Fish in the sea
A teacher of mine once sat me down and showed me a picture of a bunch of fish.
She asked me to look at the picture and chose which fish is most like me. Of course I looked at her strangely and replied that I am not a fish nor do I intend on becoming one and therefore I can not choose one.
Calmly she said that I should imagine that I was a fish- which one would be me?
Again I answered that I can not relate to myself as a fish and it’s quite difficult to see myself as one.
She stayed calm for a while trying to get me to chose a fish from the paper that reminded me most of myself. Eventually she gave up and said, “I see we’re not getting anywhere, I guess you are not a fish after all.”
Now, years later I think back to sitting in that small office with my teacher, in front of a picture of a bunch of fish.
Let me describe the picture.
There were fish swimming together in schools, there were fish swimming alone. There were animated looking fish with smiles on their faces, and there were fish with thorns on their backs. There were big fish and small fish, there were fish swimming against the tide and others were swimming with the flow of the water.
Though all the fish were different- they all had something in common- they were all swimming in the big blue ocean. No matter what the fish looked like and what the fish was doing, they all need water in order to keep them going. If a shark or a bigger fish would come, there is no fish that would say “I give up, I’m gonna leave the water now.” You just have to keep on going.
We live in a big bad world with a lot of pain and suffering and there are lots of things that will frighten us. Never jump out of the water.
If you don’t keep on moving forward the waves are bound to pull you back!
Fight the tide and swim strong.