Today I share a piece of writing inspired by my word of the month for March: TRUST.
In the Slow Friends Community we’re journalling and meditating our way through the seasons this year, using a framework of words to guide us. If you’re looking to share conversation with like-minded friends, or simply need the gentle nudge to delve quietly into deeper parts of yourself, then I hope you will join as a paid subscriber.🙏🏻
Trust has certainly been a useful word for me to focus on this month as I’ve made my way back from Southern Spain to the South of France and now, to the canals of England where I’ll soon be embracing new work, new directions, and also supporting my daughter as she spreads her wings towards greater independence…
The Weight of Water
Trusting in that which we cannot know.
I woke on an early morning in the South of France and stepped out onto the balcony. Snow-capped mountains loomed behind me and in front, the Mediterranean Sea stretched out like a smooth pale blue carpet. Watching as the sun rose like a ball of fire I felt at complete peace, as if the entire universe was bringing everything together just for me.
Sometimes life happens like this: utter perfection. If only in these moments we took the time to truly relish every last drop—to fully realise the beauty, absorbing each minute connecting part; being absolutely present.
That morning I know I was present and yet, still, now that it has gone I wonder: could I have appreciated it more? Should I have stood a minute longer to breathe in the cool early spring air, closed my eyes and tipped my face to the glowing — growing — warmth and hugged myself just a little tighter, safe in the knowledge that everything, every teeny tiny detail, was absolutely faultless.
I wonder if you, too, dear reader think about such moments yourself?
As I type this now in the shadow of a boatyard sign, rotten, oil-stained palettes and bags of coal in my eyeline, at the mercy of a not-so-friendly boat mechanic, I think of that moment in France where I trusted everything with a deep inner knowing.
But a sea cannot be a smooth pale blue carpet each and every day. Instead, some days that very same sea was slate grey, foreboding and fierce. Other days the waves whipped at the shoreline with the ferocity of a wild lion as I looked on, thinking about life and all that it throws at us with seeming nonchalance, leaving us to pick up the pieces.
And where is the trust then?
Is it left purely to our own good sense, or in the hands of an ever-changing natural world that stands strong despite being tossed around in the storm, or perhaps to a higher power.
We, each of us, must find our own way to hold onto it.
When we climbed aboard our new-old narrowboat last week—the home that will carry us for the next while—we were filled with excitement and positivity, so when a few hours later the engine started smoking and juttering we could hardly believe that this was part of the plan, incredulous as us humans tend to be.
But does the sea cry, “Why me?” to the wind in all her fury. Or instead, simply accept that today there is to be a storm.
I write to the background of thunderous rushing water through deep lock gates, a powerful reminder day and night of trust; both in the gates holding, and in believing that we are exactly where we are meant to be. There are some moments of peace when a boat turns the lock in the opposite direction but then we are pushed and scraped alongside the wharf no matter how we tie our ropes.
Perhaps best to be loose, untethered, and with that—unbothered…by the rushing water, the unfriendliness, the days drifting away in quick succession; days where we should be cruising towards new responsibilities and commitments. Sometimes in life we cannot fight the current and so, we must instead fight to go with the flow. To ask, “What is the lesson here to be learned?”
I think my lesson is of course the obvious: best laid plans, be grateful for what you have, in the great scheme of things — dot dot dot — but other lessons are more subtle, but no less powerful:
That sometimes we must trust in the things we feel uncomfortable or confused about, and that sometimes the act of trusting is out of our hands.
Right now I can only trust in the water beneath me. That it will hold my vessel — my family — in its flow and, when my heart, the earth, or higher power decides I have learned the lessons I need to learn, or that I have shared something of myself that perhaps might be needed by this place, that these waterways will carry me to exactly where I need to be.
Thank you for reading/listening.
With love,
Alice 🙏🏻
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