A Lesson From a Water Crossing
“Every river can be crossed”
Sink or swim so to speak.
In the midst of something beautiful there’s often a barrier that has to be overcome.
The choice becomes - Tackle the obstacle and get to enjoy / relish in the beauty OR turn around.
Crossing over the water becomes symbolic of facing the challenge, doing something new and scary to come to the other side with more confidence in yourself than you had at the beginning. The washed out path becomes something you still conquered.
You realize you needed that challenge to push you.
Navigating that water allowed you to truly see the total beauty of what lies ahead - including what you had to overcome. The struggle becomes part of the beauty of success.
Story time -
When I reached the pictured water crossing there was a small family that arrived around the same time and a couple ahead that was well on their way crossing over. Myself and the family kind of stood there looking - seeing what we needed to do. The father mentioned to me he really hoped that there was a way over that would be possible for his whole family because no way did he want to retreat back up the muddy hill we had carefully planted our feet to get down to get where we were.
I started ahead, following a similar path as the couple that was ahead of me.
Not long after I had started I heard this same father give a little pep talk to his young daughter. Saying how they were planning on getting to the other side - He told her she was going to get a little wet and a little dirty but that it was okay, because she was going to do awesome.
I heard little cheers of praise as I reached the other side, I turned around to see a very brave little girl walking across the shallow water path of logs and rocks as her dad followed close-by.
This little girl’s life in this moment was forever changed. Whether she knows it yet or not. Confidence isn’t gained overnight and overcoming obstacles and doing the hard things makes life so much more beautiful.
I hope when you reach a difficult path, one where there’s no clear direction or way, you tredge through to the other side. Because everything you want is on that other side. That obstacle wasn’t there to make you turn around. It wasn’t there to discourage you.
It was simply put in your way to show you that you’re capable regardless of what you have to face. That there’s is in fact a way. And that struggle will make the journey much more beautiful.
-Skylar Clark, BS, ACSM