“What people have forgotten is what every salmon knows.” —Robert Clark

The news you are fearful of hearing. The account balance you don’t want to check. The skill you think is too difficult to learn. The person you don’t want to see or talk to, but need to. The truth you don’t want to accept.

Anything that you are fearful to face, to look at, to become fully aware of its truth, when we choose to do so, the stories running rampantly around in our mind have met the end of their road. The unhelpful narratives can no longer be seen as valid in any way, shape, or form. Why? Because we chose to bravely put ourselves in the real-time moment and see for ourselves. No more guessing, no more wondering, no more sugarcoating, no more fabricating, no more denial. The truth has been faced, and in doing so, we set ourselves free.

In Mark Nepo’s The Book of Awakening, he uses the analogy of the salmon swimming upstream to spawn after a spring and early summer of roaming and feasting in the sea. Specifically, he writes about their ability to jump up, out of the water, propelling themselves further upriver, even jumping up six-foot high waterfalls to keep persevering up the river to their home. He writes, “The salmon offer us a way to face truth without shutting down. They show us how leaning into our experience, though we don’t like the hit, moves us on.”

Exactly how do the salmon, these amazing creatures of sea and stream, do this? Without legs, arms, even wings, they leap out of the water, and yep, jump, JUMP! upriver. It sounds improbable on paper, but when we bring physics into the equation, it is absolutely possible. And because it is in their nature, part of their necessary journey that is aligned with what they are, they know how to do it, and must do it to thrive generation after generation. Working with currents, they turn their body, specifically their underside, back into the current and let it hit them – in other words, facing it directly, so that it will propel them out and forward further up stream. The physics is simple when we understand what they are doing. The key is, the salmon have to DO something. They have to face what most would think to be something to avoid in order to move forward toward their desired destination.

How does this apply to humans? If we choose to grow, to heal, to evolve, we will have to face situations that appear frightening, scary, or impossible to overcome. We have to do this because the only way to change our current reality (in the case of the salmon, staying in the ocean and dying without spawning) is to do something differently. And, let’s be honest with ourselves, if it were easy, we would have done it already. Take for example someone who longs to visit a particular country that is only reachable by plane travel. If they fear flying, their dream literally sits on the other side of an obstacle they fear. This is not to say the first flight to overcome their fears will be easy, nor absent of anxiety until the wheels touch the ground safely at their desired location, but it means, the only way to experience the change we seek is to face what we fear.

This isn’t to say that the entire road to change and evolution will be marred with difficulty. It won’t be. But once we understand that significant currents that appear to be pushing against us, may actually be there to help us progress, our path forward becomes clear. Now, we need to choose to face it. Each time we do, our fear of facing what needs our attention lessens, our confidence gradually strengthens, and we see our lives evolve in the direction of our intentions, hopes, and dreams being realized.

Let me leave you with this truth: Often it has been the case along my own life journey, beginning as a young girl who had to garner up the courage to do things that I feared were impossible, but with the encouragement of my parents established the reputation of being kind, honest and trustworthy and now into my adult years has lead to a life that has continued to amaze me with all that is possible if only I choose to be brave that the very thing I feared was at its most frightening in my mind, not in reality.

Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t always simple, but it was 99.9% of the time less daunting and less horrible than my Lizard mind had me believe it would be every time I imagined what facing my fear would be like. This fictionalized horrific moment created by the Lizard mind is an untrained mind’s way of thinking that it is keeping us safe. What it really does is keep us stuck. When we understand why it is doing this, we can acknowledge its apprehension and demonstrate through the action of facing our fears that its holding us back is misguided, even if well-intentioned.

So today, what is the obstacle, the current, you are fearing is the one thing you cannot overcome, you cannot leap above and over and onto the other side? Be as clear and concrete as you can with yourself, frank, honest about what you think you cannot do and that is standing in your way of growth, healing or evolving into a life that you have envisioned. Then, garner up the courage and face it. Not only will you survive it, but you will learn an abundance about the wild imagination that can work against us as much as it can work for us. Become clear about in which scenario it is helpful to trust your imagination, and you will begin to set yourself free.

Have a wonderful week, and thank you for stopping by to begin it inspired to live your life fully and sincerely.

~Explore TSLL’s Contentment Masterclass: view the detailed syllabus, read student reviews, watch the trailer and discover who this course was designed for.

SIMILAR POSTS YOU MIGHT ENJOY