Riding the Waves of Life

Sometimes you find inspiration in the weirdest places. I was getting ready for church Sunday morning and had the Today Show on. As I walked through the living room, I saw that Willie Geist was interviewing Jeff Goldblum. I have always LOVED Jeff Goldblum and love watching the interviews that Willie does, so I stopped for a minute. Jeff was talking about playing the piano and how it relates to life in general and then Willie said something that hit me. It was so good I had to stop and hit rewind so I I could write it down. Here’s what he said, ”You don’t get to pick what the wave’s doing, you just have to figure out how to ride it.” WOW!!! (Click here to see the interview.)

Isn’t that just how life is? We can plan everything out as much as we want, but things are going to come along that we didn’t plan for. No one really plans for an unexpected death of a loved one or a terminal diagnosis, but it happens. I know that I have dealt with many unexpected waves. Ones that felt so big and overwhelming that I thought I would never break through the surface to breathe. It didn’t feel like I was riding the waves of life… it was more like drowning.

Lately I have been drowning. We have just had so much going on. It has been like one massive wave after another, and I have been gasping for air. If you have been following my posts, you know some of the things going on. Thankfully, I have started seeing a counselor and opening back up to my closest people. I’m using those great things called coping skills and realizing that I cannot control everything! (No matter how much I try or would like to.) I have stopped trying to control the waves and have been figuring out how to ride them. No matter how ”choppy” they might be/get.

We are all going to go through times when the water is calm with barely a ripple as well as those times when the tsunami wave hits us out of no where. The main thing we need to do is to figure out how to ride the wave so we can stay on top instead of allowing it to drag us under. That doesn’t mean that we have to do it all alone though. Sometimes we need a floatation device, whether that is a person or a coping skill. Just find what will keep you afloat, and good luck riding the waves of life!