Feelings can be a bit of a "fickle mistress." They can also be at times our own worst enemy.
Feelings tend to get categorized as either good or bad, which can be slightly misguided, given specific situations.
How many of us label feelings such as fear, anger and sadness as bad or negative ones, while labelling others, like joy and excitement as good or positive. But for example, isn't a feeling of fear that tells us to "get the hell out of there" a good thing in that case? We've labelled or categorized the feeling of fear as bad when it was actually a good thing.
You see, feelings can be that weird "fickle mistress."
The reality is that feelings are neither good nor bad; feelings just are.
Emotions are part of your life and to deny them is to deny a part of ourselves.
Let's continue.
This would be just about the last place to find an abandoned fishing skiff stuffed with buoys.
Now, not having extensive experience in abandoned boat finding, I would assume old boats would be more than likely found around a fishing harbour, a marina, some local boat works place, or out in the back forty of a favourite Uncle's farm. You know, behind the utility shed where Auntie Mae isn't likely to look.
This little darling, however, was found in a laneway just off Highway 311 in Prince Edward Island. Several years ago(2017 to be specific), we were on our way to hike Boughton Island; got lost(not lost in as much as misdirected by technology) and needed to turn around... and there it was.
Lynn felt that this little abandoned beauty needed to be included as part of our trip back then, so she jumped out of the car and snapped a couple of quick pictures. And that was it.
Abandoned, but now preserved on film. Well, at least digitally.
Nevertheless, what is the story or history this little fishing boat could tell if it could talk? What adventures did it have over its lifetime plying the waters surrounding Prince Edward Island? Was it handed down from grandfather to father and finally to son? How many rough days on the ocean did it have, trusting it would deliver the day's catch and its owners back to the harbour and their families safely?
Who knows?
Much like this tiny fishing skiff, there are those days we may feel abandoned, discarded and worn out from life. And for sure, life can wear you out - if you let it.
I'm beginning to wonder if the problem here is feeling abandoned.
Feelings can be a fickle part of living. I wrote recently that sometimes feelings can take us to places that aren't at times rooted in a strong sense of reality. Feelings are wonderful things, whether they be good or bad and are part of what makes us who we are.
But sometimes they are just that - feelings.
So, maybe we're not really abandoned, but we feel that way for some reason.
I am and perhaps many of you are as well, our own worst enemy at times.
We feel sorry for ourselves when there is no need to. We work harder than ever expending buckets of energy to have the world revolve around us, forgetting that it also revolves around others as well. We start comparing our accomplishments to those of others with some arbitrary measuring stick, feeling that we're not good enough and the list goes on and on.
Then there is that day or those days when we wake up feeling like the world has abandoned us. Just like our little fishing boat, abandoned at the end of a laneway in rural Prince Edward Island. The problem is, though the world is still doing what it does - perhaps on those mornings, the real problem is us. We just wake up feeling that way.
And do you know what the funny thing is? How do we really know that little boat has been abandoned? We feel it's been abandoned by the story the picture provides. I only said it was on a laneway that we drove into to get turned around. This could have been a long driveway to a very expensive home with manicured lawns and gardens. Perhaps our little fishing boat is a piece of very expensive art commissioned as an entry piece to the property.
Maybe it isn't or has never been abandoned by anyone.
Perhaps it only feels abandoned(assuming fishing boats have feelings). Maybe it's been comparing itself to those big fishing trawlers and lobster boats when in reality our little fishing boat was the one thing that gave a father the means to provide for his family. Maybe over its career, our little boat helped that family send a child off to college or university. Perhaps our little boat is the only bit of history that remains that ties a family together.
Feelings are part of what makes us who we are. But, they can be just that - a feeling that may not be rooted in reality and that can take us somewhere we don't want or need to be.
How we feel and why we feel in a particular way, especially when the feeling is negative can be difficult to get a handle on. Feelings are woven into and a complex part of the tight weave of living and life that we are at any particular point in time.
But that feeling may just that a feeling and not representative of where we really are at. Even not giving it much of a try, we can find plenty of people to hold us down and keep us back from being all we were created to be. You and I don't need to be one of them.
Given that, today might be the day to stop being our own worst enemy.
How do you deal with feelings that may take you to a place which is not the reality you're in?
Something to think about!
--as always with love--
--- get outdoors; find inspiration; discover yourself ---
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