Starfish – Doing What You Can

Today, I’d like to share a story with you that I’ve spoken of before but would like to bring back. Once, there was a big storm over the ocean, and its waves left many starfish stuck on the beach. A man walking along the beach noticed a woman picking up starfish and throwing them back into the water. As he approached her, he asked what she was doing. She replied, “It’s low tide, and as the sun rises, unless I throw them back into the water, all of these starfish will die.” The man looked down the miles of beach at all of the starfish and incredulously remarked, “There must be tens of thousands, though! How could you possibly hope to make a difference?” The young woman knelt down, picked up another starfish, and threw it in the ocean. She smiled and said, “It made a difference to that one.”

Sometimes we become overwhelmed by life’s problems. Sometimes life just sucks. We are the starfish stuck on the beach, hoping to be thrown back into the water, and we are also the man walking on the beach thinking there’s no way we can make a difference. A wise man once said embrace the suck, but sometimes all we can do is sit in the midst of it. There’s not always something we can do.

I can’t tell you things will be ok although I hope they will be. There are times when things just don’t work out for us. In hindsight, we may be able to find a nugget of wisdom, but when we’re in the thick of it, it can be tough to see the light, and the experience feels downright horrible. I’m with you on the days you feel like this. We all have them. Days where we don’t know who we are, what we’re doing, or if there is any real security in life.

It can be near impossible to throw on a smile those days when all we want to do is crawl back under the covers and forget about everything. You’re not alone here either. We’ve all felt this at one point or another, but look at you. You’re still standing. You’re still here.

And maybe that’s the whole point of all of this. Maybe, as cheesy as it sounds, it’s about how we stand back up on these days and do what we can, even if that is just making it through. Maybe that’s all that’s required of us. But even in these darkest depths, we find a glimmer of hope for ourselves, this world, and life itself. We can feel a sense of gratitude before it disappears once more.

Gratitude is something unique. It’s something we can both stumble upon and create. It’s something that gives us hope and makes us long for something else. It brings us to the present but also teleports us through time, to the past, and the future. It is a passenger on our journey through life, and without us, it couldn’t exist. It can’t be described, only felt.

Gratitude is a form of active love for people, things and the memories they invoke, and the beauty of this world in its perfectly imperfect ways. The days in which all we do is stand back up are built on this. It is the hope for something better that we find the strength to get back up. These aren’t easy days. It is loving life for everything it offers us. It gives us hope, and it can also twist it into despair. We can experience passion and lethargy, excitement and boredom, love and hate. But maybe, one wouldn’t be possible without the other. Without the cold, we wouldn’t know warmth.

I’ve noticed the only thing we can do is be grateful for what we have. Sometimes we forget what it is that we have. Our wealth, whether that is security, money, family, love, or anything else, can sometimes feel like not enough. We see others with more and lose perspective of what we possess. But Marcus Aurelius once said, “Don’t be envious of wealth. Think of what you do have and how jealous you would be of what you had if you have even less.” What would you be jealous of in your own life? Is it a loving family? Is it a roof over your head? Is it time spent doing what you love? Is it passion, excitement, safety? There is no wrong answer because we are all wealthy in one way or another. Life is often about perspective regardless of the events transpiring around us. We can find light in the dark and dark in the light.

Both of the ecstasy and pains of life are impermanent. Time marches one, and this too shall pass. Life is not about clinging to one or the other. Maybe all we can do on some days is be grateful for what we have and know that it’s ok for the rest to suck. There’s no wrong way of looking at this. But in accepting life’s lows, we can also be present in its highs. And maybe, that’s the beauty of life. Maybe that’s what’s so imperfectly perfect about everything. That the Yin and Yang of life are what makes it so rich, some days suck, but others, others are truly magnificent. Those days will come too.

I don’t have any answers. In fact, I’ve found the older I get, the more I understand how few I have. But this could be what makes life so real. We don’t know anything. We don’t know the next step we are supposed to take. We don’t know if we’re on the right path. We don’t even know if we’ll be here tomorrow. I sure hope I am, and each day I’m here, I’ll do my best to throw a starfish or two back into the ocean, to leave an impact on the people around me, and help the world little by little. The world has a lot of maybe’s and I don’t know’s. It’s ok. It’s ok not to know what the hell is going on. We’re right there with you. It’s all ok.

My prayers go out to everyone in Ukraine. For those of us fortunate to be in a place with no bombs being dropped, let’s be grateful for what we do have, for those who are in our lives. They are what make life so worth living. They are what get us through the tough days and celebrate with us on our mountains. Let’s do what we can in this life. It sure can feel lonely at times, so don’t forget to bring each other along. We’ll make it.

We are not just the starfish and the man on the beach. We are also the woman throwing them back. I read somewhere that “Too many people spend their lives being dutiful descendants instead of good ancestors. The responsibility of each phase is not to please their predecessors. It’s to improve things for their offspring. It’s more important to make your children proud than your parents proud.” It doesn’t matter what you’ve come from. You can make an impact. It doesn’t matter what is going on around the world when you try to make a difference where you can – right here.

Life’s not always going to be sunshine and rainbows. And that’s ok. But what we can do is be grateful for what you have and stand tall in the face of the rest. Somedays, all that is required of you is just to stand back up. In others, you’ll be able to step up for them. We can lean on and support each other. You can change the world, even if it’s just for one person. You can make a difference for one starfish. You being here make’s a difference. And that will always be more than enough.

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