in the spirit of harmony

I began walking and quickly noticed that my hands felt weightier than my feet did. How long I walk depends on how heavy of a load I’m carrying that day. A short amount of time passed before I found a seat and held my hands out in front of me. I let my eyes study the wrinkles of my palms and the lines of my fingers. While doing so I had the thought, what if perfect balance doesn’t exist? Pondering that question made me glance high up and then all the way back down to the ground. In my own good time, I became aware of all the space between sky and earth. This is where the wind blows, but it never stays. I stood up and kept on walking. Since my feet felt light, I steadily caught my rhythm. That buoyant feeling soon trickled all the way through my body and with every step forward, I found accord. In every breath that filled up my chest, I could sense the fibers of my body tuning together. Shortly, my mind joined in on this collective satisfaction within my body. I paused and glanced downward again, looking past my hands this time. As my feet came into focus, so did a new thought. Why would I chase balance if harmony exists here, inside me?

Nature keeps proving to be the ultimate study guide — and as a student of life — I am always taking notes. When I quiet my world, I become exposed to another world. Once tested by discord, this is the place I can enter and trust that I will emerge stronger and more able to navigate the complex ocean of my mind. It’s the place where I can acknowledge that what I want might not be what I need and where I can accept that I am where I’m supposed to be. It’s never about conforming, but always about accepting. It’s where I can focus and decide how I choose to build and give. Unlike the demands of society, my ideas often bloom slowly and strengthen quietly. This world tells us to make it happen fast or faster. Comparison tells us to work hard or harder, without lifting our heads up. The goal of a perfect balance requires us to create equilibrium by weighing two things against one another. Relentlessly doing so can make us feel like we are chronically imbalanced, all while we are unknowingly dodging the opportunities to accept and experience the natural flow of life. And so, we end up dissatisfied, depressed, and certainly missing out on harmony.

As I keep giving myself to the harmonies of daily life, I discover that the depth of connection is the number one supporter of harmony. When you lack depth with self, all connections suffer. And when there is minimal connection, you get a bogus version of harmony, or fulfillment, if you will. Depth looks different in all our human lives but regardless of where you look, you’ll see that growth requires depth. It’s not complicated but it is hard work. I’ve learned that growth is directly proportional to how much of ourselves we can sit with, without running away. We’ll never reach a state of connection, flow, or harmony without accepting our own tides, both high and low. We ought to keep putting our efforts towards connecting with ourselves — understanding our fluctuations, observing the drift of things, and getting with the currents. In order to reach a level where flow is even a possibility, we have to try. It’s been essential for me to remember that trying hard is a habit that gets me where I want to be — up until the point that it becomes a barrier. Arriving at a place of being completely absorbed in whatever you are doing — be it in sport, prayer, art, conversation, or walking — is to release yourself from trying. If flow is an absence of conscious effort, then connection will be more of a happening and less of a doing.

Approaching the end of my walk that day, I made my way towards a bench and sat. This time I was near the sailboat docks and way less consumed with the belief that I was a terribly imbalanced human. While witnessing the sails go up in the air and the boats go out onto the water, I let those happenings affirm that life will present us with different things and each one may call for a different level of attention. Even though the idea of balance tells me that what is not equal is wrong, I remember that harmony is the truth that different seasons require different things from us. If we want our days to feel less like fighting against the current and more like being carried effortlessly, then maybe we should keep practicing the art of sailing rather than rowing. And just like the setting sails before me — with the correct bearing and relevant tuning — I can allow myself these moments of surrender, of flow, of harmony. I sat back, took a deep breath in, and listened closely to my exhale. It said, “Every day is a second chance, live accordingly.” I then grabbed my pen and started writing “I’ll choose harmony; I can let things be…”