Do you ever feel like you're back at the beginning? Like you went through a whole cycle only to be back where you started.
Everything you knew is now a question, and everything you questioned is now a bigger question.
Plan A failed me. It ruined me.
But how could I have known it would fail if I didn't take the risk? I couldn't. So I'm grateful.
So now, here I am at Plan B.
This plan consists of not really having a plan.
And it scares the poop out of me.
But maybe that's the secret.
By planning every detail we've failed already because there's no way it'll all work out the way we planned.
I guess that's the beauty of a Plan B. And C. And possibly D.
Process of elimination.
But I'm sure after getting to Q, R, and S, starting over becomes the routine, and it would feel like it's time to just stick with the letter you're on.
Settling.
Which, isn't always a bad thing.
But even when we settle, we're still searching.
Isn't it strange how life pulls us by the constant ebbs and flows of its waves?
Isn't it interesting how little control we have? Swimming as hard as we can against the flow only causes us to grow tired.
The shore is the goal.
The warm sandy beach where we think we will finally be happy, we will finally be satisfied.
But we're all human here. Maybe Michael Phelps is the exception, but the rest of us are no match for the strong current at war against us.
We seem to get close, or possibly even feel the grains between our toes, but as soon as we start to feel comfortable, we're ripped by the tide back to being lost at sea.
We swim our lives away, often calling "land ho!", expecting buried treasure and paradise, only to be left empty once again.
Part of our human condition, possibly worse than our imperfection, is our never ending search of satisfaction. Our search for rest, peace, happiness, hope, and love.
And not realizing that we're never going to find it.
Men have voyaged to the ends of the earth. No land un-tread, and no sea un-sailed, and still this dream is no where to be found.
Our world is lacking the one resource we all so desperately need more than anything else.
So, why don't we look somewhere else? The only solution would be that it's not here. We were made for somewhere else (C.S. Lewis paraphrased).
We swim all day, every day. Trying to get somewhere. Anywhere.
We're searching for a Source of peace to still our anxious and discontent hearts.
And ironically, it's when we stop treading that we experience the peaceful weightlessness. We let the water embrace us in its arms and carry us wherever it goes.
When we realize that this peace is the very thing we were fighting against, we find our footing and can walk through any storm.
When we stop fighting the current and frantically searching for comfort, the Living Water will carry us and take the burden of the waves of life. It will offer us a life jacket. It will offer us satisfaction.
When we stop fighting the current, the Current will fight for us.
Some may say, "just keep swimming,"
but I believe that we find our Strength in sinking.
