The Road Too Rarely Travled
Ok, so perhaps it has once again been a while since last I posted and once again vow anew to keep you regularly updated. “So what has been happening in the mind of Mike of late?” is the question on literally tens of people’s minds. Well I am proud to report, very little of much consequence. As I sit here I can already sense the disappointment, but fear not, I have a tale for you to read. Now this while this may well be more aimed at convincing myself of certain things (or perhaps some other), but I hope you find it stimulating.
My story starts with a simple phrase which while cliched seems to resonate with most people and indeed myself. Go with the flow. I have been told this time and time again in different contexts by different people in many different situations. What I have yet to encounter, is a person who has fully come to terms with what this really entails. It is in fact by no means an easy come easy go life which it seems on the face of it to be. It is precisely this deception which makes “going with the flow” something that very few people actually live by.
Now what I have to say on this matter will no doubt seem mundane to you the moment you begin to reflect on what I have said and am about to say. This does not however make what I have to say any less important. So what do we does it mean to go with the flow?
No doubt this conjures images of oneself floating, some lazy sunny afternoon on a cool dark river dressed in banks made deep emerald but the shade of great weeping trees. And so it should. But this ideal still life image is the one of the greatest lies that is told.
While I believe it to be true that this snap shot depicts much of our workaday lives, it is a few hours down stream where we fail to live that life we so desire. As the flow begins to quicken it threatens to drown us in our ambitions, our fears, our perceived inadequacies, and the general problems that we tend create out of nothing as only the human mind can do. For some rather obvious reasons, going with the flow is a maxim which most tend abandon as they claw their way against the flow which can never in truth be avoided.
Facing the rapid is often too daunting a prospect to face. An all too easy intuition is to try and get oneself as far from the rocks as possible and back to the humdrum of the cool depths. In reality this can never be. We can fight the current, staving off the inevitable hardship for only so long. In reality all this achieves is getting ourselves banged up even worse on the way down.
So what should we do? Go with the flow? Perhaps this solution seems obvious now. But please do not think that it will be easy. To truly go with the flow requires that we accept that there will be rocks before us. To realise that we are going to get bloodied up a little bit. Few things that are easy are best. It is easy to go to war, god knows we do it often enough, but it is hard to lay down arms and talk. it is easy to sit back while injustice is done, but hard to fight for what you believe.
It is easy try avoid your personal rocks, but it is hard to realise that risking a grazed knee or a hurt pride is the only way to reach those cool depths we so crave. Even if there are many rocks and many a broken bone beyond the present rapids.
how very thought provoking and well written as usual.