The Straight Path to Success?

Learning from the Beach: The Straight Path

           As most of my family know, I look forward to our annual family week at a popular North Carolina beach. Surrounded by many children (nieces, nephews, cousins, friends), lots of laughter, sometimes teenage drama, and just family stuff, I typically look to get away for a while each day (wink-wink). My breakaway and meditation (prayer) time is when I walk the beach. 

Each day I get up early in the morning and plan a 45 minute to 2 hours out and back walk down the beach. Every year I reflect on my walks and the very interesting ideas that come to me during my personal beach time. One idea that continues to be on my mind is the idea of the “straight path.” 

It was about 6:15 am in mid-July, and I was just finishing my simple stretches, and the much needed morning coffee when I mapped out my walk. I planned to walk south for about 45 minutes, to a pier about 2.5 miles away. I noticed that the waves were not choppy, yet rolling in, with a gentle break. The birds were running in and out of the water, hoping to catch some kind of food yet avoiding the waves as they approached. About 100 yards off the beach were dolphins, who appeared to be playing in a spirited way. Also, there were fisherman, other beach walkers, and many dogs. The breeze was blowing fairly consistently southeast and was providing a strong wind at my back. As I walked to the pier, the legs were feeling great and I was enjoying smells of the water, the breeze was pushing me along and the rising sun was providing some real inspiration. I arrived at the pier much quicker than anticipated.  

Once at the pier I sat down and just took it all in, enjoying the magic that is typically on display at the beach. After about 15 minutes I decided to head back to the house when it hit me. Smack right in my face was the wind! Rather than the tailwind that assisted me on my walk out to the pier, the now facing headwind was much more than I calculated. I was about 10 minutes into the walk back, and I realized I did not walk too far and now I had to make a concerted effort to get back home in a reasonable time, so not to miss the much-anticipated breakfast. So, rather than just walking casually, I fixed my sights on the pier where I started and decided that I was going to walk a straight line, without stopping and without any distractions. Marching through the headwind, keeping my eye on the pier I walked directly straight –walking with force and determination (btw – this was a really tough headwind), counting each step and pushing myself to arrive at the pier in time to make breakfast.  About 50 minutes later I arrived – slightly sweating, lots of sand on my face and a bit tired. Once again I stretched and thought to myself that was a great walk and was proud of myself for keeping my head down and walking straight and reaching my goal on time.

As I was walking off the beach back to the house I glanced again at the direction of my walk and noticed that my walk was NOT straight at all – the prints of my feet were all over the place. Sometimes I walked 5 to 10 yards to the right or left of my center line. I noticed my steps were not consistent but staggered, almost resembling someone playing a game of sport. I noticed that my steps avoided the crashing waves and that sometimes I avoided the birds or dogs, whereas other times my path changed based on the grade of the beach's slope. This brought to my mind a simple idea in life – that despite our wanting to walk a straight line to accomplish our goals it rarely ever happens. Even when we think we mapped our walk correct and we accomplished our goal as planned there seem to be many aspects of our progress that we fail to recognize. Many times we fail to recognize the pitch of the hill, the changing direction of the birds, the sometimes approaching waves that we avoided and the list goes on.

So, what do I take from this simple lesson? 

1. You will almost never accomplish what you set out in the way you planned.
2. You should always plan for contingencies – even when you feel as though you will accomplish the goal as planned with ease.
3. Once your goal is completed, you should look back and take note of the accomplishment – even the most simple of goals has many ins and outs that you did not account for and you should celebrate even the smallest accomplishments in life.
4. This simple idea reinforces a few concepts – plan your goal, set a clear execution strategy to achieve your goal, plan for contingencies, drive forward despite the winds and once your goal is accomplished – celebrate. Celebrate even the simplest of goals. 

Be prudent and be happy!

Peace.

Chris