Swimming Like Ducks

Hi, friends. How was your week?

Mine was chaos.

Do you ever have those weeks where just a million little things seem to go wrong, and even though you know everything will be fine and none of them are really that terrible, it just adds up to you feeling constantly frustrated?!?

Yeah, I had one of those.

There were bright spots, though!

I got the keys to my new yoga space (starting next month, you'll see classes there).

Impeachment!

Ate a really delicious cookie.

Got a really great night's sleep.

Sometimes when the world seems to be falling apart, or little or big things seem to personally be a mess, this is what I do:

I write down the good things that happen. They don't have to be big.

"smelled something delicious my neighbors cooked"

"used a new pen and it felt satisfying on the paper"

"heard a favorite song"

"saw a bird"

"hilariously loud burp"

As things were a little wild this week, locally and globally, I started thinking about ducks.

(I don't know why my brain does what it does)

If you see ducks moving through the water, they often look like they're calmly floating.

But under the water, there's all this stuff happening. Those ducks are swimming, kicking their feet, doing the work.

That's like our yoga, no?!?

We're making big efforts, we're doing the work, we're moving our bodies, we're thinking about our big toes or quads or shoulders, AND learning to breathe calmly through it.

Floating on the surface, kicking like hell underneath.

And that's like our lives, no?!?

We're making big efforts, we're reading books, going to therapy, giving love to our relationships...we're doing the work.

BUT BUT BUT

Also.

This duck idea is an old metaphor that gets used a lot.

And there's a little more science than just working hard.

Ducks are also bouyant.

Over time they have evolved to float more efficiently, to actually need less work underneath to keep the calm, to keep moving. The ducks know how to 'read the room,' and they're reeeeeaallly good at only paddling furiously when it's necessary, floating along with things when it's not.

I love this EVEN MORE.

Because, SHOCKING I KNOW, this is also our yoga.

The more we practice, over a longer period of time, the better we get at going with the current. We do the work when we need to and also learn to struggle less when there's nothing we could do, anyway.

Sooooo

is there a point here today?

You tell me.

I know there were times this week where I was fighting so hard against little things going wrong, and it was inefficient and unproductive and none of my fighting helped. Then I remembered the practices. I paused, I took a breath, I went with it, I moved my body, I took more breaths, more pauses. I gained clarity. Figured out a better way.

Be like a duck?!

Maybe that's the point. Lol.

Maybe it's just, let's keep trying. Make lists of good things. Release a little bit of the struggle against things you can't control so you have more energy to face the things you can. Take more breaths. Keep on keepin' on.

QUACK QUACK