Today, the beach looks wide and expansive.
Tide out. Waves gentle. The shoreline sculpted and seemingly intentional in every aspect of it's design.
I have my bare feet on the sand. It's grounding.
Having one less layer between yourself and the earth seems to feel natural in a way that's both obvious and yet surprising. It nudges you closer towards being present. And for a moment or two, before a invasive thought comes in to my mind, I feel alive in a way that isn't bold or dramatic, but sort of essential.
Maybe it feels good because it's a reconnection. It's getting to experience again something you have felt before, even if the specific memory is hard to reach for.
Maybe it reminds you of a more simplistic time, when you weren't full of opinions and beliefs and well practiced behaviours.
There's a kid on the beach, armed with a plastic shovel and excitement. He's digging a hole in the sand. His mother comes up beside him, hovering. She's smiling. In a sing song kind of tone she asks: "What are you going to do with that dear?"
He doesn't look away. "I'm digging a hole"
"I know. Digging where?"
He's reflective for a moment, maybe confused. "I'm digging"
It's such an Adult Human Being question to ask "what are you going to do with that?" We need to know what the point is. Where it's all headed. Because, without it, we can't convince ourselves we are allowed to enjoy anything at all. It all must be headed somewhere. And somewhere better be big and important.
It's a framework that might be useful in certain domains. Extremely critical and important in others. But in this moment, on a beach, with the sun beaming and the tide out, it's useless. Sad, even.
It's more than likely that the mother meant nothing by it at all. I'm sure she didn't, really. Just a question to get her child talking and see the world through his eyes. But it's somehow revealing.
We've lost our ability to exist without trying to contextualize everything.
We've lost our ability to live without definitions.
Me too.
I'm walking on the beach, barefoot and mostly relaxed, but I think about where I need to be and what I need to do later and other vague projections about the future. It's hard to separate anything from this continuous mental loop, because life has added in layers of complexity and various attempts at meaning that far exceed what lies within the perspective of that little kid, holding a shovel, digging away, for no reason other than that he enjoys it. I walk the last stretch of the beach and put my shoes back on. Dusting the sand off of my feet with my socks. Then putting the socks back on. Then shoes.
And then I'm gone.
I am certain I'm not allowed to spend my whole day walking the beach, simply because I enjoy it. So I leave.
Six and a half hours later, I come back.
Looking for another calm. Chasing the high of an empty mind. I've forgotten all about the kid, forgotten all about before. There's nothing but the beach again. But I'm hardly there at all. Not really, anyways. Thoughts running and bouncing in my mind, endlessly, infinitely. I'm sleepwalking, more or less.
I catch myself drifting off too far in to the depths of my own mind every few minutes, and try to pull myself back to whatever I think being "in the moment" means. Feel the sand and smell the air. It feels good. For a few seconds. And then it disappears.
Fleeting and temporary.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see the hole the kid dug. It just barely slips in to my consciousness.
It's a modest hole, really. Barely large enough for me to put both my hands in. But there's something great about it. It's not neatly circular or formatted in any particular way. One side of it is much deeper than the other. It looks like something random and impulsive.
I think about his little plastic shovel digging in over and over and over again, his determined hands holding it tight, fully focused.
It's a good thing, I think. It's pure. There's a element of happiness in being able to pretend for a moment that life is as simple as digging holes at the beach, because it feels like a good thing to do in the moment.
It's refreshing, even joyful. To do something because it's fun. Not for an outcome or a cause. Just, for fun.
And then, once again, I'm gone. Dusting my feet off with my socks. Putting my shoes on next. Mechanical order and routine. Well practiced behaviours.
It's the next day. I'm back at the beach again.
I see the tide is in now. It's washed over the hole, surely. Evaporated and replaced. I don't think much about it. It's the middle of the afternoon, and it's beautiful out.
And sure enough, right close to the shoreline there's the same kid, again. Both hands on his plastic shovel. His tool of choice. His medium of expression.
He's digging again, with the same passion and focus, and general sense of equanimity. There's no feeling of defeat or lost progress seeing the hole he once dug be destroyed and ruined. Perhaps he doesn't even notice or remember.
He's just digging.
A new hole, in a new place. An experience complete all on its own.
The waves wash up on to his heels, just inches away from where he's working, threatening to destroy his latest endeavour, but he doesn't pay any attention to it. He's just digging.
It's easy to justify it as a kid being a kid. Which is exactly what it is, in a way. Yet, there's something far more wondrous about it.
He's doing something because he enjoys it. For the sake of enjoying it. Whether or not the hole is there later, doesn't matter.
He isn't doing it for a sense of permanence or to carve his legacy in to the sandy shores.
He doesn't need his name on a plaque encrusted in gold letters around it for the ages.
He's not photographing the hole, showing it to his friends, asking for their praise and admiration of his efforts.
He's just digging.
Because it's fun to dig. That's the only reason, at all. It's fun to dig.
And yet, we can't just dig holes all day. Not because it isn't pleasurable or relaxing, but because we have a life to live. And not just obligations and commitments, but things of meaning and consequence.
We have people we want to spend time with. Memories we want to make.
We have long lists of things we want to experience and see and feel.
And it all has to fit in somewhere. Endless priorities, clashing up against one another, until there's no clear priority at all, and we have to begin the process of figuring out what it is we * really * want all over again.
This is the process of discovery for most of us human beings. Thinking, imagining, trying and iterating.
There's many upsides to that, of course, or else we wouldn't behave in such a way. There's tangible love and accomplishment and meaning to be had.
But sometimes, the downsides are present, just much less obvious.
We can't just dig holes all day. It's the truth.
But that truth doesn't mean that we can't ever find moments of bliss and detachment. It doesn't mean we can't find ourselves fully in the moment. Even the seemingly insignificant ones.
It doesn't mean we can't do things simply because they are enjoyable and give us a sense of connection that might not be of enormous consequence, but is none the less meaningful.
We can't dig holes all day long. But we can sometimes. And we should.
So why don't we?
Why don't I?
Maybe because there's a seriousness that gets attached to life somewhere, and it's supposed to operate like a compass for purpose and meaning. But often times, it acts more like a rigid wall and it keeps us out of all kinds of stuff.
It's easy to rationalize that, over and over to yourself. There's always things to do. There's always lists. There's always obligations and ambitions. And we should tend to all of those, absolutely.
But, perhaps, we should carve out a tiny slice of our own world just for ourselves. A piece of existence that doesn't mean much at all. Something that is simply joyful. It's simply for us.
And it doesn't matter if it lasts. Doesn't matter if anyone notices.
Because we got to do it.
And that was more than enough.
Wow! Love that you can put into words what you feel and think. Such wisdom and insight. Thank you for what you share.