Once upon a time, there was a lady who felt that she had reached the end of her rope. It seemed like all the passion of life had disappeared as had all her interests and desires. Her purpose for life had vanished or was hidden away somewhere deep in her soul. Her creative wells had seemingly gone dry. She still had her work, her family, and her friends but, over time, it all seemed meaningless to her. Healthy, intelligent, and financially stable, her wanting to be happy receded within the darkness of her mind and heart.
The remedy is a trip to the seashore.
Finally, nearing the point of desperation, the lady visited an old friend, her family doctor that she had known for most of her life. The physician listened attentively to her story and was touched by her sense of anxiety and personal anguish. He then asked the lady, “When you were a child, what did you like to do best?”
“I liked to visit the seashore,” she replied.
“All right,” the doctor said, “you must do exactly as I tell you and do not deviate from my instructions. I want you to spend all day tomorrow at the seashore. Find an isolated stretch of beach and devote the entire day there from 9 o’clock in the morning until 6 o’clock in the evening. Leave your phone at home and bring nothing to read. In fact, other than a blanket, bring nothing with you and do nothing calculated to distract you in any way. I will give you 4 prescriptions that I want you to take in the exact order I tell you. Take the first prescription at 9 o’clock, the second at noon, the third at 3 o’clock, and the last prescription you will take exactly at fifteen minutes before 6 o’clock. Then at 6 o’clock, leave the beach. You are not to look at them now. Wait until you arrive at the seashore tomorrow and only look at, and follow, the directions on the prescriptions at the times I just explained to you.”
The lady agreed to follow the doctor’s advice and the next morning, just before 9 o’clock, she parked her car and proceeded to walk towards a lonely stretch of the beach. The lady noticed a sand dune a few hundred yards down the seashore and walked towards it.
It was a cloudy morning and there was a strong wind blowing in from the sea. The surf was high and pounding and sea spray was misting over the surf. The wind carried the mist onto the beach where the lady felt the moist salty mist pierce virtually every cell in her body. She shivered. Perhaps it was more than the mist; maybe the pull of anticipation while, at the same time, the apprehension of what might be in store for her this day. Certainty versus uncertainty battling within the theater of her mind.
The seething surf pounding on the seashore brought her back to the present moment and she found a comfortable place to sit. She took out the prescription marked number one and read the note that was inside. It said… “Listen.” That was all that was written on the note, the one word, “Listen.” So for 3 hours that’s all she did. She listened to the sound of the howling wind, the playful cries of the seagulls, the thrashing surf, even an occasional airplane engine some 30,000 feet above her. She sat quietly and listened. Thoughts, both comfortable and uncomfortable, would enter and exit her mind. She did not judge or react to them. She simply listened.
At noon, she read the second prescription. The note simply read… “Reach back.” That was all that was written on the note, “Reach back.” She was unsure exactly what this meant. But as she released all expectations and realized that all she had to do was allow her thoughts and feelings to go back in time. She reflected on all the incidents, situations, and circumstances of her life that she could recall. She recollected the happy times and the challenging times; the successes and the disappointments; the opportunities and the adversities. Between noon and 3 o’clock she sat by the seashore and reached back.
At 3 o’clock she tore open the third prescription. It read… “Re-examine your motives.” This took so much intense thought and concentration that the hours flew by. For three hours, as the sun began to break out from the clouds, she re-examined her motives, her passions, her reasons for living, and all the gifts that had been bestowed upon her that, so often, she took for granted. She came to realize that the quality of her life was in in direct proportion to what she focused on. During these hours of focused solitude, she understood that she had spent far too much time paying attention to her worries rather than paying attention to the celebrated life she had been given. And she reintroduced herself to all the opportunities that still lay ahead.
Time slipped by quickly and soon it was 15 minutes before 6 o’clock. As the clouds returned and a dark sky took its place above the seashore, the waves grew taller and threw a constant taste of salt spray into the wind that attacked the beach but gently and lovingly engulfed the lady as she remained on her sand dune. With moist hands, she opened the fourth and final prescription. It read… “Write your worries in the sand.”
There had been a couple of things that had consumed her thoughts and caused her particular discomfort and worry. So she walked toward the surf and the hard sand. And with a stick she found in front of the sand dune, the lady wrote her worries in the sand. When she was finished, she stood and looked at them for a moment and glanced at her watch. It was now 6 o’clock and, following her doctor’s directions, she headed back to her car. As she was about to leave the beach, she turned to take one last look at the seaside. She observed the rough ocean protected by dark ominous clouds. She saw the carefree gulls playing in the wind. She saw the waves and salty wind spray shooting off the surf. And she saw her sand dune where she had resided most of the day. Then her gaze turned toward the worries she wrote in the sand and noticed that the tide has already erased them.
She smiled, departed the seaside, and drove home.
Many years ago I was taught that, in most cases, fear is nothing more than an acronym for false expectations appearing real. The same teacher who told me the story of the lady and the seashore, explained to me that according to the Bureau of Standards, “A dense fog covering seven city blocks, to a depth of 100 feet, is composed of something less than one glass of water.” In other words, all the fog covering seven city blocks, at 100 feet deep could be, if it were collected together, held in a single drinking glass.
And this could be compared to our worries. If we can envision the future and if we could see our problems in the true light, they wouldn’t tend to overwhelm or blind us to our reality that everything is actually just fine; that we do make mountains out of molehills. It doesn’t mean we don’t have issues to face, including death itself. The challenge is that we seem unable or unwilling to relegate them to their true size and place. And if all the things most people worry about were reduced to their true size, you could probably put them all into a water glass as well.
Authoritative estimates show that about 40 percent of our worries never happen (my daughter is late returning home; something must be wrong). About 30 percent of our worries are about things that are over and done with; that can’t be changed by worry (like trying to unring a bell). Needless worries about our health make up approximately 12 percent, petty worries account for about 10 percent, and real legitimate worries… 8 percent. Only 8 percent of our worries are worth concerning ourselves with and about and 92 percent are pure fog with little substance at all.
When the 92 percent of your worries start of affect your life in ways that do not serve you and stand in your way of achieving happiness, perhaps you might consider a trip to the seashore.