we are, what we are and why we think, feel, and act the way we do. These, and the complex question of ‘why’, all become simplified when we are removed from our internal responses. When the mind is at peace, the answers will appear as if out of nowhere. The epitome of self-awareness is the grasp we have of the answers.