Dive Right In

Try something new… Go for it… Dive right in. Turn the page on a brand new year to find 365 big, empty squares. Clean blank spaces. Some unruled. Some with faint gray lines to help keep things in order. Three hundred and sixty-five of them. Full use of all these days is not guaranteed, but imagine we have the privilege. Some employ a “one day at a time” process, allowing today’s square to be filled by whatever moves the moment. Some take pen in hand very early on to note events, occasions, appointments, due dates and deadlines.

In the Caribbean Sea, a brown pelican has no calendar, iPhone or daily reminder app. It instinctively knows where to find what it needs and do what it must. It needs a place to be at rest, a colony to ensure the species will survive. It needs to plunge headlong into the azure sea to fish. It learns to adjust. Feeding grounds change. Storms knock out a favored roosting spot. Still, each day, the sturdy pelican dives right in. Some days we must carefully plot our next move, calculate the possible outcome and proceed ever so cautiously.

Sometimes to break an old habit, start a new practice, become healthier or more compassionate, sometimes we must not plot or plan or calculate. Sometimes, like that hungry pelican, we must simply dive right in.