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Just Keep Swimming
This morning I went on a hike with a few of my friends. We woke up early and drove about 30 minutes to the outskirts of Dallas where the plan was to hike up to a small outlook over a lake. However, when we got to the trail, we were quickly confused. There seemed to be several trailheads and no sign of any type of outlook area. So, we kind of randomly picked a path and started walking. As we were wandering through the woods we all realized that we were probably on the wrong path as we passed by the same spot several times. Yet, we kept on walking with just a small sliver of hope that maybe by chance we were somehow doing the right thing. While we were doing this I realized that this hike was much like life. Sometimes you know where you want to end up, but have no clue how to get there, and just have to embrace the journey and not lose hope.
This reminded me very much of the movie Finding Nemo. If you are unfamiliar with the film, I highly recommend that you watch it. At one point in the movie Marlin (a clown fish) and Dory (a royal blue tang) are swimming along on a seemingly helpless journey to find Marlin’s son Nemo. As they are swimming, Dory starts to repeatedly say “just keep swimming, just keep swimming, just keep swimming,” with a certain amount of optimism and happiness in her voice. I was really thinking about this part of the movie this morning as we were truly wandering aimlessly through the woods. No one had any clue where we were or where we were going but we just kept walking. This is kinda how life has felt for me these past few weeks and I think everyone at some point or another has experienced similar feelings - those of knowing where you want to go but having no clue how to get there. It is in times like these where we have to “just keep swimming.”
After hiking about 2.5 miles we ended up exactly where we started. So, in a sort of last resort, we decided to just walk down the street that the trailhead was on for a few minutes. And of course, no more than .2 miles down the street, was the outlook we were looking for. We had just spent over an hour hiking through the woods only to realize what we were looking for was 0.2 miles down the street from where we parked, no hiking required. Now don’t get me wrong, I had a ton of fun with my friends and I don’t regret anything, but in a very small way this all goes to show that sometimes in life things get really crazy and confusing and it is easy to feel lost.
So that is my challenge to you this week: “just keep swimming.” Sometimes it can seem like your goals in life are nowhere to be found and feel hopeless. But I think it is important not to give up or lose hope in what you are trying to accomplish or give up halfway along the journey. Now I’m not trying to make any overly broad statements, I think every once in a while it might make sense to change or amend your goals, but remember that you made your goal your goal for a reason. Don’t give up on something just because you are temporarily lost in the woods - keep pursuing what you set your mind on and hopefully, at some point, you’ll find yourself on the correct path again. It is hard to find something if you stop pursuing it.
Stay Motivated,
-Dan
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