Being Still vs. Still Moving

An ocean of difference…

For me, being, in it’s most unadulterated state is circumstantially dependent… achievable only after a violent stomach flu, 10- mile run or sever hangover.

I am more of a doing kind of person. Preferably at high speeds with clear focus and big results.

The idea of being still gives me hives.

Here’s the breakdown in logic: If I am not accomplishing tasks, nothing will get accomplished. If nothing gets accomplished, I will have nothing new to accomplish.

If I have nothing new to accomplish, I will become an irrelevant waste of space to myself. And my self-worth will begin crumbling.

Slowly at first, and then in short order, big chunks will crash like giant polar ice caps in a cataclysmic beginning of the end.

Clearly, too much being, for me, is not ideal for self-preservation.

As a family we have known we may be moving at some point to Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

I have been being with this idea and its endless list of complicating factors for a while.

Every time I come across a challenge/ obstacle, I try to find the silver lining or submit to the tepid, Birkenstock-wearing platitude, time will tell.

I choose to see it as an adventure, a new chapter.

But this weekend, as I was running through our idyllic town by the beach and the bridge, by the harbor and the boatyards, it occurred to me that there is NO water in Chapel Hill.

None.

When I got home, I Mapquested the distance from the Atlantic ocean to Chapel Hill – THREE hours and fifteen minutes with no traffic.

I sat still. Very still.

Then the panic set in.

The idea of being landlocked literally made it hard for me to breathe. I am being extreme and unreasonable, I thought to myself.

This is not a new thought. But it didn’t matter. The ocean is like a dear friend to me. But there are lakes, Joe chimed in.

Lakes? I said.

I have never really been a lake person. I got used to Lake Michigan not being an ocean but eventually I moved back east. And there are no lakes that size in NC.

So we’ll take ocean vacations, I said to myself. I rolled my eyes. Or maybe we don’t go at all.

What if we are still moving, I thought.

And then it hit me, the idea of still moving.

I am good at moving. But perhaps this is an opportunity to learn how to be still, while moving.

I love the ocean because it soothes me with its choppy waves and rhythmic tides. It mirrors my energy. Rises up and crashes against the shore, always beginning again– renewing itself.

But maybe the stillness of grass, sway of trees, quiet proliferation of flowers and slower pace of life is the next chapter in my evolution of being.

Maybe I can trade blue in for green.

Maybe there is an inner ocean I am meant to explore?