Sometimes, when your feet are firmly embedded in the soft sand, the ripples can feel like a tickle or stroke. You and the wave, moving almost imperceptibly together.

Sometimes, when you can see a big one coming, you have time (and forethought) to duck down, so that the turbulence passes right over your head, and you stay intact, in the embrace of stillness.

But sometimes, you don’t see it coming, or it’s bigger than you can handle, and in a flash of uncertainty – run, duck, hide? – you barely have time to figure out the right thing to do.

When it comes at you like a torrent, resistance is futile. As useful as running full speed into the side of a building.

If you can open to the full force of it, the moment may turn from terror and chaos to surrender and grace. Open your arms, soften your binds, and let yourself be pushed, pulled, flung and thrown. Feel the enormity of it, then let yourself be taken.

You may be filled, not only with the sting of salt water up your nose and down your throat, but with the reinforcement of your own okay-ness.

The forces that tumbled you about are the same ones that will stand you up again. It’s the struggle that keeps you twisting and turning longer than you need to.

Will you let yourself be carried, tossed and scrubbed clean? Can you be patient (and trust) until the Universe inevitably places you back on your feet?

Want to listen instead of read? I’ve created an audio of this piece, just for you. Take a listen, won’t you?

https://soundcloud.com/pascale-kavanagh/small-waves-big-waves-tsunamis

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