I grew up in Florida going to Florida beaches. What I loved most was to boogie board or body surf. The principles were the same. When a large wave starts to head toward shore, then turn toward shore and start paddling fast. Hopefully, the wave will pick you up on the way to the shore and you’ll get a fun ride. You might call this, “Go with the flow” and not resisting. An opposite way would be to get upset that waves come at the beach and to turn toward the waves and scream and hit them. The waves would still come regardless of either method. Wouldn’t you agree?
I have discovered that much unhappiness in life comes from resisting the things that come our way. Just like waves, we can get upset about trials in our lives. We can throw a tantrum that trials come our way or we can realize trials come in life and choose our response. A positive way is to choose to accept. Eckhart Tolle said "Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it. Work with it, not against it.” I wrote on my bathroom mirror recently: “Accept. Don’t resist!” as a reminder to myself.
I admit that I’m a trekkie. Whenever I heard the enemy “Borg” say “Resistance is futile,” I twinged. But if the Borg were trials in my life, perhaps they were being kind to tell me that resistance doesn’t help. This is still one of my favorite quotes by Eckhart Tolle: “When you accept what is, every moment is the best moment. That is enlightenment.”
We can either surf our way through life on a wild ride or resist any trials, which only make us stronger anyway. (This is not meant to make light of people who suffer.) I read some surfer lingo on http://www.riptionary.com/ that said: “A spiritual place when everything seems to be in synch...the wave, the surfer and the board are one entity. When a surfer achieves this he's said to have the...glide.” This sounds like enlightenment to me. Let’s pull out our surf boards and glide our way through life.
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