Imagine you are standing on a small rock overlooking the ocean below. The surface of the water is moving. You can see lots of rippled waves and various currents shifting about as the wind whips up the sea.
You are an experienced diver and so you get into position – ready to enter the inviting, cool blue liquid below. You pause for a moment to tune in to the subtle cues of nature around you. Having grounded yourself in this settled state of awareness you are ready to move forward. Your feet are evenly balanced, your body is poised, you are facing the water below, your breathing calms and then you take a longer, fuller inhalation. You are ready. Immediately you jump.
As you enter the ocean, very quickly the surface level agitation and movement is left behind and the water becomes more settled. With every metre that you descend into the depths, the water changes. You take in your new surroundings. You tune in to the currents and the force of the water. Adjustments are made and you move forward fearlessly.
Analogies are helpful because they give us a model that we are familiar with to explain or highlight some new aspect of knowledge that we want to develop or explore. Diving into water is a very good analogy for how to take action in life. It has all the ingredients of what is required to let go and take the next step.
Let’s look at each of these stages:
Be established in Being
The strength of any action will be dependent on how aware you are. How conscious are you of what is going on around you? How awake are you to what is required in that moment? How alert are you to the changing Laws of Nature? The more aware you are of yourself and your environment, the more successful your actions will be. It is a fact. This is what meditation does for us. It pulls the mind back to the source of thinking, pure consciousness, so it becomes infused with energy and creative potential. From a state of strength, balance and clarity we can then launch into whatever is next. Otherwise the mind will be weak and we will end the day feeling strained and tired.
Have a view of where you are headed
No action can be performed successfully without having a clear result in sight. Have an idea of where you are headed. What are you doing? What are you aiming for? Without this the action will be undirected and without power.
Make the necessary preparations
Do what needs to be done in order to get moving… and then get moving. The trick is to not get caught in over-preparing to the point that we miss the window of opportunity for moving forward. You will never be able to prepare for every possible eventuality of a particular action. You will not even be able to work out what all the possible eventualities might be – no matter how sharp your intellect is.
Don’t get caught in over thinking. This simply gets in the way of action. It creates delays, opportunities are missed when we dilly-dally. Do what is needed to get you going and then go.
Let go and leap
The key to leaping is to let go. If you watch a diver who mucks up a dive it is most often because they get this bit wrong. They have settled down, done their prep and then they fail to let go. Instead they hesitate by holding on, trying to control every step of the way – the result is always full of friction and imbalance. The key to right action is to do less and accomplish more. Maximum success will come when we learn to attune ourselves with nature and then let nature take care of the details. Action that is in accord with the laws of nature will be strong.
Land and look about
Having leapt then land and look about. What has changed? What is nature up to right now? In this new situation, with this new information, what adjustments need to be made? Perhaps my goal needs to shift? Perhaps I need to change my course? Maybe I need to exert more effort in a certain area? Maybe I need to pull back and get more information? When we act, we gain – we gain new information, new possibilities, fresh perspectives.
And then what does this ask of us?
1. Be established in Being…
2. Have a view of where you are headed…
3. Make the necessary preparations…
4. Let go and leap…
5. Land and look about…
And then leap again!
